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U N I O N

WITH

OUR LORD JESUS CHIRST.

U NION

Our Lord Jesus Christ

REV. FR. JOHN BAPTIST SAINT -JURE,
Of the Society of Jesus.

Translation Revised by a Father of the sa?ne Society.

Paradisum habemux multo meliorem et longe delectahiliorem guam primi parentes
hnhuerunt, et pwadisus noster Christus Dominus est. — St. Bernard, Serm. I., in
Xativ. Doni.

we a paradise much better and more delightful than our first par-
- paradise is our Lord Jesus Christ.

4R

NEW YORK : . - J v

: J. SADLIER & CO., 31 BARCLAY STREET.
Montreal : No. 275 Notre-Dame Street.
1876.

op CfiweiuMg

WASHINGTON

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S76. by

D. & J. SADLIEIt & CO.,

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.

Stereotyped by VINCENT DILL,

2j and 27 New Chambers St., N. Y.

APPROBATION.

PREFACE TO THE FRENCH EDITION.

The Rev. Fr. John Baptist Saint-Jure,
author of the book we present to the public,
is too renowned for his learning and holiness
of life to need any eulogium from us. The
greater number of the works that gave him
so distinguished a rank among the grand
ascetic writers of the seventeenth century,
are still in the hands of pious persons ; and
for more than two hundred years "The Know-
ledge and Love of Our Lord Jesus Christ"
" The Book of the Elect ; or, Jesus Crucified"
" The Master ; or, Jesus Teaching Men" have
not ceased to produce in the Church most
abundant fruits of sanctity.

It is therefore with reason that we are sur-
prised to see forgotten during this long period,
one of the most excellent of the works of this
apostolic man. The " Union with our Lord

viii Preface to the French Edition.

Jesus Christ in His Principal Mysteries " is
in our day almost entirely unknown. The
Catalogue of Writers of the Society of Jesus
has not even given its title, and it seems to
have escaped the researches of those editors
who for some years past have been so zealous
in reproducing the other works of the same
author.

The edition that we now reprint in English
appeared but a few months after the death
of Father Saint-Jure. Unlike the preceding
editions, it bears his name, and it contains
some new matter on the union of the soul
with our Lord by charity. It is, as it were, a
spiritual testament of the holy man wherein
he seems anxious to declare for a last time,
that admirable doctrine on the love of Jesus
Christ which during his long career he never
wearied of teaching.

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

This short work of Father Saint-Jure
which we present to the public is peculiar
in its character. It is a book suggestive of
matter for reflection and meditation rather
than one intended for mere spiritual reading.
Consequently it appears suited particularly
to persons who are trying earnestly to ad-
vance in the practice and acquisition of the
Christian virtues and the imitation of our
Lord. To such persons we humbly recom-
mend it, begging their prayers for

The Translator.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

Preface to the French Edition vii

Translator's Preface ix

CHAPTER I.

On the Mysteries of Our Lord Jesus Christ 13

CHAPTER II.

Jesus Christ is the Spiritual Air that we ought Constantly to

to Breathe 38

CHAPTER III.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Season

of Advent 55

CHAPTER IV.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ from Christ-
mas to Lent 87

CHAPTER V.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Season

of Lent 138

xii Contents,

CHAPTER VI.

PAGE

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ from Easter

to the Feast of the Blessed Sacrament 300

CHAPTER VII.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Mystery
of the Eucharist from the Feast of the Blessed Sacra-
ment to the Month of August 343

CHAPTER VIII.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Month

of August, by the Virtue of Faith 395

CHAPTER IX.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Month

of September, by the Virtue of Hope 408

CHAPTER X.

Practice of Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ for the Months
of October and November until Advent, by the Virtue
of Charity 42 1

UNION

OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.

CHAPTER I.

OX THE MYSTERIES OF OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST.

Our. predestination and salvation depend
absolutely on our union with our Lord Jesus
Christ, since, as the Prince of the Apostles
tells us, there is no salvation out of Jesus
Christ, and God has given to men under hea-
ven or in the whole universe no other name by
which they can be saved. " Neither is there
salvation in any other. For there is no other
name under heaven given to men, whereby we
must be saved." (Acts iv. 12.) And our Lord,
speaking of himself, assures us that everything
in heaven or on earth is subject to his power,
and that God, his Father, has placed all things
at his disposal. " All power is given to me in

2

14 Mysteries of Our Lord.

heaven and on earth." (Matt, xxviii. 18.)
" The Father has given him all things into his
hands." (John xiii. 3.) We must from this
draw two important conclusions which we
ought never to forget, but rather should recall
each moment of our lives, and should, as it
were, write everywhere in large characters,
even with the golden rays of the sun, if this
were possible. These conclusions are that we
have a continual and inexplicable need of
Jesus Christ for all that concerns our salvation,
and that, consequently, we should exert all
our efforts to unite ourselves intimately and
inseparably with him.

Now this union is formed, practiced, and ren-
dered perfect by sanctifying grace ; by acts of
the virtues, in particular of the virtues of Faith,
Hope, and Charity; by the worthy reception
of the sacred body of Jesus Christ in the
Blessed Sacrament, which, for this reason, is
called Communion ; by desires, by petitions,
but chiefly by imitation of our Lord, which
produces his likeness in us.

Inasmuch as it is in this likeness that the
entire secret of our predestination and salva-
tion consists, so he who bears it will infallibly
be predestined and saved. The nearer we
approach our Lord, the more we resemble

Mystei'ies of Our Lord. 15

him, the more signs of predestination and sal-
vation, the greater number of tokens of eter-
nal happiness we shall possess. "Whom he
foreknew," says the celebrated passage of St.
Paul, "he also predestinated to be made
conformable to the image of his Son : that
he might be the first-born amongst many
brethren." (Rom. viii. 29.)

" Behold," says St. Chrysostom, " the height
of glory to which God raises thee, making thee
by grace what his only Son is by nature, and
calling thee from dust and ashes to the honor
of being his brother. But to bring this to pass
thou must resemble him ; because those for
whom God has from all eternity stored up
special favors and whom he has looked upon
with particular kindness, he has predestined to
be one day like to his son in heaven, provided
they be like him here on earth.

For this reason the Holy Spirit, speaking by
the prophet Aggeus, gives to the Son of God
a very significative and remarkable name,
calling him the seal which the Father uses to
mark his elect. " I will make thee as a signet,
for I have chosen thee." (Agg. ii. 24.) Our
Lord is the seal with which God signs all the
predestinate ; he impresses it upon them, and
they must all be marked with it, for it alone

1 6 Mysteries of Our Lord.

confirms them in their high estate and in their
sovereign glory.

Thus St. Paul, writing to the faithful of the
church of Ephesus, tells them that they are
marked with Jesus Christ and bear his like-
ness. "In Christ you were signed." (Ephes.
i. 13.) And St. John saw twelve thousand of
every tribe of the children of Israel who were
marked in the same manner. "There were
twelve thousand signed." (Apoc. vii. 5.) He
says that on the contrary the reprobate bear
the mark of the beast, that is of Antichrist or
the devil, and that it is engraved and stamped
upon them.

It is, then, this mark and likeness which
makes us adopted children of God, and assures
our salvation. The noblest of God's designs,
and the greatest work that he performs in
heaven or on earth, is to form and represent
his Son Jesus Christ in us.

The first and most sublime production of
God the Father is the production of his Word
in himself by eternal generation ; the second
is the production of his Word incarnate out of
himself, in the most pure womb of the ever
Blessed Virgin by the incarnation ; and the
third is the production of it in us by justifica-
tion. The production of the Word in the

Mysteries of Our Lord. ij

bosom of the Father is the glory of the Father ;
the production of the Word incarnate in the
womb of the Virgin is the glory of his Mother ;
and the production of Jesus Christ in us is our
glory, our salvation, and the most perfect dis-
position in which we can be to procure great
honor to God. Therefore God, anxious for
his honor and our salvation, ardently desires
this representation of Jesus Christ in us, and
acts continually in a thousand manners to
produce it.

■ The Father, moreover, desires it, because,
knowing that his Son humbled and annihilated
himself for his glory, he wills that as a recom-
pense he be exalted, and be made as it were,
to exist in a glorious manner in us and in all
things ; for as he loves him solely he wishes to
behold him everywhere, and to have no other
object on which to look with complacency.
The Son also desires it, so that his sufferings
may not be in vain, and his designs may not
remain unaccomplished ; the Holy Ghost, de-
sires it, he who, having formed our Lord Jesus
Christ in the womb of the Blessed Virgin, is
constantly occupied, by means of the lights,
inspirations, and assistance he gives in forming
him morally in us, so that we may manifest
him to the whole universe, expressed and

1 8 Mysteries of Our Lord.

represented in our interior, our exterior, and
all our actions.

Again, the Church, our mother, exerts all
her efforts for no other object than to perfect
in us the image of Jesus Christ, and to make
-us like unto him ; and when she sees that we
do not resemble him, she says, with St. Paul :
"My little children, of whom I am in labor
again until Christ be formed in you," (Gal. iv.
19,) who formerly bore gloriously the image
of Jesus Christ, your Father and my Spouse,
and who were very like to him in the purity
of your lives, now that the irregularity of your
conduct has effaced from your souls the features
of that divine likeness, I am constrained to
conceive and bring you forth anew to Jesus
Christ, to retrace his features in you until you
resemble him perfectly. Behold whither all the
designs of God and of the Church tend, to
making us like Jesus Christ — and behold also
what should be the object of all our own
intentions and efforts.

To accomplish this object we should, as it
were, bind and unite ourselves to his mysteries,
because his mysteries are his principal actions,
and, what is more, they are nothing else but
himself; for the incarnation, the nativity, the
passion, the death, and the resurrection of our

Mysteries of Our Lord. 19

Lord, are our Lord incarnate,' newly born,
suffering, dying, and risen. Hence to bind
and unite ourselves -to his mysteries is to bind
and unite ourselves to him, and by that bind-
ing and that union to put on his likeness.

Our Lord desires to continue and fulfill in
us, as in his members whom he would sanctify
and save, all those mysteries which are the
sources of our sanctification and salvation.
Thus he desires to express and consummate
in us his incarnation, his birth, his passion, his
death, his resurrection and ascension, becoming
in a certain manner again incarnate in us,
being born in our souls, and enabling us to
reproduce the characteristics of these mysteries
and to practice the virtues he practiced in
them. So what St. Paul says, namely, that
he filled up those things that were wanting to
the sufferings of Christ, in his flesh (Coloss. i.
24) in a general way, must also be understood
of Christ's incarnation, his nativity, and all his
other mysteries ; it is necessary for us, if we
would be saved, to fill up what is wanting in
these mysteries, not in our Lord, in whom
they were accomplished to the last degree,
and who on his part did all that was requisite,
but in us, who as his members and images are

20 Mysteries of Our Lord.

bound to reproduce them according to our
capacity.

Hence we must unite ourselves most care-
fully to all our Lord's mysteries, yet the
greater part of Christians fail to do this. This
neglect causes St. Bernard to say : " There
are Christians to whom Jesus Christ is not yet
born ; there are others for whom he has not
yet suffered ; others for whom he has never
risen ; and others still for whom he has not
ascended to heaven." (Serm. 4, de Resurr.)
And then the saint gives the reason : it is
because these Christians have not united them-
selves to these mysteries, have not been
assimilated to them, and have not reproduced
the virtues our Lord practiced in them.

In order not to incur this reproach, which
would not only bring us confusion, but would
entail upon us a great loss, we should enter
into the mysteries of our Lord, considering
that they are the sources of our supernatural
life, and the fountains of living waters of which
Isaiah said : " You shall draw waters with joy
out of the Saviour's fountains." (Is. xii. 3.)
You shall joyfully draw the salutary waters of
grace from the fountains of the Saviour ; that
is, from his mysteries, so that we may repeat
with St. Paul : "We all, beholding the glory

Mysteries of Our Lord. 21

of the Lord with open face, are transformed
into the same image from glory to glory, as by
the Spirit of the Lord." (2 Cor. iii. 18.) We,
who are true Christians, consider the glory of
our Lord, that is to say his mysteries, not
timidly, nor with shame at the lowliness and
meanness that appear on the exterior of some
of them, but with a steady countenance and
a resolute eye, deeming them all glorious, and
so much the more so in proportion as they are
more covered with infamy and dishonor for
our salvation. We present ourselves before
these divine mysteries as before clear and
bright mirrors, and their rays fall upon us,
transforming us into their likeness ; thus,
moved and impelled by the Holy Ghost, we
go on from light to light — I mean from mystery
to mystery — from our Lord's incarnation to his
nativity, then to his circumcision, and so on to
his other mysteries, in order to draw from each
new traits of resemblance to Jesus Christ him-
self in our soul and body and in our whole
being.

Xow, it must be remarked that each of our
Lord's mysteries is composed of two parts :
the first is the body and exterior of the
mystery, the second is its interior and spirit.
The body and exterior is all in the mystery

22 Mysteries of Our Lord.

that appeals to the senses : as in the nativity,
the poverty, contempt, nakedness, cold, the
manger, etc.; in the passion, the scourges, the
thorns, the nails, the insults ; in the resurrec-
tion, the coming forth from the tomb completely
victorious over death, the brightness, beauty,
agility, subtilty, and immortality of his sacred
body ; and the same with regard to the other
mysteries.

The spirit and interior of the mystery is
what passed in our Lord's soul while he
accomplished^ it; first, the thoughts of his
understanding with regard to God his Father,
his holy Mother, his elect, all men, and every
soul in particular ; secondly, the affections of
his will ; thirdly, the intentions and designs
he had in accomplishing the mystery, both for
the glory of his Father and for our salvation ;
fourthly, the virtues he practiced in it, the
humility, poverty, obedience, and the like;
and finally, the grace he merited for us by
those thoughts, affections, intentions and
virtues, to have in a certain proportion the
same thoughts, affections, and intentions, and
to practice the same virtues in the same
mystery, which is properly to enter into the
spirit and assume the features and coloring of
the mystery. For we are bound to believe

Mystei'ies of Our Lord. 23

that as our Lord is the Saviour and pattern of
men, he has merited for them by his operations
in each of his mysteries, the assistance neces-
sary to enable them to imitate those opera-
tions, and consequently to resemble him, and
by that resemblance to make certain their
predestination and eternal salvation.

It must be understood, moreover, that each
mystery has its own spirit and character, that
each is filled with a special grace and produces
a particular impression, and that our Lord had
in each different intentions for the glory of his
Father and our sanctification, and thus different
modes of preparing us for our beatitude. Just
as the material sun produces different effects
as he moves along his course and accomplishes
his annual revolution, so when the Sun of
Justice, our Lord, is in the mystery of his
incarnation and thence casts his rays upon
us, he produces effects of grace and other
impressions of salvation, different from what
he does when he is in the mystery of his birth
or of his resurrection. Each mystery has its
own light and warmth, its ideas and sentiments,
its affections and virtues ; these constitute the
particular spirit of the mystery, its principle,
its soul, so to speak, and consequently they

24 Mysteries of Oil}' Lord.

are what we should especially endeavor to
understand and to imprint in our souls.

We should not, meanwhile, forget the body
and exterior of the mystery, for he who would
desire to imitate only its interior and spirit
would assuredly deceive himself, and would be
like a person seeking a man and then content-
ing himself with only a soul ; for just as a man
is not a soul alone, nor a body alone, but a
soul and body joined and united, so our Lord's
mysteries are composed of the union of the
interior and exterior, and not of the one
without the other. Moreover, the exterior of
the mystery serves to dispose and prepare us
to receive and appreciate the interior, and
therefore should be studied first ; for, even
as God does not create the soul of man until
his body be formed and organized to a certain
point, so our Lord does not produce the spirit'
and interior ; that is to say, the thoughts,
affections, and fruits of his incarnation, his
nativity, or his passion, in a man who is not
first prepared by the exterior acts of those
mysteries.

It is, then, necessary for whosoever would
share in the grace, and receive the spirit of a
mystery, for example, our Lord's nativity, to
prepare himself by some act of poverty, by some

Mysteries of Our Lord. 25

endurance of cold or discomfort ; for he who
would expect to profit by this mystery while
retaining an affection for riches and pleasures,,
would grossly deceive himself, and would
resemble a person turning his back to the
place to which he desires to go ; and this
because the disposition of him who desires
something must always have some conformity
to the object of his desire.

As our Lord's mysteries are the vital princi-
ples and causes of our salvation, it is necessary,
if we would be saved, that they be applied to
us and in some sort renewed in us. As it is^
not enough for our salvation that we rise and
ascend into heaven in the person of our Lord,
who contained us all in himself by grace and
by glory, if we do not also in our own persons
rise and ascend into heaven ; so it is not
sufficient that we be incarnate, that Ave be
born, and that we suffer and die in him, if we
do not likewise accomplish these acts after
his example in ourselves, because the imitation;
and re-accomplishment of these last mysteries
in us is the road to the glory of the first. In;
the great mystery of our fall, and in conse-
quence of our sad condemnation, not only wTe
all once sinned in Adam, as St. Paul says, and

were all driven from Paradise and died in him,
3

26 Mysteries of Our Lord.

but, moreover, we are individually stained
with sin, we are banished from that place of
:happiness, and we are subjected to the rigor-
ous sentence of death. Our Lord's mysteries,
the painful and the joyous, the ignominious
and the glorious, must be renewed in us indi-
vidually, their likeness must be impressed
upon, and their effects produced in, every
•individual soul.

For this reason we should take great pains
to unite ourselves with them, especially at the
times when the Church proposes them to us
'because then they have more efficacy. We
must believe that it is not without a reason
that our Lord inspires his Church to put
!before our eyes at such or such a time the
mysteries of his life, but in order that then
more than at another time he may render
them useful to us and communicate their fruits
imore abundantly. The prophet Isaiah indeed
promises us that we shall draw joyfully from
the fountains of the Saviour, which are his
'mysteries, the waters of grace, of the virtues,
and of our salvation ; but the prophet Zacha-
riah adds that this shall be on a certain day :
" In that day," he says, " there shall be a foun-
tain open to the house of David, and to the
inhabitants of Jerusalem." (Zach. xiii. I.)

Mysteries of Our Lord. 2 J

It is, then, " in that day," that is at the time
the Church directs, that the soul should draw
those salutary waters from the mysterious
fountains of the Saviour, because then they
are open and send forth their waters with full
force ; whereas at other times, if they are not
altogether closed, they are at least not so
widely open and do not pour out their streams
so abundantly. So, while the precious waters
flow plenteously, the soul should take advan-
tage of them ; and thus she may reap more
fruit in a single day than she would in six or
eight at another season, as is related of the
Blessed Mary d'Ognies in her life written by
Cardinal de Vitry.

But, as dispositions are various and the
movements of the Holy Spirit diverse, this
does not prevent there being souls that have
greater facility in entering into one mystery
than into another, and drawing more profit
from one than from another ; such souls should
stay and draw the waters of their salvation
and advancement in virtue as long as the mys-
terious fount remains open to them.

You ask me now liozv we may unite our-
selves to these mysteries of our Lord's life and
death. I reply that, granted the knowledge
faith gives us of them and which is suffi-

28 Mysteries of Our Lord.

cicnt, it is chiefly by means of the affections
and the virtues relating to them, as you will
see when we treat of each of the mysteries
separately.

We have arranged these mysteries and the
practices of the union we should contract
through them with our Lord, in the following
manner :

From Advent to Christmas the practice will
be upon the mystery of our Lord's incarnation.
■ From Christmas to Lent we will dwell upon
the nativity, the circumcision, the adoration
of the Magi, the flight into Egypt and the
dwelling there, the return to Nazareth, and
the entire hidden life of our Lord.

During the season of Lent we will study the
passion and death of our Lord.

From Easter to the feast of the Blessed
Sacrament, our Lord's resurrection and ascen-
sion, and the descent of the Holy Ghost, will
be our subjects.

From the feast of the Blessed Sacrament
till Advent we will meditate upon the most
Holy Eucharist considered as a Sacrament and
a wSacrifice ; we will endeavor to unite our-
selves to our Lord in this adorable mystery by
suitable affections, especially by faith, hope,
charity, and imitation of him.

Mysteries of Our Lord. 29

In each practice or exercise we shall always
include six things which will be its six parts
or divisions :

First, the subject-matter about which we are
to occupy ourselves, that is, the mystery pro-
posed for our consideration and practice. We
shall dwell especially upon the knowledge of
it given us by faith, without seeking other
lights which very often only amuse and puff
up the mind while drying up the will. Faith,
and not learning or science, converted and in-
structed the world. Believe firmly the mys-
tery just as the Church teaches it to you, and
this is enough to cause it to produce in you its
effects.

Secondly, tlie affections and interior acts
which we must conceive and form -according
to the mystery, in which the soul should care-
fully exercise itself, and keep itself, as it were,
buried during the whole season of the mystery.

Thirdly, the virtues most prominent in the
mystery and the practice of which, both inte-
rior and exterior, we should embrace with
special affection, and of which we should daily
produce with fidelity and confidence, but with-
out haste or embarrassment of spirit, a certain
number of acts in proportion to our disposition
and strength.

30 Mysteries of Our Lord.

Upon this point I have an important coun-
sel to give : some persons are afflicted, and
complain that their souls do not open to the
mysteries of -our Lord; that when the great
feasts come, then it is that they have least
devotion, that then their understanding is
more than ever darkened and they comprehend
nothing of these wonders ; their will is more
than ever arid, so that they are obliged to
remain dull and dry, as it were, at the gate of
the mystery, without power to enter into it. I
say to these persons that they should not be
troubled, and complain of this ; God does not
require of them such a sensible appreciation of
his mysteries, inasmuch as it does not depend
upon them, but is purely his gift. They would
like to have clear and beautiful thoughts, to be
filled with devout affections and to burst into
floods of pious tears, never considering that the
key to the stores of such sensible light and de-
votion is not in their hands. All that God
demands of them is that they apply them-
selves to our Lord's mysteries by an imitation
of the virtues he practiced therein, by a prac-
tical reproduction of his mysteries in their
daily lives ; this they can do with the help of
his grace, which he is always ready to give
them ; and this is the chief thing, for, as our

Mysteries of Our Lord. 31

Lord's principal object in his mysteries was to
effect our salvation and as a means to this, to
render us virtuous, the accomplishment of this
object in us by the practice of the virtues must
be their most important and most necessary
fruit.

St. Bernard, treating of the mystery of the
nativity, says-: " In order that Mary, Joseph,
and the Infant cradled in the manger may
always dwell in us, in order that we may enter
into the mystery of our Lord's nativity, and
that it may penetrate our souls, let us live in
this world soberly, justly, and piously." (Serm.
4, in Nat. Dom.) And St. Paul, speaking on
the same subject, teaches us in positive
terms the same thing — not to seek to have
grand lights nor lofty conceptions: " The
grace of God our Saviour hath appeared to all
men, instructing us that, denying ungodliness
and worldly desires, we should live soberly
and justly and piously in this world." (Tit. ii.
11.) Our Saviour Jesus Christ, with infinite
goodness and grace, has appeared as the Sun
of Justice to the eyes of all men, to dissipate
their darkness and teach them to avoid sin,
to renounce worldly desires, and to lead lives
of sobriety toward themselves, of justice
toward their neighbor, and of piety toward

32 Mysteries of Our Lord. .

God. It is, then, in this way, a way all are
capable of, that we ought to unite ourselves to
our Lord's mysteries.

Fourthly, meditations on the mysteries of
the season : these you can easily enough make
yourself from the matter contained in each
practice or exercise, dwelling upon whatever
moves you most ; or you can select them from
such books as you judge most suitable.

Fifthly, readings appropriate to each exer-
cise will be indicated, without however for-
bidding you to select others, provided they
relate to the subject.

Finally, the sixth thing will be ejacidatory
verses, which should be always in the heart and
often on the lips, in order to keep the mystery
fresh in the memory, and, by a constant recol-
lection of it, to unite us to it, and, through it,
to our Lord.

Besides all these, there are still three things
to be remarked concerning the affections :

The first is the very common and injurious
delusion of taking much more pains and em-
ploying much more time to cultivate and
polish the understanding than the will, al-
though merit, sanctity, and perfection in this
life, are not in the understanding, but in the
will. We seek only to learn, to enlighten our

Mysteries of Our Lord. 33

mind, and to add knowledge to knowledge,
and we neglect our will, which meanwhile
needs to be carefully exercised in affections of
piety and incited to the love and practice of
humility, patience, and the other virtues, most
particularly charity, wherein the perfection of
the will lies. We all know quite enough, and
much more than we practice. Who does not
know that he ought to love God with all his
heart, and ought to avoid sin above every-
thing ? And nevertheless how few there are
who do it ! The reason of this disorder is
that our mind has an extreme desire to learn,
and we naturally find much pleasure in the
acquisition of knowledge, whereas our will is
indifferent to virtue and must be constrained
to practice it, thus obliging us to do violence
to ourselves.

The second thing to be remembered is also
another illusion that possesses a vast number
of persons who in the spiritual life are gov-
erned too much by the senses ; they wish to
feel their spiritual operations, and, if they are
not sensibly touched and moved in their devo-
tional exercises, they are troubled, become
uneasy, and believe they are making no pro-
gress. To disabuse these persons, let me as-
sure them that the spiritual life is, as its name

34 Mysteries of Our Lord.

implies, a life whose vital acts take place in
the spirit, and not in the body. Material
things make sensible impressions upon the
body ; thus fire makes itself felt in the hand by
means of heat, and ice by cold. Spiritual things
do not act upon the soul in the same manner,
but insensibly, producing in it spiritual effects :
which action consists in causing it to avoid
evil and to do good, in enlightening its under-
standing with knowledge necessary for salva-
tion, in strengthening its will so as to regulate
its affections, that it may bear patiently its
aridities and all its trials, govern rightly the
movements of the body, and, in a word, prac-
tice all virtue.

If sometimes during exercises of piety the
body is penetrated with sensible consolation,
it is rather the pure effect of the grace and
unction of the Holy Ghost, than of the spirit-
ual operation of the soul.

The third thing to be remarked is, that
when you desire to obtain some virtue or
other favor from God, you should, among all
dispositions and means, make use principally
of prayer or petition, because by it you will
attain your end more speedily, more easily,
and more certainly, than by reading, medita-
tion, or other operations of the understand-

Mysteries of Our Lord. 35

ing. Therefore ask perseveringly by prayers,
sometimes long, sometimes short, but always
earnest, thus doing what our Lord and his
apostles so frequently recommended, namely,
to " pray without ceasing." (Luke xxi. 36 ;
t Thess. v. 17.)

To induce our Lord to bless your enterprise
and pour upon you through these channels of
salvation an abundance of graces, it will be
well to prepare yourself for each exercise by
Communion and some other good works.

In conclusion, I say to all who are sincerely
and earnestly desirous to be saved, that they
should before everything else endeavor to
unite themselves to their Saviour ; that, seek-
ing virtue, perfection, and God, they should
exert all their efforts ta unite themselves inti-
mately with Jesus Christ, because he is the
model of all virtues, the example of perfec-
tion, and the road by which to seek and reach
God. St? Augustine says : " We have no road
that is shorter and surer, we can conceive of
no means more efficacious to approach and
reach God, than Jesus Christ." (Aug. i.n Ps.
cxviii., Cone. 6.)

Let us, then, take great pains to unite our-
selves continually to him in everything, but

36 Mysteries of Our Lord.

chiefly in his mysteries, according to the di-
rections that will be given in this book. Cer-
tainly, as the well-being of a child depends
on its remaining at its mother's breast, whence
it draws the nourishment that makes it grow
and become strong, so we, if we would grow
in grace and become strong in virtue, must
cling to our Lord in his amiable mysteries. Let
us go to these fountains of the Saviour to draw
with faith in their truth, with deep affection
of the heart, and a desire of imitation by our
works, the waters of our salvation and beati-
tude. In the churches, sings David in pro-
phetic vision of these mysteries, " bless ye
God, the Lord, from the fountains of Israel.
There is Benjamin, a youth in ecstasy of
mind." (Ps. Ixvii. 27, 28.)

Praise and bless God for the fountains of
Israel, which are the mysteries of his Son, in
which the little Benjamin, that is, the soul,
will exercise itself in a spirit of lowliness,
simplicity, and faith, and in its exercises will
have transports of admiration, reverence, love,
humility, and other sentiments. Moses had
previously spoken under the same inspiration :
4< Benjamin, the best beloved of the Lord, shall
dwell confidently in him ; as in a bridal-cham-

Mysteries of Our Lord. 37

ber shall he rest all the day long." (Deut.
xxxiii. 12.) Benjamin, the beloved of the
Lord, shall dwell in confidence in these mys-
teries, and shall rest therein all his life long as
in a place of peace, sleep, and repose.

CHAPTER II.

JESUS CHRIST IS THE SPIRITUAL AIR THAT
WE OUGHT CONSTANTLY TO BREATHE.

Spiritiis oris nostri Christus Dominus. — Lam. i\\, 20).
The breath of our mouth, Christ the Lord.

THESE are the words of the Prophet Jere-
miah, which St. Irenseus, St. Justin, Origen,
Tertullian, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, and a
multitude of other Fathers understand to refer
literally to our Lord, to signify that he is the
breath of our nostrils and the air that \vc
-ought constantly to breathe. Among all the
things we need for our life and which we can-
not dispense with, experience shows that the
most necessary is, beyond doubt, air ; without
it we would surely and speedily die. The
necessity for air arises from the fact that our
life depends upon the preservation of the
natural heat of the blood ; this heat being
very great, requires to be constantly cooled so
that it will not extinguish itself; for heat is
extinguished by its own intensity if it is not
tempered by cool air, as is seen in fire in an
oven, which goes out directly if the mouth of

Jes?(s Christ the Spiritual Air. 39

the oven is closed, and in animals that are
stifled to death. This is the reason why respi-
ration is necessary to our life.*

The breath of our mouth, Clwist the Lord. —
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the breath of our
mouth and the air our soul should breathe.
Just as we have absolute need of the air for
the natural life of our bodies, so, and in an
incomparably greater degree, the spiritual and
divine air which is Jesus Christ, is necessary
for the supernatural life of our souls. We
would soon die without air, and to prevent
this we breathe it constantly every hour and
moment, at all times and in all places ; in like
manner we have an extreme and indispensable
need of Jesus Christ for all that concerns our
salvation, and our souls cannot without him
be for a moment alive and in a state of grace ;
therefore we must constantly draw him into
us and inhale him.

Now, with regard to the manner of inhaling
our Lord and drawing him into us, I will tell
you that there are several different ways. We
notice that the air we breathe is not always
the same ; that sometimes it is warm and some-

* The reader is reminded that this passage was written two hun-
dred years ago, when the natural sciences were not so well
understood as at the present day. — Translator.

40 Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air.

- times cold ; one day dry and the next damp ;
in one place pure and rarefied, as on the moun-
tains, and in another place, as in the valleys
and over marshes, heavy and thick ; that the
bodies of persons brought up in different at-
mospheres have different constitutions and
tendencies, and even their minds are fre-
quently affected by the same cause. In like
manner, our spiritual and divine air, that is
our Lord Jesus Christ, has different qualities in
our regard ; and we must inhale and draw him
into us according to this diversity.

First, we must inhale and draw him into us
in his characters of our Saviour, our Redeemer,
our High Priest, our Master, our Model, our
Remedy for all our evils, and our Source of all
blessings.

Secondly, we must inhale him in his virtues
and draw him into us, sometimes humble, some-
times patient, at another time obedient, then
meek, charitable, forgiving injuries done him,
or according to his practice of some other
virtue in our regard.

Thirdly, in his mysteries, we have to inhale
our Lord incarnate, or newly born, or lead-
ing a hidden life, or conversing with men, or
suffering and dying, or ascending into heaven,
or in some other mystery.

Jcs2is Christ the Spiritual Air. 41

. When we have drawn Jesus Christ into us
in these different manners, we must offer him
to God his Father with most profound respect,
with infinite thanksgivings to him for having
given his Son to us in all these states, with an
ardent zeal for the divine glory and a burning
desire that he may, under these different forms,
glorify and praise God as God merits, and that
we, on our part, may with all our strength
honor, love, and serve God in Christ and by
Christ.

The reader may ask me, moreover, what
means we must use to inhale our Lord, and
with what chains we can draw him to us. I
reply that it must be, in the first place, by acts
of faith, believing firmly two things : first, that
our Lord is truly such as his mysteries repre-
sent him, that he became incarnate, that he is
our Saviour, our Redeemer, that he is humble,
etc. ; secondly, that we have an absolute need
of him in these states, that without him there is
no salvation for us, that without him we would
be forever in bondage and misery, that with-
out him we could never have a truly humble
thought, and that we must derive from him
all the good we are capable of.

Just as anything in our body that is not
animated by our soul has no life, as our hair

42 Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air.

and nails, so all in us that our Lord, who
is our only Saviour and our true life, does not
touch, is dead and lost. If his thoughts, his
affections, his words and his works, do not
purify and sanctify ours, the latter are stained
and criminal ; if his prayers do not animate
and vivify ours, then ours are only aberrations,
indevotion, and irreverence ; if his sufferings
are not applied and united to our sufferings,
ours are useless and lost, and are no more than
evils to us ; and if his death does not commu-
nicate its merit and strength to ours, our death
will be the death of a reprobate. " If I shall
touch only his garment, I shall be healed,"
said the woman afflicted with an issue of
blood. (Matt. ix. 21.) If I can but touch
his robe I shall be healed ; without this touch
I shall never be healed, no matter what I do.
The • second thing by means of which we
must draw our Lord to us, is desires ; and the
third, petitions. For, as the lungs and heart
by their dilatation attract the air, so the soul
attracts our Lord when she opens and expands
with her desires and prayers ; whence it is
that we may say with the Royal Prophet :
" I opened my mouth and panted." (Ps.
cxviii. 131.) I opened the mouth of my
soul and drew my spiritual breath, which is

Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air. 43

our Lord, who himself by the same prophet
had commanded me, saying: "Open thy
mouth wide and I will fill it" (Ps. lxxx. 11)
with great desires. We must enkindle in our
souls ardent desires and burning wishes for
our Lord to come to us in such or such a
.aality, in this virtue, or in that particular
mystery, and we must beg him to come, pray
him, suppHcate him, conjure him with all the
earnestness possible.

Let us say to him with Isaiah : " Thy name
and thy remembrance are the desire of my
soul." (Is. xxvi. 8.) Thy name and thy mem-
ory, the memory of thy incarnation, of thy
humility, of thy character as my Saviour, is
foremost in my mind, and I desire to draw
thee to me in that state and in that beautiful
and salutary character.

"My soul hath desired thee in the night;
yea, and with my spirit within me in the
morning early I will watch to thee." (Is.
xxvi. 9.) My soul hath thought of thee during
the night ; with ardent affections it hath longed
for thee in the mystery of thy birth. My eyes
opened early in the morning to see if thou
hadst come.

" I have longed for thy salvation, O Lord.
. . My soul hath fainted after thy salvation.

44 Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air.

. . As the hart panteth after the fountains of
waters, so my soul panteth after thee, O God.
'My soul hath thirsted after the strong living
God. When shall I come and appear before
the face of God?" (Ps. cxviii. 174; xli. 1, 2.)

O my Lord, how I long for thee in the mys-
tery of thy hidden life, in thy virtue of patience,
in the functions of pastor, physician, high
priest, which thou dost exercise toward me,
and which are the sources of my salvation !
My soul faints through the vehemence of its
desire. As the hart, pursued by the hunters
and parched with thirst, runs with all '■ 3
strength to the fountains to drink, so my soul,
O my God and my risen Lord, runs to thee.
Oh ! how I thirst for Jesus Christ, my Saviour,
for my sake withdrawn into the desert, suffer-
ing for me, for me obedient even unto death,
so that he may come to me, may enter into
me, may impress upon me the features of his
virtues and his mysteries ! And wdien shall I
present myself to him marked with those noble
features ?

Again, say to our Lord with the same David :
"Thou art my helper and my protector. O my
God, be not slack." (Ps. xxxix. 18.) Thou
art my help and my protection. O my God. do
not delay thy coming. And with the Spouse

Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air. 45

in the Apocalypse : " Come. . . Amen. Come
Lord Jesus." ' (Apoc. xxii. 20.) Come, Oh !
come, Jesus my Saviour, and say to me :
"Surely I come quickly," thou shalt see me
very soon.

With St. Bernard let us repeat to him :

" Desidero te millies :
Mi Jesu, quando venies ?
O mi Jesu dulcissz/7ie,
Spes suspirantis animce ;
Te pice quaerunt lachrymcz,
Et clamor mentis intimcz"

(Bern. Jubil.)

"A thousand times I sigh for thee :
O Jesus mine, when wilt thou come ?
O Jesus mine, most sweet to me,
My panting spirit's hope and home,
In quest of thee 'mid tears and cries
My famished soul relentless flies."

Or, again : —

" yesu Christe, fous indeficiens,
Fous humana cor da reficiens ;
Te saspiro te solum sitiens,
Tit solus es mild sufficiens."

(Id. Orat. Rhythm, ad Chr. et B. V.)

"O Jesus Christ, unfailing fount of love,
O fount, the human heart's refreshing cup,
For thee I breathe, for thee alone I thirst,
For thou to me alone art all enough."

After the desires you should proceed to
prayers and supplications, most earnestly beg-
ging our Lord for two things : first, that it
may please him to come to you in this char-

46 J e sits Christ the Spiritual Air.

acter, or in that virtue, or that particular
mystery ; secondly, that he will deign to
bestow upon you the salutary effects of the
character in which you invite him to come,
that he will impart to you the knowledge,
esteem, and love he had for that special virtue,
and grant you to practice it as he did, and
that he will communicate to you the lights
and affections belonging to the mystery. Beg
him to bestow on you the spirit and grace of
that, and of all his mysteries, to apply to you
their merits, and furnish you the assistance
necessary to imitate the virtues he practiced
in them ; and in this way to impress upon you
in a manner his incarnation, his birth, his
solitary life, his conversation, his sufferings
and death, and enable you to express and
represent him incarnate, newly-born, solitary,
conversing with men, suffering, dying, and
dead, in your life and in your conduct.

This is what the Church often asks in the
holy sacrifice of the Mass, as when she says :
" Titos tantis, Domine, dignaris uti mysteriis,
qucesumus ut effectibus 110s eontm vcracitcr
aptare digneris" (Dom. 3d, post Epiph.) "We
beseech thee, O Lord, that we, to whom thou
vouchsafest the enjoyment of so great mys-
teries, may be fitted truly to receive their

Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air. 47

benefits." And again : " Ut sacri peragat
instituta mysterii, et salutare tirani in uibis
mirabiliter operetur." (Dom. 3d Adv.) "Let
the sacrifice of our devotion, we beseech thee,
O Lord, be always offered unto thee ; that it
may both accomplish this sacred mystery, and
also wonderfully work in us thy salvation."

In the fourth place, we may draw our Lord
into us in a mystery by exercising the affec-
tions which have most harmony with it, and
which we shall indicate in each division of this
book.

The fifth means of drawing our Lord to us
is the courageous and exact practice of the
virtues, which you will also find indicated.

Behold, then, what should be our continual
occupation and our mo-st cherished practice !
It is the perpetual breathing of Jesus Christ
as our spiritual air, and then the breathing or
sending him back to God his Father, to be
our mediator before the Eternal Throne, our
advocate, our refuge, our priest, and our sacri-
fice of adoration, expiation, thanksgiving and
impetration, in a word, to be our all.

In addition to what we have already men-
tioned, we should, in order to practice this
exercise still more perfectly, breathe and draw
our Lord into us in his mysteries according as

48 Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air.

the Church solemnizes them, or according as
our devotion inclines or our wants oblige us.

You should draw him into you in his virtues,
when you have occasion to practice those
virtues, or to overcome the contrary vices ;
for example, when you ought to humble your-
self, when you have to endure contempt or
conquer a sentiment of vanity and self-esteem,
inhale our Lord humble, teaching you interiorly
to what degree he humbled himself for you,
and saying to you : " Learn of me, for I am
humble of heart." When it is your duty to
obey, and to submit your will and judgment,
inhale our Lord obedient and submissive ;
he will enable you to understand his perfect
submission, and how he obeyed even unto death
and the death of the cross for love of you. Do
the same with regard to the other virtues.

But as our salvation and perfection consist
especially in two things — in acting and suffer-
ing, we should imitate our Lord in both
respects.

First, in acting. As we daily act and do
something, and as our Lord, while on earth,
did the same, we should in all our actions
breathe our Lord acting, and should do every-
thing with him, by him, and in him, in his
fashion, both as to the interior and the exterior

Jesus CJirist t/w Spiritual Air. 49

of the act, the intentions, the moderation, the
time, the place, and all other circumstances.
Just as your soul is the cause of all the actions
of your body in the natural life, our Lord,
taking the place of soul in your supernatural
and divine life, should be the cause or spring
of all the actions of both your soul and your
body ; and then you may say with St. Paul :
"I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me."
(Gal. ii. 20.) I live ; no, it is not I who live,
but it is Jesus Christ who lives, thinks, loves,
hates, speaks, and acts in me.

To act excellently toward God you must,
in the following manner, draw our Lord to you
and bind yourself to him : Our Lord was
always recollected in God, always attentive
to God, always occupied with God, keeping
himself in spirit before the Infinite Majesty
with extreme care, with singular modesty,
with most profound reverence, and with inex-
plicable abasements, humiliations, and anni-
hilations of self, uninterruptedly offering to
God for the divine glory, his soul and body, his
being, his faculties, his acts, and all that
passed in the universe. Draw our Lord into
you by conducting yourself in the sarrie man-
ner toward God, so as to do with Christ and

50 Jesus CJirist the Spiritual Air.

like him the same thing, according to your
capacity.

When you are going to pray, either mentally
cr vocally, inhale our Lord praying to his
Father ; and seeing his attention, devotion,
fervor, and respect, endeavor to imitate him in
such a way that it maybe he who prays in you
and by you.

If you have the honor to be a priest and to
say Mass, inhale him as your high priest who,
in you and by you, sacrifices himself to God
the Father for his glory and your salvation,
and offers himself and you as a sacrifice of
infinite adoration, in acknowledgment that
God is your first principle from whom you
derive your body, your soul, and all that you
have ; that he is your sovereign Lord who has
absolute power over you to do with you what-
soever he wills, without your having any right
on your part to oppose him by the least
thought, or to contradict him by the least
word ; and that he is your last end for whose
glory you were created, and for whom you
ought entirely and constantly to employ and
spend yourself. This sacrifice of the Mass is
one of infinite propitiation to obtain the par-
don of your sins and the remission of the
punishment due to them ; it is a sacrifice of

Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air, 51

infinite thanksgiving to thank God for all the
benefits with which he has loaded you ; a sac-
rifice of infinite impetration to obtain from him
fresh benefits, that is, all the assistance you
need. " As Christ says the Mass with you and
in you, say it also with him and in him.

By following this plan all the faithful, who,
according to St. Peter, (1 Petr. ii. 9) are in a
certain manner raised to the dignity of priests,
may also in some sort say Mass, drawing to
themselves our Lord who performs this action
and offers this sacrifice.

After having drawn our Lord into you in
the Mass as your priest, draw him in the
Blessed Sacrament as your Shepherd who
nourishes you with his own flesh and blood
and gives you a divine food capable of pro-
ducing in your soul, if it is well disposed, the
effects of bodily food, which will be to
strengthen it, delight it, satisfy it, unite it to
him, and cause it to sleep and consequently
to forget all creatures; who will fulfill these
words of the Wise Man: " With the bread of
life and understanding he shall feed him, and
give him the water of wholesome wisdom to
drink," (Eccl. xv. 3,) the water of the wisdom
of his salvation.

Having received our Lord, try to employ

52 Jesus Clirist the Spiritual Air.

well the precious moments, and beg this dear
Shepherd to operate in you in a high degree
all these effects.

To act in a Christian and holy manner
toward your neighbor, draw into you our
Lord, loving men, honoring, instructing, re-
proving them, bearing wTitll them, having
compassion on their spiritual and corporal
miseries, giving them remedies, conversing
with them. See him with the Samaritan
woman, and remark writh what gentleness,
affability, charity, and prudence, he deals with
her. Take courage to imitate him, breathe
him in his gracious, amiable, and most useful
discourse, in his modest and peaceful de-
meanor, in his condescension, his kindness,
and his patience, and in all the other virtues
he practiced in the highest degree during his
intercourse with men ; and study to reproduce
in your conduct and conversation these fea-
tures of perfection, these lineaments of graces.

With regard to the actions that relate to
yourself do the same : for example, when
going to take your meals, breathe our Lord
taking his, either alone or in company, and
consider his temperance, his sobriety, and his
modesty. Laboring, traveling, or performing
any other action, inhale our Lord engaged

Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air. 53

in the same, and act with him and by his
spirit, offering with the Wise Man this prayer
to God : " Send wisdom out of thy holy hea-
ven, and from the throne of thy majesty, that
she may be with me and may labor with me."
(Wis. ix. 10.) O God ! send me from on high
and from the throne of thy greatness, thy
Son, the Incarnate Wisdom, so that he may
be in me and may labor with me ; for I am
sure that without him I shall fail in everything,
and shall do naught that will be of value.

Secondly, we must imitate our Lord in suf-
fering. When you have to endure some
suffering of bouy or soul, breathe our Lord
suffering, so that he may communicate to you
his patience and fortitude, and you may, as
far as is possible, suffer with him for the same
ends and in the same manner. There are
souls that are always afflicted, and bodies that
are always sick and infirm : let these persons
as their sovereign remedy, draw into them our
Lord fastened for cheir sake to the cross and
thereon suffering inexplicable torments and
extreme agonies ; and wdien the moment of
their death approaches, that moment which
must decide their happy or unhappy eternity,
or even now, and frequently, let them take
great care to draw into them our Lord dying to

54 Jesus Christ the Spiritual Air.

console and sanctify their death by his, and
to make theirs a dependence and a consequence
of his.

Behold, then, the method we must use to
breathe our spiritual air, and to draw our Lord
into us. As this is absolutely necessary for
our salvation and our perfection, we must en-
deavor to practice it without relaxation, and,
in order to do so, can make this compact with
our Lord, namely, that each moment our body
breathes the physical air, we will have the
intention of breathing him and drawing him
into us in one or more of the ways mentioned,
or in all of them. Certainly, if our body is so
anxious and careful to breathe continually the
air for the preservation of its natural life, our
soul should be vastly more careful to breathe
unceasingly our Lord to preserve its life of
grace. Then let it do so with as much dili-
gence and fidelity as the importance of the
affair deserves.

CHAPTER III.

PRACTICE OF UNION AYITH OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST FOR THE SEASON OF ADVENT.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

THE practice of union with our Lord for the
season of Advent, has for its subject the
adorable mystery of the incarnation, and his
dwelling during the space of nine months in
the most pure womb of his holy Mother. The
mystery of the incarnation is a mystery of
union, a mystery of love, a mystery of glorifi-
cation, and a mystery of annihilation.

It is a mystery of union, because the divine
nature was in it united intimately, substan-
tially, personally, and forever, with the human
nature, and the Son of God became the Son
of man. " Verbiim caro factimi est. The word
was made flesh," (John. i. 14,) and the one
formed with the other so close a union " that,"
St. Bernard says, " God and slime, that is to
say, man made from the slime of the earth,
were joined together in the inseparable unity
of one person, and all that God did appeared
to be done by the slime, and all that the slime

56 Practice of Union with Our Lord

suffered seemed to be suffered by God in it,
though a mystery as incomprehensible as it is
inexplicable." (Serm. 2 in Vigil. Nativ.) And
earlier than St. Bernard, St. Leo had said :
" There is such a communication and so close
a union between the two natures, while each
retains inviolable its own qualities, that there
is no division of goods nor of evils between
them, but what belongs to one belongs also
to the other." (Serm. 8 in Nativ. Dom.) So
the Son of God by this union made himself, as
St. Paul says, "in all things such as we are,
without sin." (Heb. iv. 15.)

The incarnation is a mystery of love, be-
cause, as the principal and strongest inclina-
tion of the person who loves is to desire and
procure by all the means he can devise, union
with the person beloved, the love that God
bore to man caused him to desire, to seek, and
to bring about this admirable union. And this
sliows evidently and clearer than the sun the
infinite greatness of that love which St. Paul
so often describes to the faithful, and which he
says surpasses all thought and language.

The incarnation is a mystery of glorification,
inasmuch as human nature was in it raised to
such a height of glory that there is no science
nor power that can raise it higher. Speaking

For the Season of Advent. 57

on this subject St. Augustine says "that this
elevation of human nature is so high and emi-
nent that it cannot be more so." (L. 1, de
Pr^ed., Sa,nct. c. 1.) The reason is manifest,
because human nature is raised in this mystery
to the throne of the Divinity, and a true man
is become true God. St. Augustine in another
place says : " Go.d desired to show in what
esteem he held human nature, and what degree
of honor he gave it among all creatures, when
he was pleased to appear to the eyes of men
as a true man." (L. de vera Relig. c. 16.)

The incarnation is also a mystery of glorifi-
cation of the Divinity ; because God, wishing
to be infinitely glorified according to his merit,
not only in himself, but also outside of himself,
as he obtains the first by his Word which is
the knowledge infinitely excellent and the
sovereign esteem he has of himself, so for the
latter purpose he has employed the only means
possible, namely, the production of a creature
capable of rendering him a glory absolutely
infinite.

This he has done in the adorable mystery
of the incarnation wherein that same Word is
personally united to our nature in an individual
humanity, to which, besides the created gifts
bestowed upon it that incomparably surpass

58 Practice of Union with Our Lord

all those he has granted to all other creatures,
he has communicated substantially all his infi-
nite perfections, making it infinitely holy,
perfect, and capable of glorifying God infi-
nitely ; and this in two manners :

The first, by the simple manifestation of
those perfections ; for, as St. Augustine says,
" the beauty of creatures is the glorious testi-
mony and the praise they render to him who
created them." (Serm. 143, de temp.)

The second, interiorly, by his own acts,
which the Incarnate Word always referred to
the honor of God, and which, being all infi-
nitely excellent on account of the infinite
dignity of his person, all honored God infi-
nitely. This second manner is also exterior ;
for our Lord by his example and teachings
induced men to honor God, and he is, more-
over, the cause of all the honor and praise that
are offered to God and that will be offered
throughout all eternity, and the principle of
all the good works that will ever be done in
the world, since they are due to his merits.

This is the reason why the Sacred Scriptures
frequently call the Incarnate Word the especial
glory of God ; (Ps. lvi. 9 ; lxxxiv. 10 ; Is. Ix.
I ; Rom, iii. 23) and the celebrated words of
St. John: " Iti principio erat Vcrbnm, et Ver-

For the Season of Advent. 59

bunt erat apud Deum, et Dens erat Verbnm"
(John i. 1,) express the same meaning. "In
the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God." The
Word that is God is the eternal and infinite
glory of God, because it is the thought of
infinite esteem which he has of himself and
which is justly proportionate to its object.
11 And the Word was made flesh," and we saw
the glory of God that is that same Incarnate
Word, the Son of God, the honor and glory of
his Father, even as the wise son, as Solomon
says, is the ornament and glory of an earthly
father. (Prov, x. 1.) "The Word was made
flesh ;" therefore, at the moment of his birth,
the angels sang "Gloria in altissimis Deo"*
as though they meant to say : We can now
give to God in this Child all the glory he is
worthy of; and it is this Child that gives it to
him, and all creatures likewise can give it in
and by this Child.

Thus it is that our Lord Jesus Christ in his
quality of the uncreated Word, is the infinite
glory of God in himself from all eternity; and
as the Incannate Word, he is still the infinite
glory of God in himself and outside of himself
for all eternity to come. This shows us that

* " Glory to God in the highest."— (Luke ii. 14.)

60 Practice of Union with Our Lord

the incarnation is, as we have said, a mystery
of glorification of the Divinity.

It is, finally, a. mystery of annihilation,
in the person of God, because, in order to
unite himself to us in that manner and to
testify his love for us by so indisputable a
proof, and to elevate us to the height of infi-
nite glory, it was necessary for him to humble,
abase, and annihilate himself, making himself
man, a son of Adam the sinner, a poor man
and a miserable creature, and consequently a
mere nothing, as the creature is of itself. St.
Paul teaches us this great truth in these re-
markable words : " Being in the form of God,
he thought it not robbery to be equal with
God ; but debased himself, taking the form of
a servant, being made in the likeness of men,
and in habit found as a man." (Philipp. ii. 6.)
The Son being Go'd by essence, and not deem-
ing it an injury to his Father to esteem and
call himself God, nevertheless annihilated him-
self, taking the nature of a servant when he
took man's nature, and when he appeared both
in body and soul in all things like us.

The incarnation is a mystery of annihilation
in the humanity of our Lord, because that
humanity was despoiled of its natural person-
ality, annihilated to itself and to all that

For the Season of Advent. v 6 1

distinguishes the person of a man ; and still
further, it was annihilated in all the inclinations
of man for honors, comforts, and pleasures, the
Word to whom it was united, leading it in
the very opposite ways of opprobrium, poverty,
and suffering.

The incarnation is a mystery of annihilation
in our Lady, who, to be capable of assuming
the character of Mother to the Man-God,
had to be humbled and annihilated in her own
estimation below all creatures.

Our Lord, during the nine months that he
dwelt in the most pure womb of the Blessed
Virgin, as in the purest and holiest place on
earth, was ceaselessly occupied in praising,
blessing, adoring, thanking, and loving his
Father, and in offering to him his soul and
body, his being, his faculties and their opera-
tions, for that Father's glory and the salvation
of men. He addressed him at the instant of
his incarnation these words of the Royal
Prophet which the Apostle repeats: "Sacri-
fice and oblation thou wouldst not, but a body
thou has fitted to me. Holocausts for-sin did
not please thee. Then said I : Behold I come,
that I should do thy will, O God." (Heb. x,
5, 6, 7 ; Ps. xxxix. 7.) I know that neither
peace-offerings, nor holocausts, nor victims

62 Practice of Union with Our Lord

slain for the expiation of sin, please thee ; but
, that thou hast given me a body to be sacrificed
in their stead. Thou hast thus decreed ; I
submit. I offer myself cheerfully for the exe-
cution of the sentence, and I give myself to
thee to do with me all that shall please thee.
Our Lord also occupied himself in justifying
and sanctifying his holy Mother, and in enrich-
ing her with gifts and graces; he likewise
thought graciously of all men, and of you in
particular, and he yielded himself in spirit to
suffering, infamy, and death, for your salva-
tion. .

Now, although the womb of the Blessed
Virgin was the holiest place in all the universe
and the one most worthy of receiving our
Lord, still, in view of his infinite majesty as
God, and of the perfect use he had of his rea-
son as man, and of all the graces and wonder-
ful gifts he possessed, the obscurity and lowli-
ness of that dwelling where he was shut up in
general privation of all the objects of the
senses, causes the Church to say to him with
St. Ambrose and St. Augustine : " Non lior-
riiisti Virgiuis uterum? Thou didst not abhor
the Virgin's womb, thou hadst no horror to
enter it in order to accomplish our salva-
tion.

For the Season of Advent. 63

II. — THE AFFECTIONS.
/. Admiration.

The first affection will be admiration and
astonishment founded upon the grandeur of
the mystery, and upon the grandeur of the
benefits of which it is to us the source.

Regarding the grandeur of the mystery it is
enough to say : Verbum caro factum est — The
Word was made flesh — because these words
contain in a few syllables the novelty of novel-
ties, the wonder of wonders, the miracle of
miracles, that join in the same person great-
ness with littleness, dignity with lowliness,
beatitude with misery, immortality with death,
eternity with time, all with nothing, the Cre-
ator with the creature, and God with man.

That God should become true man, and man
true God, is something so strange and so above
finite comprehension, that no created reason
with all its power can understand how it was
possible. The most magnificent and most
perfect of all God's works and his incomparable
master-piece, is, says St. Denis the Areopagite,
the incarnation of his Son which so far sur-
passes our intelligence that the most enlight-
ened of the angels with all his natural intellect

64 Practice of Union with Our Lord

understands nothing- in it. (St. Dionys. de div.
nomin. c. 2.)

When we see a machine worked by some
excellent engineer producing extraordinary
and unexpected effects, we are astonished and
look on in admiration. The change of King
Nebuchodonosor into a beast, which, however,
was not a change of substance and nature, but
only of exterior appearance and of certain
operations, impressed and terrified all the peo-
ple of the time and all posterity. What
admiration and delight then should we not
experience at beholding the union of two
natures infinitely diverse by which God became
true man and man. true God ; by which the
infinite was changed to the finite, the immense
received limits, the omnipotent became weak,
the most happy miserable, the immortal sub-
ject to death ; by which God led the life and
performed the actions of man, and man those
of God ? " Quis audivit unquam tale" Isaiah
cries out, " et quis vidit liinc simile?" Who
ever saw or heard the like ? The same prophet
remarks that for this reason the first name
given to the Incarnate Word will be Admira-
ble : %K Vocabitur nomen ejus Admirabilis" his
name shall be called (Admirable) Wonderful.
(Is. ix. 6.)

For the Season of Advent. 65

Our admiiacion and astonishment ought to
have also for their object the grandeur of the
benefits we receive from this mystery, and
which are comprehended in these words : "Ft
liabitavit in nobis." (John i. 14.) The Word
was made flesh and dwelt among us ! By this
dwelling he has delivered us from all our evils
and has loaded us with his blessings ; he has
united our nature to his divine person, and
consequently, by the bond of relationship that
we have with him in his human nature, has
raised us to the sovereign honor of an alliance
with God ; he has dissipated the darkness in
which we were plunged and were wandering
miserably and blindly to our damnation, send-
ing us the clear daylight of truth and enabling
us to see the sure road of our salvation ; he
has destroyed the power of the devil and the
tyranny of sin ; he has closed the gates of
hell and opened to us those of paradise, that
we may there live forever in happiness, with
him.

The Church in admiration calls this mystery
a commerce and a wonderful traffic : 4' O ad-
mirabile commerchim ! " And she has great
reason, because therein our Lord has given us
his divinity and taken our humanity ; he has
conferred upon us his riches and his glory and

66 Practice of Union with Our Lord

has taken upon himself our poverty and infamy.
What a traffic ! What graces ! What inex-
plicable favors ! If a king should send to a
poor villager overwhelmed with misery in his
little cabin, ten millions of dollars, the poor
man would undoubtedly be extremely aston-
ished and surprised at such an unexpected
gift from a prince, and without any merit on
his part. This is what happens in the mys-
tery of the incarnation, and in a far higher
degree, both as regards the infinite greatness
of the gift that is made and the infinite great-
ness of the giver, as well as the infinite little-
ness of man who receives it.

2. Gratitude.

For this reason man, moved by this inesti-
mable benefit, should break forth with all the
fullness of his affections into praises, benedic-
tions, and thanksgivings to God, saying with
David: "The mercies of the Lord I will sing
forever." (Ps. lxxxviii. 2.) I will bless and
thank him for them eternally ; and with Isaiah :
4iO Lord, thou art my God, I will exalt thee
and give glory to thy name ; for thou hast
done wonderful things, thy designs of old
faithful. Amen." (Is. xxv. i.) O my Lord!
I gladly tell thee that thou art my God ; I

For the Season of Advent. 6j

will praise thee and will glorify thy holy name
with all my power, because thou hast done
admirable things in the incarnation of thy Son
which was the effect of thy love, and of those
eternal thoughts thou hadst of my salvation,
and the inviolable promises thou didst make
of it, which thou hast executed in good time.
Then he should exclaim in the words of the
apostle : "Thanks be to God for his unspeak-
able gifts !" (2 Cor. ix. 15.) Praise, adoration,
and infinite thanks be offered to God for his
unspeakable gift, which is his Son incarnate.

Certainly St. Bernard is right in telling us :
" Remember, man, that thou art dust, and
therefore be not proud; and also remember
that, even dust as thou art, thou art united to
God, and therefore be not ungrateful." (Serin.
2 in Cant.) And when he says in another
place: " This benefit ought never to be for-
gotten by those who have received it, and
there are in it two things upon which they
ought to deeply reflect : one is the manner in
which God conferred it — he emptied himself
for us ; and the other is the profit we have
received from it, which was to fill us with him."
Ingratitude for so great a benefit would be
something fearful, and would deserve a terrible
punishment.

68 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

j. Love.

As the love that God bears us was the true
cause of the personal union he was pleased to
contract with our nature, and the source of
all the blessings we receive from it, we ought
to accept that sovereign honor and the trea-
sures of those immense blessings with sincere
and ardent love. As God comes to us through
love we ought to go to him in the same way,
and with much greater reason, since he is of
himself worthy of infinite love, and w^e of our-
selves are only worthy of hate. The gift he
has made us of his Son, and that which 'the
Son has made us of himself, obliges us all to
this love, and should force the most obstinate
hearts. Love attains the highest degree of
its perfection and exerts its last effort when it
confers a gift commensurate with the power
of the giver ; when this gift is something most
precious and which the giver cherishes above
all things ; when it is made without constraint
or obligation and in a disinterested spirit ; and
when, moreover, it is very necessary ai}d very
useful to the one who receives it ; if you add
to all these conditions the fact of the giver
bestowing it with great difficulty and extreme
pain, you can say nothing more. Now, all

For the Season of Advent. 69

these qualities are combined in excess in our
Lord who was given to us in the incarnation,
and who therefore exacts from us with perfect
right a most ardent reciprocal love.

4. Desires and Petitions.

We should conceive burning desires and
should ask most earnestly that our Lord would
deign to come to us in this mystery. The just
men of the Old Law earnestly prayed for the
coming of the Messiah ; they greatly desired
and sighed for it, and offered many petitions,
and supplications, and vows, and tears, to draw
him from heaven. Each one of them was, as
well as Daniel, a man of desires, yir desideri-
ornm. Send, O Lord, they said, send him
whom thou hast resolved to send. "Drop
down de\y, ye heavens, from above, and let the
clouds rain the just ; let the earth be opened
and bud forth a Saviour, and let justice spring
up together. O that thou wouldst rend the
heavens and wouldst come down." (Is. xlv.
8; lxiv. 1.) Thou, O Saviour, so greatly de-
sired, burst the heavens and come quickly.
We cannot wait for thee to come by ordinary
ways, we are so anxious for thee, so eager to
behold thee.

The first sentiment of her love that the

JO Practice of Union with Our Lord

Spouse revealed, and the first word from her
lips in the Canticle was, according to the usual
interpretation of the Fathers, an expression of
the desire that filled all humanity, and espe-
cially the synagogue, the desire of the coming
of the Messiah, and the prayer she offered to
obtain it. Let the Divine Word, she cried,
uniting his nature to mine, give me the kiss of
peace, reconciling me with God his Father,
and teaching me not only by his angels and
prophets, but by himself and with his own
words, the doctrine of my salvation.

In the eighth chapter of the same book, as
the Fathers explain the passage, this trans-
port of desire escapes from her heart and lips :
" Who shall give thee to me for my brother,
sucking the breasts of my mother, that I may
find thee without and kiss thee ; and now no
man may despise me ?" Who will do me this
favor, O Divine Word and only Son of God !
that I may see thee clothed with my nature
and shrouded with my flesh, and thus become
my brother and the son of my mother ? Who
will help me so that I will not be obliged to
seek thee in the bosom of thy Father where
thou art hidden from all eternity and enveloped
with inaccessible light, but may find thee in
the womb of thy Mother, or clinging to her

For the Season of Advent. Jl

breast ? Who will give me to see thee with
my eyes, to hear thee with my ears, to touch
thee with my hands, and, holding thee fast, to
attach myself to thee by sentiments of faith,
love, joy, gratitude, respect, adoration, obedi-
ence, and homage, so that none may dare to
contemn me, since by this mystery thou art
become my brother and my spouse, and I thy
sister and thy beloved ?

In other passages the Spouse declares that
he whom she sought was To Ins deside7-abilis,
the All Desirable ; and she calls him the end
of all her desires and the object of all her
longings.

Our Lord in the Apocalypse calls himself
Amtriy which is a Hebrew word meaning, in
its primitive signification, "it is so, it is true,"
because he is true and truth itself. "These
things saith the Amen, the faithful and true
witness." (Apoc. iii. 14.) In its secondary
signification the word Amen is a prayer, or an
expression of desire, " God grant that it may
be so." Thus our Lord, the Amen, is the
term of all our wishes, and his incarnation is
the accomplishment of all our desires. The
Mosarebs called our Lady when she was in
the ardor of her desires for the incarnation,
and especially on the day of the incarnation

72 Practice of Union witli Our Lord

when the great mystery was accomplished in
her, our Lady of O, because the first word that
escapes our heart and lips when we greatly
desire a thing is, Outinam — Oh ! would to God.
The seven anthems of the Magnificat which
the Church sings during the seven days before
Christmas and wThich all begin with O, refer
to this ; they are all desires and prayers urging
the Eternal Word to come and accomplish the
mystery of the incarnation.

Let us, then, desire with all the earnestness
we are capable of, and ask with all our strength,
our Lord to come to us, to effect in our souls
and bodies his incarnation, to impress its 'fea-
tures upon us and communicate to us its grace
and spirit. Let us continually inhale and draw
the incarnate Word into us by acts of faith, by
desires, by supplications, and by the burning
words of the patriarchs, so that he may do for
us what his divinity did for his humanity, which
was to sanctify it, strengthen it, deify it, and
render it so agreeable and glorious to God that
the least of its actions, its slightest glance and
most trifling movement procured infinite honor
to the Eternal Father, and immense treasures
of blessings to men ; and that we may have
grace likewise to imitate his sacred humanity
in all the duties it performed toward the

For the Season of Advent. 73

Divinity to which it was not only united sub-
stantially and personally, but to which it con-
tinued to unite itself by its own interior actsv
by its love, its adorations, its glorifications, its-
thanksgivings, -its zeal for God's honor, its.
submission to his decrees, etc. Let us beg
him to become incarnate in us ; and, as his
incarnation is a mystery of union, of love, of
glorification, and of annihilation, to operate in,
us in an eminent degree all these effects.

III. — THE VIRTUES.

The most important point in these exercises.
is the effective expression of our Lord's mys-
teries, by the exact and constant practice of
the virtues he practiced in them, the principal
ones of which we shall always be careful to
propose.

1. Union with our Lord Jesus Christ.

As our Lord so graciously and lovingly
united himself to us in his incarnation, Ave
ought, in order to express and represent this
mystery, to exert all our efforts to unite our-
selves to him. We ought to unite ourselves
to him through the motives of love for him
and zeal for his glory, and the knowledge of
our extreme need of him. For, as our nature-

7

74 Practice of Union with Our Lord

became innocent, holy, and perfect, only by
union with the Word, we can individually share
its regeneration only by uniting ourselves to
the Incarnate Word.

God himself gives us an example of what
we must do to form this union with our Lord,
and teaches us our lesson in it. First, as he
took pleasure in uniting himself to that sacred
humanity, we should imitate him by finding
in our union with our Lord our satisfaction and
our chief delight. Secondly, as he united him-
self to that humanity in order to come and
unite himself to us, and through it to confer
upon us his gifts, wTe should go to him likewise
through it, should by it unite ourselves to him
aaid render ourselves capable of receiving his
gifts and the effects of his goodness. Thirdly,
as he united himself to that adorable humanity
in order to draw from it his own glory and to
accomplish our salvation, we should in the
same way unite ourselves to it in order to
promote God's honor and to save our own
souls. Assuredly, since God throughout all
eternity has performed no greater act, none
more excellent, none more glorious to him
and more useful to us, than when he united
himself to that most holy humanity, wre, simi-
larly, can do nothing that will render more

For the Season of Advent. 75

glory and praise to God, nor that will be more
advantageous to us, than to unite ourselves to
it. Finally, as God united himself to that
sacred humanity intimately, inseparably, and
forever, not forsaking it at the hour of death,
let us likewise contract with our Lord an inti-
mate and eternal union, such a union as
neither death, nor life, nor anything whatso-
ever can destroy.

2. Zeal for our 'Lord's Glory.

It is certainly most reasonable that, since
the Eternal Word became incarnate, and in
his incarnation humbled himself and made use
of his divinity and his humanity to exalt us,
we should do all in our power to procure for
him all the glory we can. The Greek Fathers
call this mystery a Descent, because in it the
Son of God descended infinitely low, and
caused us to ascend infinitely high ; they also
call it a Condescension, because in it he ex-
ercised unspeakable goodness and condescen-
sion in order to accommodate himself to us ;
he assumed our degradation in order to give
us his glory ; he united himself to our poverty
to fill us with his riches, and he charged him-
self with our miseries to give us a share in his
felicity.

y6 Practice of Union with Our Lord

This is why, sensibly touched by this most
admirable abasement, and completely won by
this incomparable desire of our Lord for our
glory, we should conceive a burning zeal for
his, and by all possible means endeavor to
procure him honor. We should breathe only
his praises, and should refer to them all our
thoughts, all our affections, all our plans, all
our words, and all our works. We should
consecrate our souls and bodies to his glory,
employing for it all our strength, using and
consuming ourselves for it, so as to recognize
in some degree, although infinitely unequal,
the prodigious things he has done, and the
unutterable sufferings he has endured in order
to raise us from the dust and place us in a
state of glory and honor.

Besides we are bound to apply ourselves
with all our powers to glorify God. God's
glory is the end of the incarnation of the
Eternal Word, and, in general, the end of all
that God does ; because his will cannot pro-
pose as the last end of all his works anything
but his exterior honor and the glory he can
receive from his creatures, this being the thing
that of all outside himself is best. Conse-
quently, God's glory is the end of our creation
and preservation ; save for it we would still be

For the Season of Advent. jj

in nothingness, therefore we ought to refer to
it ail that we are, since we exist only for it.

Our Lord traced for us the model in his own
person, having from the moment of his con-
ception until his death acted incessantly for
this end, whence he said : "I honor my Fa-
ther. . . I seek not my own glory. . . I
have glorified thee on the earth." (Jno. viii.
49 ; xvii. 4.) I glorify my Father, to his glory
I refer all my thoughts, all my affections, all
mv words, and all mv works ; I seek not mv own
glory. And still, now in the highest heaven,
he refers to the same intention of God's cdorv,
and he will for all eternity, his body, his soul,
all that he does and all that he will ever do ;
and with him, and in him, all men and all
creatures who are in a certain manner con-
tained, purified, sanctified, and deified in his
sacred humanity ; and moreover, he offers
them all for the same intention, out of himself
and in themselves, as things that belong to
him.

Let us then follow this perfect model, and,,
in order to do so, let us unite ourselves inti-
mately and inseparably with Jesus Christ by
sanctifying grace, by acts of faith, hope, and
charity, by desires and petitions, as to the
first cause, the general and only instrument

y 8 Practice of Union with Our Lord

of all the exterior glory offered to the Divini-
ty, for this purpose making ourselves but one
with him, as we are in reality, since we have
the honor to be members of a body of which
he is the Head.

Let us spiritually unite our souls to his soul,
our faculties to his faculties, our thoughts to
his thoughts, our affections to his affections,
our words to his words, our looks, our steps,
our motions, and all our actions to his which
are infinitely honorable to God, so that all
that belongs to us may take from all that be-
longs to him a divine lustre and coloring.

Let us fill ourselves with his spirit, which is
a spirit of pure devotion to the glory of God,
since his incarnation, his birth, his life, his
death, and all his mysteries, have no other
end than God's glory.

Let us very frequently offer him, as a trea-
sure that belongs to us, to God, to glorify
God in every manner and as much as he merits.
Let us also pray him to offer us with himself,
as one of his own possessions, for God's glory,
and in himself as being contained in him.

Still more, let us very frequently offer our-
selves for the honor and praise of God with
God himself. To understand what I mean,
we must first know that God is our Creator

For the Season of Advent. 79

who has formed our bodies and souls. David
says : " He made us, and not we ourselves."
(Ps. xcix. 3.) We also learn this from reason
and experience, which teach us that nothing"
can make itself. Secondly, that he is our pre-
server who not only has given us being-, but
who preserves it to us ; and as preservation
differs from first production only in some little
formalities, and is in substance and essence
the first production persevered in and a con-
tinued creation that follows its first plan, as
the life of our body is only a perpetual flow of
life from the soul over it ; so to say that God
preserves us is only to say that he constantly
communicates being to us, and always pro-
duces our bodies and souls, and produces them
in such or such a manner — a healthy body, an
infirm or sickly one ; a robust, weak, beautiful,
or ugly body ; a body of a melancholy, bilious,
or other temperament ; a soul with much, or
with little, or with no talent, memory, judg-
ment; a soul sometimes gay, sometimes sad,
now consoled, then desolate, afflicted, pained,
tempted, and with such and such a species of
temptation. God creates our souls and bodies
in these different dispositions, and sometimes
in several different ways in one day.

Thirdly, it must be carefully remarked that

80 Practice of Union zvitJi Our Lord

God makes our bodies and souls thus for his
own glory, and produces them in these dif-
ferent states in order to procure to himself by
means of each of these different dispositions
a particular kind of honor which he could not
derive from any other. This is why, if you
tell me that if you had more talents, more
judgment, more capacity than God has given
you, if your body were stronger and healthier
than it is, you would in your opinion render
him more honor than writh the body and mind
you have ; I will reply that truly you might
with a different body and mind render honor
to God, but not the kind of honor he desires
from you, which only your body and your
mind just as you possess them can render him.
An artisan uses instruments of different sizes
and shapes .to fashion his works, and a small
and bent instrument will not do what a large
and straight one will, but wrill be good for some
other part of the work. In embroidery the
different silks used to form a flower all produce
effect, each according to its particular color
and shade ; and in music, the different tones
produce harmony, but each in its own particu-
lar manner. Just so a healthy body and a
sick body, a great mind and an inferior one, a
rich man and a poor man, and, in general, all

For the Season of Advent. 8 1

creatures in the universe in their marvelous
diversity, serve God in their different ways,
and each in its own way renders him an honor
which it alone can render him.

We know very well that God has created
us for his glory and our own beatitude, but we
are ignorant of what particular glory -he re-
quires frorri us, and to what degree of beatitude
he has designed to raise us, whether it be to a
place in the choir of angels of the lowest
order, or among the archangels, or with the
highest seraphim. And further, wre know not
by what particular means we are to execute
these two great works of the glory of God and
our own beatitude ; God alone knows this ; he
alone knows in what manner he desires to be
served and glorified in you and by you, and to
what measure of grace and happiness he has
predestined you ; and likewise, he alone knows
by what means you are to reach it. The only
means capable of procuring him that particular
glory he desires and expects from you, and of
bringing you to the degree of grace, perfec-
tion, and eternal felicity he has assigned you,
are your body and soul just as he has made
them, the dispositions of light or of darkness,
of consolation or of desolation, of unction or
of dryness, of peace or of disquiet and temp-

82 Practice of Union with Our Lord

tation, in which he puts you to-day, at this
hour and moment, and the present condition,
office, and employment to which he has called
you.

Therefore, as God truly present and dwell-
ing in us, constantly creates for his own glory
our bodies and souls in all the various disposi-
tions of nature and grace wherein they are at
each moment, and refers them to his honor
and praise, thus making for himself in us per-
petual sacrifices, and taking infinite compla-
cency in all these dispositions because he
creates them, according to the words of the
Prophet king : " The Lord shall rejoice in his
works," (Ps. ciii. 31) and because in their vari-
eties they are the true and only means by
which he gains from us the particular honor
he requires at that moment ; we should unite
ourselves to him dwelling in us, and should,
as it were, second him, agreeing to all that he
does in us for his glory and with him taking
pleasure in it, esteeming ourselves happy to
be able to concur with him in so noble a de-
sign, and very frequently referring our bodies
and souls in all their states to his honor.

Let us in this imitate our Lord in whom the
Divinity, sanctifying and deifying the human-
ity by its personal union with it, consecrated

For the Season of Advent. 83

and applied it to its own glory ; and that
most sacred humanity referred to and em-
ployed for the same end without any intermis-
sion, its soul, its body, its essence, its faculties,
its operations, and its whole being.

The last thing that we must understand is
the practice of this divine glorification in us
and by us.

It consists, first, in accepting and bearing
with a great desire and an ardent zeal for
God's glory, all the dispositions and changes
that he produces in us, in our bodies and
souls, in whatsoever manner they may come to
us.

Secondly, in accepting and bearing them in
a spirit of faith, with a sentiment of esteem
and approbation of his will ; with submission,
with humility and great respect, with patience
and fortitude, with silence, with love, and with

joy-
Thirdly, in referring very frequently during
the day our body and soul, our being, our
powers, our actions, and all that we are to
God's glory, uniting ourselves to him in order
that he in us may refer them to that end, im-
itating the example our Lord has given us of
this.

The more frequently, the more perfectly,

84 Practice of Union with Our Lord

that is, with the more zeal, the more faith,
and the more of the other virtues, we shall do
this, the more excellently we shall glorify
God and the greater honor we shall render
him.

In conclusion, remember that as God's will
is always invariably fixed to desire and claim
his glory, the shortest, easiest, and surest way
of glorifying God is to will precisely all that
he wills ; and in proportion as we do this with
more or less resignation, abandonment, and
destruction of our own will, the glory we ren-
der to God will be greater or less.

j. Self -Abasement.

Our Lord annihilated himself in order to
unite himself to us and to raise us to the de-
gree of honor we now enjoy. " Seme tip sum
cxinanivit" says St. Paul. Therefore, let us
annihilate ourselves for him, let us labor to
destroy and annihilate in us all that is ever so
slightly contrary to his glory and our perfec-
tion ; let us annihilate our spirit, our judg-
ment, our will, our desires, our inclinations
and humors, and let us undertake this task
courageously and faithfully. And truly, if he
who is All and Sovereign Majesty was pleased
to become nothing, and to humble himself

For the Season of Advent. 85

infinitely that he might make us something
great and exalted, we who intrinsically are
nothing, are under all imaginable obligations
to abase and annihilate ourselves for him, at
least so far as nothing can abase itself. To
incite you to this, keep continually in your
mind, and very frequently on your lips, these
words, %i semetipsnm exinanivit" he debased
himself, he annihilated himself.

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

V.— READING.

(Under these two headings Father Saint-
Jure suggests matter for meditation and read-
ing,, taken from pious books of his own com-
position, or from other authors ; but as they
are not all easily to be found in English, we
shall generally omit what comes under these
titles.)

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

These verses, together with those scattered
through our pages, may serve to fix the mys-
tery in our memories, to bind our spirits to it,
and to help us to inhale our Lord and draw
him into us ; for this reason we should during

86 Practice of Union with Our Lord.

the day frequently repeat them, now one, now
another, according to our dispositions.

,v The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us." (Jno. i. 14.) These words should
be repeated with faith, love, and reverence,
and sometimes with bended knee as the Church
requires of her priests when they repeat them
in the Mass.

u Lord, what is man, that thou art mindful
of him ? or the son of man, that thou visitest
him ?" (Ps. cxliii. 3.) Lord, what is man that
thou shouldst make thyself known to him,
even visibly and in his own nature ? And the
son of man that thou shouldst have regard to
him ? If thou consultest thy own knowledge
thou wilt find that man is only vanity, homo
vanitati siniilis f actus est.

" Semctipsum exinanivit, he emptied him-
self." (Philipp. ii. 7.) He annihilated himself.

CHAPTER IV.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST FROM CHRISTMAS TO LENT.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

The practice for this season will have for
its subject the mysteries of our Lord's nativi-
ty, his circumcision, the adoration of the kings,
the offering his holy Mother made of him to
God his Father in the temple, his flight into
Egypt and his dwelling there, and all his hid-
den life.

We must regard with the eyes of faith, with
a simple and attentive gaze, our Lord in the
stable, laid in the manger upon the straw,
with our Lady and St. Joseph and an ox and
an ass for his company ; we must behold him
suffering the wound of a sharp knife and testi-
fying the violence of his pain by his tears ;
and so on, we must study him in the other
mysteries of this season.

II.— THE AFFECTIONS.

The affections and interior acts we should
conceive toward our Lord in these sacred
mysteries are the same that moved the shep-

88 Practice of Union with Our Lord

herds and the royal magi ; and, to seek still
more perfect models of these sentiments, the
same that filled the hearts of our Lady and
St. Joseph.

/. Faith.

Our first sentiment should be a lively faith
that this little Child is the true God, that
beneath this lowliness and this mean appear-
ance is concealed the full glory of the Divin-
ity, that under this feebleness lies the strength
of the Omnipotent, under this silence the
Eternal Word and the wisdom of the Father ;
that in this little child, weeping and shivering
with cold, is contained the joy of the angels
and of all the blessed, and in this little crea-
ture the Creator of the universe.

Thus, looking at this Child in the manger
on the straw, we will not confine our gaze to
his flesh nor to his miserable surroundings, but,
enlightened by a strong faith, we will, with
piercing glance, penetrate the depths of the
mystery and discover there the Divinity re-
splendent with glory, though enveloped with
the cloud of this sacred humanity, and we
Will exclaim with St. Thomas, but in a spirit
of more perfect faith : " Dominns mens ct Dens
metis — My Lord and my God !" (jno. xx. 28.)

From Christmas to Lent. 89

Yes, this little Child is my God, and I desire
no other besides him, even as there is no other.
Yes, this little Child is my God, my true and
legitimate Lord ; this Child who weeps is
my joy and my beatitude ; this Child so poor
and destitute of necessary things is all my
treasure ; this Child so tender and feeble is all
my strength ; this Child so humiliated and
abased is my sovereign glory ; this Child who
utters not a word is my master and my wis-
dom ; this Child of a day is my Eternal Crea-
tor : Dominus mens et Dens mens — he is my
Lord and my God.

2. Adoration.

After the act of faith we must make an act
of adoration. This will naturally and easily
follow the act of faith ; when you firmly be-
lieve that a person to whom you are presented
is your king, this belief immediately produces
in your mind an impression of respect for his
person, and impels you to bow profoundly
before him ; you find no difficulty in doing
this, because it appears to you so just and
reasonable. After your act of faith you will
experience the same reverence toward our
Lord, and you will adore him with the Blessed
Virgin, with St. Joseph, with the magi, and

90 Practice of Uviion with Our Lord

with the angels who received, St. Paul says,
the command to adore him at the moments
of his incarnation and his birth. And again,
when he bringeth in the first-begotten into
the world, he saith : " And let all the angels
of God adore him." (Heb. i. 6.)

If the Seraphim and Cherubim adore him,
and through reverence bow down before his
majesty, how much more reason have not we
who are but dust, and besides are under far
greater obligations to our Lord than the
angels are, since, as the apostle says, he did
not take their nature to save them, but ours
to save us — how much more reason have not
we to adore him, to humble and abase and
annihilate ourselves in his presence ? There-
fore, let us say to him :

I adore thee, O little Child and great God ;
I adore and honor thee in union with the
Blessed Virgin, St. Joseph, the magi, and the
angels, with sentiments of the deepest respect
and profoundest reverence I am capable of.
And as the angels adore thee in heaven in the
bosom of thy Father and on the throne of thy
glory, with humiliations and abasements that
exceed our thoughts and words, I adore thee
in the crib and on the bosom of thy Mother,

From Christmas to Lent. 91

with, at least in desire, the same respect and
submission.

3. Admiration.

It is a spectacle worthy of extreme admira-
tion to see the Eternal the child of a day,
the Immense reduced to limits, the Impassible
suffering, the Immortal subject to death, the
Rich needy, Joy weeping, Beatitude miser-
able, Speech dumb, Light unillumined,
Authority submissive, Wisdom taught, Power
supported, and God, before whose Majesty
the Seraphim and Cherubim are but atoms,
lying in a manger upon straw between two
animals.

St. Bernard, beholding the sight, cries out :
" Who will not admire, and who can suffi-
ciently admire a thing so admirable and
strange ? God eternal, Son of the Most High,
begotten before ages, is born a little Child."
And the prophet Habacuc, fainting from
astonishment, says to this Child: "Lord, I
have considered thy works and was afraid."
(Habac. hi. 2.) Seeing thee not in heaven
among the angels, but in a stable between
two animals.

4. Gratitude.

Words are inadequate to express how much
gratitude we owe our Lord for having come

92 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

down to earth for our sake and placed him-
self as we see him in the stable. He said of
himself, M I came forth from the Father, and
am come into the world." (Jno. xvi. 28.) Be-
hold two terms, two places, two conditions,
widely different — that he left, the bosom of
the Father, the splendor of glory, majesty
adored by angels, the state of infinite beati-
tude— and that to which he came, a stable,
a manger, poverty, contempt, and misery !
When we think of St. Alexis whom the
Church calls the most noble of Romans,
when we think of him in his father's house
abundantly provided with all his heart could
desire, and on his marriage-day loaded with
favors and honor, and then a few years later
sleeping under the steps of his father's palace,
unknown, poor, scorned, and mocked by his
own servants, we are greatly surprised to see
the same person voluntarily in two such
different conditions. But in our Lord we see
a change still more extraordinary, and which
caused his Father to* say by the prophet
Abdias : "Behold I have made thee small
among the nations. Thou art exceeding con-
temptible." (Abd. i. 2.)

This change accepted for our sake by the
Son of God, demands in return a most un-

From Christmas to Lent. 93

bounded gratitude. If a king should come
from the ends of the earth to visit you, you
would consider yourself under obligations to
thank him ; and if in coming he had suffered
very much, you would feel yourself under still
greater obligations ; and if he came to deliver
you from most serious evils that were afflicting
you, and to bestow upon you all sorts of
favors, you would deem yourself less than the
brutes if you were not overwhelmed with
gratitude. Oh ! what sentiments of gratitude
ought we then to have toward our Lord !
what thanksgivings we should offer him, since
he is far more exalted than any king, and
comes from a much greater distance than the
ends of the earth, and endures excessive
sufferings in order to deliver us from our evils
and to enrich us with blessings that are in-
comparably more precious than those any
earthly king could bestow !

5. Love for our Lord.

The mere sight of what takes place in the
stable should fire our hearts with love for our
Lord. God, knowing that so long as he re-
mained invisible and insensible, man, who in
his operations depends greatly upon the
senses, would always have much difficulty in

94 Practice of Union with Our Lord

loving him, to take away this difficulty and
remove all the obstacles to the love he re-
quires of man, made himself visible and sen-
sible in the most lovable and charming manner
possible, by becoming a man like unto us ; he
made himself our Brother and our Spouse,
titles most powerful to attract and oblige us
to love.

What is more, God became a creature, God
is a little child, God lies upon the straw be-
tween two animals, God is miserable, and for
us ! After that we do not love him ? Has
not St. Paul good reason to say : " If any man
love not our Lord Jesus Christ, let him be
anathema?" (i Cor. xvi. 22.) If any one after
such obligations does not love our Lord, let
him be anathema.

And the mark of the sinner that he takes in
his circumcision, and the precious blood that
he painfully spills in that mystery, and with
such extreme ignominy, and so soon ! Does
not this force us to love him ? St. Bernard ex-
claims in admiration : " The Son of God found
himself on the day of his birth less than the
angels, because he found himself man ; this is
wonderful. But on the day of his circumcision
I see something more admirable and more
astonishing still, because in that mystery he

From Christmas to Lent. 95

made himself less than the angels by taking,
besides the nature of man, the form of sinful
man." (Serm. 3, de Circumcis.) Thus Holy
Church says on the feast of the Circumcision :
rt Propter nimiam cJiaritatem stiam, qua dilexit
110s Dens, Filium suum nisit in similitndinem
earuis peccati. On account of the excessive
charity with which he loved us, God sent his
own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh."

Our Lord, both as God and man, was abso-
lutely impeccable, and there is nothing so
contrary to God as sin. Riches are certainly
opposed to poverty, greatness to littleness,
joy to sorrow, and life to death ; but sin is
still more opposed to God. God easily brought
together and united in his person those first
things, though so different from him ; but he
could not do the same with the last — sin. We
have seen him at once rich and poor, great
and small, happy and miserable, immortal and
subject to death ; but we never saw him holy
and a sinner. Hence, the more sin is contrary
to him and the more he is the enemy of sin,
the more plainly he has declared the excess
of his love for us by deigning to take the mark
of sin, and doing so willingly and lovingly in
the desire rather to compromise his own honor
than not remedy our ills.

96 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

Truly, it is going very far in the way of love
that the Son of God should not be content to
prove his affection for us by becoming man,
by being born a little child, poor, contemned,
and subject to every discomfort ; but that he
should desire to appear that which he is not,
and which he can never be, a sinner, and to
bear the vile character and the shameful mark
of sin, which he holds in horror and cannot
endure. Being unable to be a sinner, for our
salvation he assumes the appearance of one.
Oh ! what love, and what benevolence !

Who can describe the good will and the
ardent affection with which in the temple he
offered himself to God his Father for us, and
offered himself to be scourged, crowned with
thorns, and crucified ? What a wonderful
proof of love thus to give himself to us, and
to allow us to possess him in exchange for so
little, for the sigh of a repentant heart, for a
morsel of bread and a cup of cold water given
to a beggar ! while to purchase and possess
us, though there is no comparison between
his value and our worthlessness, he gave all
his blood and sacrificed his life, so great was
his desire to give himself to us and to win us
to him !

All these proofs our Lord has given us of

From Christmas to Lent. 97

his love, demand of us for him all the love our
hearts are capable of. The prophet Isaiah
said to him that if he should make himself
man and should descend to such abasements
for us, and should work those miracles of love
that are seen in his nativity, the most obsti-
nate would be unable to withstand his efforts,
but would surely melt into tears ; the haugh-
tiest spirits would humble themselves, hearts
of stone would break, and the coldest souls
would enkindle with his love with so much
the more ardor as he lowered himself for them
to depths so unworthy of his Majesty. " The
mountains would melt away at thy presence,
they would melt as at the burning of fire ;
the waters would burn with fire ; when thou
shalt do wonderful things we shall not bear
them." (Is. lxiv. I, 2, 3.) "The more he
abased himself for me," says St. Bernard,
"the dearer he is and the more I love him,
because he has made himself more amiable."
(Serm. 1, in Ephiph.)

St. Paul, to move us to this love, says that
"The goodness and kindness of God our
Saviour appeared," (Tit. iii. 4) when, to show
his love for men, he appeared to them clothed
with their nature, lying in a manger, and bear-
ing the mark cf sin. Commenting upon which

98 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

words of the apostle, St. Bernard adds : " How
could our Lord display more plainly his good-
ness than by uniting himself with my flesh ?
Was -there a means of showing more clearly
his mercy than by assuming our miseries ?
And what more certain proof of his benev-
olence could he give than to reciuce him-
self, the Word of God, for our sake, to the
condition ot the grass of the field ? "

Who that believes these truths and reflects
upon them with any degree of attention, can
fail to consider himself under positive obliga-
tions to love our Lord with all his heart, and
to prove his love by deeds, just as our Lord
proved his for us, not by words, but by
wondrous works ?

God the Father, on the day wheri his Son
was presented to him in the temple in his
own name and in ours, and in that of all the
human race, gave him back to his holy
Mother, to let us know that it is to her he
gives him, that she must give him to us, that
to her we must address ourselves if we will
have him, that without her he shall never be
possessed by us. To her, therefore, we are
indebted for Jesus Christ, since she is his
Mother, ana without her consent to the pro-.
posal the Archangel Gabriel made her in

From Christmas to Lent. 99

God's name, on the day of the Annunciation,
a consent she was free to give or to refuse,
we would never have obtained him, and
consequently we would never have had a
a Saviour nor a salvation. On the feast
of the Purification she receives him anew
from God the Father in order to again give
him to us.

Therefore, we possess Jesus Christ, and in
him all our happiness, only through the
Blessed Virgin, and but for her he would not
be ours. St. Bernard says: " God has so
decreed that we can possess nothing that we
do not receive from Mary's hands." Hence
we must infer that wTe are also under infinite
obligations to honor her, to love her, and to
render her endless thanksgivings and every
possible homage.

We should make our offering of the Son to
God the Father in the dispositions of the
Blessed Virgin, with a most profound interior
and exterior humility, with singular reverence,
with great devotion, with cordial tenderness,
with unspeakable gratitude for having given
him to us, with ardent zeal for his glory, and
with all other affections ; wre should offer him
as the dearest and most precious thing we
possess, to be our mediator with the Father,

IOO Practice of Unio7i with Our Lord

our advocate, our pledge, our ransom, our
sacrifice of glorification to procure infinite
glory to God, our sacrifice of propitiation to
obtain the pardon of our sins, our eucharistic
sacrifice to thank him for his benefits, and our
sacrifice of impetration to obtain fresh benefits,
in fine, to be before the throne of God our
all.

God the Father having received his Son
from us, gives him .back to us to be our
Saviour, our Redeemer, our protector, our
consoler, our physician, our model, our
strength, our wisdom, our riches, our glory,
our peace, our joy, and our all. "Christ is
all, and in all," says St. Paul. fColoss.
iii. 2.)

Our life should be a continual exercise of
offering and giving with these sentiments,
Jesus Christ to God his Father, and of receiv-
ing him from God ; and as he is given to us
with infinite love, let us receive him with most
ardent love.

Then, enjoying your happiness and the in-
estimable favor that is done you, with the
holy old man Simeon, take the dear child in
your arms, and gazing upon him with faith,
respect, gratitude, joy, hope, and love, remem-
ber that even as that holy old man could not

From Christmas to Lent. ioi

die until he had first seen Jesus Christ accord-
ing to the promise he received from the Holy
Ghost : " He had received an answer from the
Holy Ghost, that he should not see death
before he had seen the Christ of the Lord ;"
(Luke ii. 26,) and as he sang : " Nunc dimittis
servum tuum, Domine, secundum verbum tuum
in pace ; now thou dost dismiss thy servant,
O Lord, according to thy word in peace,"
(lb. ii. 29,) only when he held him in his arms
pressed close to his heart ; so it is impossible
for you to die to your vices, to your bad incli-
nations and your corrupt nature, or to sing
your nunc dimittis, that is, to bid a last fare-
well to them all, and to enjoy the peace of
the children of God and true rest of spirit,
until you hold Jesus Christ in your arms,
which will only be when you are united eter-
nally and intimately with him, in your under-
standing by meditating upon his mysteries,
and in your will by loving him.

i 6. Joy.

If the possession of a good be the legitimate
object of joy, a joy that goes on increasing in
proportion as the good is greater and the pos-
session of it more secure, our Lord's nativity
should be to us a cause of inexpressible joy on

102 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

account of the infinite blessings it brings us,
and which are so securely ours that no one in
all the world can steal them away without
our consent.*

Isaiah, referring to this mystery, says :
•'The people that walked in darkness have
seen a great light ; to them that dwelt in the
region of the shadow of death, light is risen."
(Is. ix. 2.) They that were shrouded in dark-
ness and that fainted with weariness in the
regions of death, found the day in their midst
when the Sun of Justice who came to give
them life was born.

At the rising of this Sun the angel said to
the shepherds : " Behold I bring you good
tidings of great joy that shall be to all the
people ; for this day is born to you a Saviour
who is Christ the Lord." (Luke ii. 10, n.)
There is born to you, to you who w^ere con-
demned and lost, a Saviour ; to you who were t
sold, a Redeemer ; to you who were captives,
a liberator ; to you w7ho wrere sick, a physi-
cian ; to you who were afflicted, a consoler,
and the One who will deliver you from all
evils and bestow upon you every blessing.

" Let us rejoiee, my brethren," says St. Leo,
•'because our Saviour is born this day; for

From Christmas to Lent. 103

there is no place for sadness where life has
birth." (Serm. 1, in Nat. Dom.)

Let us conclude with the sweet and forcible
words of the eloquent St. Bernard : " We have
heard in our land a glad voice, a voice of ex-
ultation and salvation has resounded in the
tents of sinners ; we have heard a good word,
a word of consolation that should cause us
great joy, and that is worthy of being well
received.

"Praise God with joy and gladness, O ye
mountains ! and you, O ye forests and woods,
shake your branches as though clapping your
hands in the presence of the Lord because he
is come ! Hearken, ye heavens, and thou, O
earth, lend thine ear, and let all creatures in
the universe break forth into canticles of won-
der and thanksgiving ! But thou, O man,
sing louder still, for Jesus Christ, the Son of
God, is born in Bethlehem of Juda !

"Is there a heart so hard as not to be
melted by the sweetness of these words ?
What more welcome news could be brought
to us ? What more agreeable could be told
us ? When has the world ever heard, or seen,
or received the like ? Jesus Christ, the Son of
God, is born in Bethlehem of Juda ! O short
sentence, but filled with heavenly delight."

104 Practice of Union with Our Lord

(Serm. I, in Vigil. Nat. Dom.) Thus St. Ber-
nard discourses on the birth of our Lord, and
the great cause of joy which it should be 'to
us. Let us, then, rejoice, but in a holy man-
ner, and so let us accomplish what the angel
said to the shepherds, and to us in their
persons

7. Hope.

As these reasons well considered are suffi-
cient to fill our hearts with a torrent of delight,
they should also fill them with a great hope
in our Lord as the remedy for all our ills. It
is true we have many, both spiritual and cor-
poral ; . sin has loaded us down with them ;
still, since the coming of our Lord they have
ceased .to be ills, because we have in him a
powerful remedy for them, which, instead of
longer afflicting ourselves, we should think
cnly of making use of. If a person who is
worth a hundred millions of dollars owes five
cents, he does not worry about his debt, be-
cause he knows he has most ample means
with which to discharge it. The means which
we possess in Jesus Christ for deliverance from
all our miseries are incomparably more ample.
Therefore the angel says to us as well as to
the shepherds : " Fear not, for this day is born

From Christmas to Lent. 105

to you a Saviour who is Christ the Lord."
(Luke ii. 10.) He is called Jesus, that is
Saviour, because, as the angel explained to
St. Joseph, he will save men and deliver them
from their sins, and consequently from all their
miseries, of which their sins are the true and
only causes. This divine Saviour is born for
us ; he is ours. " A Child is born to us, and a
Son is given to us," says the prophet Isaiah.
(Is. ix. 6.) A little Child is born for our sal-
vation, the Son of God is given to us by his
Father to ransom us from our captivity and to
enrich us with all his treasures.

Our Lord himself says : " God so loved the
world as to give his only begotten Son."
(Jno. iii. 16.) God loved men to such a
degree that he gave them his Son. The word
give is used, not lend, nor sell, nor exchange ;
by the absolute title of gift Jesus Christ is
ours, he belongs to us, he is our property,
and in such a way that there is nothing we
possess more entirely than we do him ; no
power, neither of angels, nor of men, nor of
demons, can take him from us without our
consent ; God himself, omnipotent as he is,
cannot deprive us of him, because he has
given him to us, and God's gifts are on his
part irrevocable.

106 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

Our Lord being ours, all his treasures belong
to us, since, according to a just rule, the
accessory follows the principal ; he who gives
the tree, gives likewise the fruit. Hence St.
Paul having said that God gave us his Son,
adds : " How hath he not also, with him,
given us all things?" (Rom. viii. 32.) Thus
it is that we have in Jesus Christ, who is Lord
of the whole universe, a superabundant re-
medy for all our miseries, and we are infinitely
enriched in him and by him. " You are filled
in him who is the head of all principality and
power." (Coloss. ii. 10.) "In all things you
are made rich in him, so that nothing is want-
ing to you in any grace, (r Cor. i. 5, 7.)

From this we must be certain that our
Lord is our chief hope, that he is the efficacious
remedy for all our miseries, the cure for all
our ills, the sovereign balm for all our wounds,
and the true consolation for all our sorrows.
Therefore we must have recourse to him in
all our necessities, we must go to him freely,
frankly, and with the simplicity and confidence
of a child, of a brother, and of a friend. If
we go in this spirit, he will not fail to deliver
us from the evils that afflict us ; or, if deliver-
ance be not for our good, he will give us
what will be much better, patience, resig-

From Christmas to Lent. 107

nation, and strength to bear our burdens to
the end.

Look at our Lord in his crib as upon one of
the thrones of his mercy, and say to him :
O dear and divine Infant ! thou art my
hope ; thou, the only Son of God, the
omnipotent Creator of the universe, the
treasury of all blessings, thou art my hope,
thou art my refuge, my support, and my
whole confidence. Thou hast taken my flesh
to remedy its infirmities and weaknesses ;
thou hast taken my soul to release it from its
sins and deliver it from all the defects to
which it is subject ; thou hast taken poverty
to make me look to thee for aid in my tem-
poral necessities ; I behold thee shedding
tears because thou dost desire to wipe mine
away and to console me in my sorrows. O
divine Infant ! Thou art indeed my sweetest
hope!

8. Sorrow for our sins.

If the birth of our Lord is a mystery of
joy, it is also a mystery of sadness ; and if the
angel said that he announced^ a subject of
great joy, he might have added that he gave
us a motive of lively sorrow for our sins.
Truly, could there be anything more capable

io8 Practice of Union zvitli Our Lord

of exciting in our hearts an intense regret for
our sins, than the frightful extremity to which
for their atonement we have reduced the
divine Majesty? than a sight of the Son of
God, the Creator of heaven and earth, becom-
ing a creature, becoming a man, a miserable
man ? than to behold him born in a stable,
laid in a crib between two animals, poor,
contemned, and destitute of every comfort ?
than to see God a little child, God lying upon
the straw, God weeping, God chilled by the
cold, in order to appease the anger of the
Father irritated, against us, to satisfy the
divine justice and pay our debts ? We may say
to him in the words of the prophet Abdias,
though using them in a different sense :
"Behold I have made thee small among the
nations ; thou art exceeding contemptible."
(Abd. 2.) Alas ! Why are wre so unfortunate
as to have reduced God to this ?

If it wrere necessary for the expiation of a
crime committed by one of the people that
the king,. the queen, the princes, and all the
chief personages of a kingdom, should weep
bitterly, should traverse the streets with
naked feet and clothed in sackcloth, and
should fast on bread and water for an entire
year, and the offender, witnessing all, were

From Cliristmas to Lent. 109

not sorry for his fault, would it not be a sign
that he was out of, his senses ? How then can
we, if we have our reason, not regret our
sins which have brought Infinite Majesty to
the strange necessity of covering itself with
the sackcloth of our mortality, of being born;
in a stable like a beast, and of suffering all
that it has ?

This is why we should testify to God ex-
treme regret for our offences which have
reduced him to such a lamentable state, and
with all the earnestness of which we are
capable should beg him to pardon them. As-
suredly, as children easily forgive, this divine
Infant will forgive us.

p. Desires and Petitions.

May our Lord be born in us, may he accom-
plish in our hearts his spiritual circumcision,
may he impress upon them his other mysteries,
may he give us the grace and spirit of those
mysteries ! such should be our aspiration, and
to attain it we should seek to draw him into
us in all his states.

It is necessary that the birth of our Lord,,
his circumcision, his poverty, the- contradic-
tions, the scorn, the persecutions, and the

other characteristics of his life on earth, should
10

1 1 o Practice of Union with Our Lord

be reproduced in his elect while they are pil-
grims here below. The gre-at St. Leo, speak-
ing of the birth of Christ, says : " The genera-
tion of Jesus Christ is the generation of all
Christians, the birth of the head is the birth
of the body ; even as wre have been crucified
with our Lord in his passion, have risen with
him in his 'resurrection, and have ascended
with him to the right hand of God his Father
■in his ascension, wre were born with him in his
birth." This is to be understood not only of
the natural and moral union which we have
with our Lord, but still further and more par-
ticularly of the care we should take to engrave
upon both our interior and exterior the virtues
and features of his mysteries. We must have
great desires for this and must pray for it
earnestly and continually, and thereby attract
our Lord into our souls to produce this effect
in them.

III.— THE VIRTUES.

7. Professed imitation of onr Lord.

One of the chief reasons wrhy the Son of
God was pleased to clothe himself with a
human nature and dwell visibly among men,
was to teach them the just value of things

From Christmas to Lent. 1 1 1

which they were very ignorant of, and the
road to salvation which they traveled but
blindly. This office belonged to him more
particularly than to the Father or the Holy
Ghost, because he is by his personal perfection
uncreated wisdom and truth itself, and by his
mercy incarnate wisdom, to which properly
belongs the teaching office. For this reason
the prophet Malachi calls him the Sun of
Justice (Mai. iv. 2), who would by the rays of
his example and words show justice to men ;
that is to say, in the first place, what virtue
and perfection are, and in the second place,
the relative value of heaven and earth, the
soul and the body, eternal and temporal
blessings, riches and poverty, honor and op-
probrium, prosperity and adversity, and the
measure of esteem we should have for these
things. And Christ, speaking of himself, calls
himself the Light of the world : " I am the
Light of the world." (Jno. viii. 12.) And
again: " I am come a light into the world,
that whosoever believeth in me may not re-
main in darkness." (Jno. xii. 46.) I am come
to make known to men what is true and what
is false, what is good and what is bad, what is
precious and what is vile, what should be
carefully treasured and what should be scorn-

1 1 2 Practice of Union with Our Lord

ed and avoided. Behold why I have come.
In another place he says : " Neither be ye
called masters ; for one is your master, Christ."
(Matt, xxiii. 10.) Be not ambitious to be
called doctor and master ; for you have a
doctor and a master, who is Jesus Christ.

If Jesus Christ is the master and doctor, he
must have a school and a chair. Where then
is his school, where is his chair ? His school
is the stable of Bethlehem ; the crib is the
chair whence this divine Doctor, this admir-
able Master teaches men and appoints their
lessons.

Yes, but from that chair he utters not a
word. True ; but in his silence he speaks
much, and even more than he could say in
words, because his doctrine is not speculative
but practical ; he has not come to teach us to
talk well, but to do well, and this is learned
much better from works than from words. As
St. Bernard says : " He does not speak, his
tongue is not yet loosened, for he is a child
only just born ; nevertheless, all that is in
him speaks, crys, and proclaims, his doctrine."
(Serm. 3, Nat. Dom.)

But what is his doctrine ? What does he
teach ? He teaches things which are diamet-
rically opposed to the opinions of men. The

From Christmas to Lent. 113

same Father says : "In omnibus ninndi judi-
cium arguitur, stibvertihir, confictaturr (Serin.
3, Nat. Dom.) The judgment which men form
of the value of things, is condemned, over-
thrown, and destroyed by all that is seen in
our Lord in the crib.

It should be remarked that men from the
beginning of the world always esteemed riches
more than poverty, honors rather than oppro-
brium, pleasures before pains ; the Eternal
Wisdom came to eradicate these old opinions,
to make them understand that they were false,
and to impress upon their minds very different
ideas. It would have been just as easy for the
Son of God to be born in a magnificent palace
as in a stable, to be laid in a cradle of gold
studded with diamonds as in a manger upon
straw, to have kings and princes around him
instead of an ox and an ass ; he could have
chosen to be born in summer rather than in
winter, at noon instead of at midnight, and in
the midst of every comfort and luxury rather
than in the greatest destitution. It was not
his will ; on the contrary, he wished to appear
to our eyes poor, contemned, weeping, and
trembling with cold, in order to show us our
wrong estimate of temporal things, and to
give us a knowledge of their true value. It is

114 Practice of Union with Our Lord

as clear as the sunlight that God, wise and
blessed as he is, would never have suffered"in
his person so much pain and sorrow, and
abased himself to the humiliations of the
stable which were so unworthy of his divine
Majesty, merely to deceive us and persuade
us of a falsehood.

Therefore let us stand firmlv, and although
the world continues to persevere in its old
opinions and errors, let us believe that it
deceives itself, since Eternal truth thus assures
us of it by his actions. Let us remember the
argument of St. Bernard, to which there is no
reply : " Either our Lord or the world is
mistaken ; now it is impossible that Wisdom
should be mistaken, otherwise it would not be
wisdom ; hence we must conclude that it is
the world that is mistaken. Still further, the
prudence of the flesh is called in the Holy
Scriptures folly, seeing that Jesus Christ who
is uncreated and incarnate wisdom, and who
consequently cannot be deceived, has chosen
that which is most distasteful to the flesh, we
must necessarily infer that it is the best and
most useful for man and what he ought to
choose ; and, that whosoever shall teach or
persuade us of the contrary must be shunned
as a seducer and a cheat." (Serm.de Nat.)

From Christmas to Lent. 115

I et us then picture to ourselves our Lord
in the stable and in the manger as our divine
Doctor and only Master in his school and in
his pulpit, giving us his lessons and addressing
to us by his works these words of Isaiah :
"This is the way ; walk ye in it and go not
aside, neither to the right hand, nor to the
left." (Is. xxx. 20.) This is the way to sal-
vation, to perfection, and to heaven ; if you
turn from it, you will fall into precipices.

Look upon him who is the King of kings to
whom belongs the entire universe, and who is
the Creator of all the riches of the world. He
has been pleased to be born poor and in want
of the most necessary things, to teach us how
he esteems poverty more than riches, and
how we, after his example, should esteem
it ; to reprove us for our excessive affec-
tion for earthly blessings, and our undue care
to provide for our needs, and our impatience
and murmurings when we have not all we
desire.

Look upon him who is the God of glory and
the Infinite Majesty, in the state of extreme
humiliation and annihilation to which he has
reduced himself, to teach us humility, and to
reprove our pride, our vanity, and our open
and hidden seeking after the honors of the

Il6 Practice of Unio7i zvitli Our Lord

world and the esteem of men. Thinking" of
this, St. Bernard asks : " How can it be that
man, who is but a worm of the earth, has not
courage to humble himself in presence of the
divine Majesty so deeply humbled ?" (Serm.
I, in Epiph.)

See him, even while he governs with sover-
eign authority and infinite wisdom all creatures
in heaven and earth, see him in the arms of
his Mother permitting her to move him, place
him, handle him as she thinks best ; and this,
that he may persuade us to allow ourselves to
be guided without resistance by our superiors,
and by his providence, in all things whether
agreeable or not, and to reprove our want of
submission. Behold the instructions which
this heavenly Doctor gives us in the crib !
Behold what he teaches us !

It now remains for you who wish to pass for
his disciples, to be so in reality, and, renounc-
ing the false opinions of corrupt nature, to
make open profession of believing his doctrine
and putting it in practice. There is no im-
posture to be feared in following Truth, no
dishonor in imitating the Son of God ; on
the contrary, we can do nothing which will
be more useful and glorious to us ; and cer-
tainly we cannot depart from the way of truth

From Christmas to Lent. 117

without entering into that of deceit, nor can
we leave wisdom without falling into folly.

2. Contempt of the World.

What we are about to remark will confirm
what we have just said. It is a strange thing
to see the extreme contempt which our Lord
expressed for all earthly grandeur, and how at
his first entrance into the world, at the first
step he takes, he tramples under foot all that
men esteem and admire, honors, riches, repu-
tation, and pleasures, teaching us by this
example how we are deceived in our judg-
ment of the value of these things, and how
rather we should regard them.

The star of the Magi gives us great light on
this subject. St. Matthew relates how this
miraculous star appearing to the princes in
their own country, caused them to start forth
and led them to Judea and to Jerusalem ; how
they inquired boldly where the King of the
Jews was born ; how the star was eclipsed
while they remained in Jerusalem, and when
they were about departing from that city,
reappeared, guided them to Bethlehem, and
stopped over the stable where the child was.
How many mysteries and excellent instruc-
tions this narrative contains for us !

1 1 S Practice of Union with Our Lord

First, the star, that is to say the light and
the guides that God gives us to direct us in
the path of our salvation and bring us to the
perfection to which he calls us, should cause
us to leave our country, in other words our-
selves, and go to Jesus Christ. "The star
went before them until it came and stood over
where the child was." (Matt. ii. 9.) It guided
them so far, and did not pass beyond. Even
so all right direction and all good guides lead
always to Jesus Christ ; they teach, they incite,
they continually encourage and persuade us
to go to him, to love him, to think of him, to
unite ourselves to him, to imitate him as
closely as the condition of each one of us will
permit, and to make this the foundation and
main part of all our devotions ; because he is
our Saviour, our Redeemer our Last End and
our road to reach it, our beatitude and our
means of attaining it, and finally our all for
our salvation.

The star then guided the Magi to Jesus
Christ. But in what state, and in what place ?
To Jesus Christ a child. And where ? To
Jesus Christ not radiant on a throne of glory,
but hidden in a stable and couched in a
manger, in a state of extreme poverty and
humility, to teach us that God's true lights

From Christmas to Lent. 119

lead to the infancy of our Lord, to the sim-
plicity, docility, submission, faith and inno-
cence of children ; and to make us understand
that all our lights, our knowledge, our science,
our devotions, and our good direction, should
lead to Jesus Christ, poor, humiliated and
scorned, that we may esteem, adore, and
honor him in that condition which he has
assumed for us, and then imitate him.

It was there that the star guided the Magi,
and not elsewhere ; it even obscured itself
above the rich and proud city of Jerusalem.
It is there the Magi, that is the wise, go fear-
lessly, not repulsed by this poor and abject
exterior. But why ?

Because they know that the present life is a
life of faith and consequently a life hidden,
rather than plainly manifested. The shep-
herds were told by the angel in precise words
that they should find "the Infant WTapped in
swaddling clothes and laid in a manger"
(Luke ii. 12), to signify to us that in this
world we see our Lord and his mysteries
through a veil, not openly, face to face.

Secondly, because they know that this life
is a life of merit, and that we must gain our
beatitude as a reward, and therefore we must
labor ; for there is no reward without merit,

120 Practice of Union with Qjir Lord

and no merit without labor. We must labor,
that is we must exercise acts of virtue, of
poverty, of humility, of submission, and others
of which our Lord has given us an example.

Finally, because they understand that man
is completely ruined in soul and body by sin,
and that all that is in him is, owing to the
vicious inclination of his corrupt nature, either
the concupisence of the flesh for pleasures, or
the concupisence of the eyes for riches, or the
pride of life for honors,* as is declared by St.
John (i Jno. ii. 16) ; it is impossible for man
to become virtuous unless he is changed,
neither can he be made capable of the happi-
ness which God prepares for him if he does
not correct his vices.

But how shall he correct them ? By their
opposites. It is a general principle of medi-
cine that diseases cannot be cured except by
remedies opposed to them ; reason and expe-
rience demonstrate this truth ; we never see
like destroy its. like; heat does not banish
heat ; cold is not chased away by cold, but
clings to it as its friend, and by the union of
the same natures increases it ; it is cold which,
by the difference and hostility of its nature,
extinguishes heat, and heat by the same law
of opposition drives away cold.

From Christinas to Lent. 12 r

Thus we must not expect that our proud
and ambitious nature will ever be cured by
glory, dignity, and praise, which serve as food
for pride and ambition ; but only by humilia-
tions and abasements, wThich are the contraries
of those passions! Our irregular affection for
riches will not be corrected by possessing
them, but by poverty as the right salve for
the wound. Our inclination for pleasures will
be nourished and increased by the enjoyment
of them, and can be destroyed only by con-
trarieties and sufferings. You are too fond of
creatures ; it will not be their conversation
and attention that will deliver you from this
defect, but rather their neglect and con-
tempt. Such, then, are the medicines for
our diseases, and without using them we can-
not be healed.

Even when human nature has not been
spoiled and corrupted by sin, as in the Blessed
Virgin ; and when it has been but very slightly,
as in St. John the Baptist ; and when it has
suffered to the degree that is ordinarily wit-
nessed in men, though afterward restored
miraculously, and receiving a most powerful
grace which renders it invulnerable to mortal
sin, as in the apostles, it must still be pre-
served, nourished, and strengthened by these

11

122 Practice of Union zcith Our Lord

same medicines — so true it is that our evils
and vices must be treated and cured in one
manner, and that no other will be efficacious.

Our Lord who had no need for himself of
these remedies, his nature being infinitely
holy and absolutely impeccable, and who
came to sanctify our nature, approved them,
esteemed them, loved them, sought and made
use of them, in order to teach us that they
are the true and only ones which we must
employ to recover spiritual health. He also
made use of them to purify them, to sanctify
and deify them in his person, and thus to
sweeten for us their bitterness and render it
easier for us to use them.

This is why the kings, the magi, the wise,
and all men, should go to the stable and the
crib to learn the method of their cure ; and
those whose condition does not permit them
to leave their honors and riches to imitate cur
Lord, should know that they must at least
renounce their affection for them ; let them
listen to the warning which David, a great
king, gives them in these words : "If riches
abound, set not your heart upon them." (Is.
lxi. II.) The same warning applies to honors
and pleasures.

But as, in consequence of the weakness of

From Christmas to Lent. 123

our nature and the powerful attraction of
sensible things, it is very difficult to keep our
hearts detached from them, and very unusual
to be surrounded by worldly glory without
being a little vainglorious, to be among vani-
ties without being vain, among pleasures
without taking pleasure in them, to possess
riches without in some degree loving them — in
short, to be truly poor in spirit, we ought to
consider it a great grace and a singular bless-
ing from God when he takes from us such
occasions of falling and places us, as regards
the things of this world, in a state where our
feeble virtue is not in such danger and can be
more easily sustained and strengthened.

Therefore, let us go with the magi, following
the star of our Lord's example ; let us boldly
enter Jerusalem and ask where the King of the
Jews is born, without minding what the world
will say about us ; let us with head erect enter
the stable, let us adore the Child in the crib
without being repulsed by its mean exterior ;
on the contrary, let us, like those wise men,
count it our greatest wisdom and our highest
prudence to recognize and adore the Divinity
in that poverty and lowliness, seeing in the
poverty our treasures, in the lowliness our
exaltation, and in the opprobrium our glory.

124 Practice of Union zvitli Onr Lord

Let us, after the model which our Lord gives
us, scorn this inferior and visible world where
we are to abide but for a little time, and where
things are but shadows ; and let us unceas-
ingly aspire to the superior and invisible world
which will be our eternal dwelling, and where
true riches, true honors, and true pleasures
await us.

Let us constantly mistrust this w*orld as a
deceiver, and no matter what it presents for
our enjoyment let us suspect it as we would
the offerings and gifts of an enemy. St. Am-
brose says (Lib. de Virgin.) that as poison is
always disguised with honey or sugar, other-
wise it would not be taken, so vices would not
tempt us if they showed themselves in their
natural ugliness and revealed the evils that
follow them ; the world and the flesh could
not deceive us — the one wTith its vanities, the
other with its pleasures — if they did not dis-
guise themselves and hide their consequences.

J. Mortification, exterior and interior.

As an example of exterior mortification, we
see our Lord born in the darkest hour of the
night and in the severest month of the winter ;
on the eighth day spilling his blood from a
most sensitive wound, the apprehension of

From Christmas to Lent. 125^

which at so tender an age and in so delicate a
body, injured him as much as the incision
caused him pain ; then suffering excessively
the greatest inconveniences in a strange coun-
try ; whence he says by his prophet: "In
laboribus a juventnte pied? (Ps. lxxxvii. 16.)
" I am poor, and in labors from my youth."

For interior mortification, our Lord was
circumcised before he received the sacred
name of Jesus, which means Saviour, to teach
us that the circumcision of the spirit which
consists in the retrenchment of thoughts,
desires, affections, words, and all other super-
fluous things, is necessary to receive the effects
of the name of Jesus, which are grace, peace,
joy, salvation, and perfection.

Oh ! how important, if we would belong to
Jesus in this world and in the other; is this
circumcision of the spirit of which that of the
body was only the -figure ! It must necessarily
be effected in you if you wish to be saved, and
to be sprinkled with the blood that Jesus
Christ shed for men in this mystery. This is
win- we are told : " Circumcidimini Domino ."
(Jer. iv. 4.) "Be circumcised to the Lord."
Practice circumcision in your interior where
God dwells, as in his temple, and where he
should be honored ; and be careful, if you

126 Practice of Union with Our Lord

would bear his mark, as he is not a body but
a spirit, to retrench the uncleanness of your
heart and the foolishness of your spirit.

Thus St. Paul says: "We are the circum-
cision." " Nos sumus circitmcisior (Philipp.
iii. 3.) We are circumcised as well as the
Jews ; but while the Jews, in their gross and
carnal law, were circumcised only according
to the flesh, we, in our law, which is spiritual
and perfect, are circumcised in a more excel-
lent and noble manner — in the spirit. And
addressing all true Christians in the persons
of those who were at Colossae, he says : "You
are circumcised with circumcision' not made
by hand in the despoiling of the body of the
flesh, but in the circumcision of Christ."
(Coloss. ii. 1 1.)

41 Thy head is like Carmel," (Cant. vii. 5)
says the divine Spouse to all souls who are,
or who desire to be his spouses; "thy head
should be like the mountain of Carmel,"
which signifies, according to the interpreta-
tion of St. Jerome, the science of circumcision.
Your first and principal exercise should be to
practice well the circumcision of the spirit.
Jesus will not be given to you unless you are
circumcised ; he gives himself only after cir-
cumcision, but then he gives himself in reality.

From Christmas to Lent. 127

Undertake, then, this spiritual circumcision,
with a resolution gently strong and constant,
retrenching from your interior and exterior,
cutting down your affections, your desires,
your words, your clothes, your table, your
furniture, your amusements — in a word, all
those superfluities which the doctrine of the
Gospel cannot endure, nor the eye of faith
behold unpained after having seen our Lord
in the stable, in Egypt, in Nazareth, and on
the Gross.

^. Esteem and love of the hidden life.

Retreat, silence, and prayer have been sin-
gularly prominent in these mysteries ; and by
that secret and retired life, by that life of
silence and prayer which our Lord led for so
long a time and almost always, he has clearly
shown us how much he prized and loved it,
and how after his example we ought to hold
it in high esteem and practice it constantly.

Assuredly it is in solitude, in silence, in
separation from creatures and in communion
with God, who is wisdom, purity, and sanctity
itself, that we will become wise, pure, and
holy ; while in intercourse with men we will
continue to be only like men, and frequently
like something lower than men. Converse

128 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

"with men usually distracts, weakens, dissipates,
embarrasses, and stains the soul ; but converse
with God produces in it quite contrary effects.

As a means of enkindling our love for this
secret and hidden life we must reflect how the
Divine Word dwelt for an eternity hidden in
the bosom of his Father without producing
himself exteriorly; and when with his Father
and the Holy Ghost he had accomplished the
work of creation, he still remained, for four
thousand years shut up and concealed without
manifesting himself; and when he did manifest
himself and appeared in person to the eyes of
men, it was under the cloak of our nature,
which disguised him so completely that he was
taken for another. Still more, though he
came to teach, he passed thirty years without
saying a word save on one single occasion,
and that at an age when men would be un-
likely to pay much heed to his instructions ;
and when at last he was pleased to teach men
and converse with them, he was always a
hidden and an unknown God. (Is. xlv. 15.)

It is remarkable that our Lord, the Word of
God, the Incarnate wisdom and the Doctor of
men, who could have told us so many beautiful
and good things, and who could not have told
us a single bad one, lived thirty years without

From Christmas to Lent. 129

telling us anything excepting once by the way
as it were ; moreover, that God willed that all
his words and actions during that long period,
which undoubtedly were most excellent, should
be almost entirely unknown to us ; it teaches
us liow much our Lord loved silence and sepa-
ration from creatures, and how we should love
the same silence and separation.

There is nothing which consists less in
words than Christianity ; it is formed entirely
of effects. "The kingdom of God is not in
speech, but in power," says the Apostle. (1
Cor. iv. 20.) And this is evident from the
manner of preaching followed by our Lord
and his apostles ; it was very simple and very
popular. Whence St. Paul, the greatest
preacher of the Church, writing to the Corin-
thians who prided themselves upon their fine
language, tells them : "When I came to you
I came not in loftiness of speech or of wisdom,
declaring unto you the testimony of Christ.
For I judged not myself to know anything
among you, but Jesus Christ and him crucified.
And I was with you in weakness, and in fear,
and in much trembling ; and my speech and
my preaching was not in the persuasive words
of human wisdom, but in the showing of the
spirit and power." (1 Cor. ii. I, 2, 3, 4.)

130 Practice of Union with Our Lord

Among the Gentiles speech was a power ;
the eloquence of Demosthenes and Cicero
produced marvelous effects in their republics.
But before God, and among true Christians,
works have the greatest weight ; works are
praised or blamed, are rewarded or punished,
according to their merit ; thus our Lord says
that on the day of judgment "he will render
to every man according to his works." (Matt,
xvi. 27.)

It is in the hidden life, the life of silence
and prayer, that we will grow with our Lord,
of whom St. Luke says, that he " advanced in
wisdom, and age, and grace wTith God and
men." (Luke ii. 52.) The characteristic of
the just is to grow, to advance constantly
from good to better without stopping. David
says the just " shall go from virtue to virtue "
(Ps. lxxxiii. 8), they will make each day new
progress on the road of their salvation. David's
son compares them to the light which appear-
ing at morning in the horizon, goes on increas-
ing continually until it reaches its perfection
at mid-day. (Prov. iv. 18.) The wicked, on
the contrary, remain always in the same place,
as David well expressed when he said : 4< The
wicked walk round about." (Ps. xi. 9.) The
impious, that is those who make profession of

From Christmas to Lent. 131

piety but practice it badly, walk found about
like animals that turn wheels, and after having
made five hundred turns and getting tired
during the whole day, are at night just where
they began in the morning ; these unfortunate
Christians after many turns and circles of
their practices of devotion, of their commu-
nions, their prayers, etc., during the course of
several years, find themselves at the same
degree of humility, of patience, of obedience,
and of virtue, as they were at first.

But the just, after the example of our Lord,
who is their great pattern, advance constantly.
At the same time we must remember, with
the holy Fathers, that our Lord's advance-
ment in wisdom and grace was only exterior
and in the eyes of men, who saw every day
new effects of increased wisdom and stronger
grace, and not interior and in the depths of
his being, where his wisdom, his grace, and
his other perfections could not receive any
increase ; and he was in that, as in many
other things like the sun, which possesses
as much light and heat when it rises in the
morning as at noon, though we say that in
proportion as it shines higher and higher
above our heads it increases in light and heat,
not in itself, but in regard to us, by bestow-

132 Practice of Union with Our Lord

ing upon us a more abundant measure of these
effects. Still we may say, with St. Thomas
and the theologians, that our Lord really
advanced every day in the experimental
knowledge of things, as well as in age.

The Just, imitating our Lord, grow in wis-
dom, in grace, and in virtue, not only by
producing, as he did, the exterior effects, but
by acquiring in their souls and contracting
the habits of wfisdom, grace, and virtue.

In order now to know how and in what wTay
the just advance, I say that it is just as our
bodies advance or grow. We sometimes see
a child of whom we remark : " There is a child
that is growing finely." Why ? Because his
body grows larger visibly, his members become
stronger and more robust every day. In the
same way the just grow and advance when
they become greater in thoughts, in affections,
and in designs for God ; when they have more
strength to bear adversities and persecutions,
and more courage to resist sin and practice
virtue.

They grow when they watch over their ex-
terior to regulate it well, and still more over
their interior to have a firmer faith, a more
filial hope, a more ardent charity, a more pro-
found humility, a more constant patience, a

From Christmas to Lent. 133

more submissive obedience, a more attentive
spirit of prayer, and purer intentions.

They grow when they labor to destroy the
old man that dwells in the members of their
bodies and in the faculties of their souls, and
to make the new man live in them. "Strip-
ping yourselves," says St. Paul, " of the old
man with his deeds, and putting on the new."
(Col. iii. 9.)

For this the just must watch over and do
violence to themselves ; otherwise it is not
possible to reform corrupt nature. The old
man will never willingly depart to give place
to the new; he must be chased out by vio-
lence ; whence were written these celebrated
words: "You will advance in virtue only in
proportion to the violence you do yourself."
(De Imit. Christi, L. I., c.xxv. 11.) The efforts
you make and the victories you gain over
yourself, will be the rule and measure of your
advancement.

He who desires to advance and to destroy a
vice must understand a most important and
absolutely necessary thing, namely, that he
must be attentive to himself and watch over
his actions. Without this attention and vigi-
lance, his nature, prone to that vice, will never

correct itself, because it will infallibly follow
12

1 34 Practice of Union zvitli Onr Lord

its inclination if not restrained, as we see in
all natural things. Do not expect a river to
leave its bed and change its course ; of itself
it will always follow its own current. Our
nature will do the same in regard to all its
inclinations and habits if it is not prevented ;
and this can be done only by vigilance and
attention to ourselves.

Therefore, rest all the hope of your advance-
ment, after the assistance of God, first on
watching over your actions* to restrain your
nature in its bad inclinations ; and then on the
violence which you must do yourself in order
to urge it to good. Thus you will grow ; in
any other way you will remain at the same
point entire years with all your exercises of
devotion, and never pass beyond.

Let us then grow with our Lord in his
growth, drawing him into us to help us in this
plan of spiritual advancement. " We may in
all things grow up in him," says St. Paul.
(Ephes. iv. 15.) Let us grow up in him ac-
cording to all the dimensions of virtue. See
how the flowers, the trees, the animals con-
stantly grow until they reach the highest
degree of their perfection. You yourself grow
every day as regards your body which contin-

From Christmas to Lent. 135

ually increases in height, size, and strength,
until it attains its full natural proportions.

Seeing this, would it not be a great shame
for you if your soul, that is incomparably
nobler than your body, did not grow in like
manner, but should remain always in the same
state of littleness and childhood. If your
body should be as small and have as diminu-
tive members at the age of thirty years as
when you were but three months old and
were still wrapped in swaddling clothes, you
would feel extreme confusion to be thus
formed and to see yourself a child in size when
you should be a man. You would certainly
be considered a monstrosity, and people would
pay money to look at you. Now, what is not
the misfortune of your body is the misfortune
of your soul when it does not grow in virtue,
but ever remains stunted, puny, and weak in
the practice of virtue and in the government
of your passions. Therefore, be terrified at
seeing in yourself this monstrous disposition,
endeavor to cast it off and to grow up from it.

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

These should be drawn from the mysteries
of the season. You may take them from the
books that suit you best, or may derive them

136 Practice of Union with Our Lord

from what we have said, dwelling chiefly upon
the affections that attract you most, and upon
the virtues most necessary to you.

V.— READING.

See what has been said under this heading
in the last chapter.

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

" If any man love not our Lord Jesus Christ,
let him be anathema, maranatha," (1 Cor. xvi.
22) — cursed because our Lord is come and is
made man for him !

" My soul hath fainted after thy salvation ;
and in thy Word I have very much hoped."
(Ps. cxviii. 81.) My soul hath fainted from
the strength of its love for thy incarnate Son
whom thou hast sent here belowr to save us,
and I have steadfastly placed in him all my
hopes.

"Thy eyes shall see thy teacher, and thy
ears shall hear the word of one admonishing
thee behind thy back : ' This is the way, walk
ye in it, and go not aside, neither to the right
hand, nor to the left." (Is. xxx. 20, 21.)
Thy eyes shall see thy Preceptor and thy
Master in the crib as in his pulpit, and thy
ears shall hear him telling thee : " Behold

From Christmas to Lent. 137

the right way, walk in it ; by it you must
reach your salvation and your perfection ;
turn neither to the right nor the left, if you
would not be lost.

"Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem; for
thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord
is risen upon thee." (Is. lx. 1.) Arise, Jeru-
salem, above the earth and above low and
human views ; open thy eyes to the light that
is sent thee ; behold the day appears and the
Sun of Justice will illumine thee ; behold the
glory of the Lord shown to thee in the stable.

44 You are dead, and your life is hid with
Christ in God." (Col. iii. 3.) You ought to
be dead, and to lead a life retired and hidden
in God, after the pattern of that which Christ
led.

CHAPTER V.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD FOR
THE SEASON OF LENT.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

As the holy season of Lent is especially
consecrated to the remembrance of the suffer-
ings and death which our Lord was pleased
to endure for us, the practice will be to inhale
him and draw him into us in his suffering
and dying states, to unite ourselves closely
with him in the dispositions of those states,
and to enter into the spirit of his cross if we
desire to share its fruits and merits.

I have already said that if we seriously
desire to be saved, our greatest care and the
object of all our devotions should be to unite
ourselves to our Lord in his mysteries, and in
everything. I say. it again, and it is most
certain, because our salvation, our perfection,
all the grace, all the glory, and generally all
the blessings that we can ever possess in this
life and in the other, depend upon this union ;
for, as the holy Precursor says: "Of his full-
ness we have all received, and grace for grace."

For the Season of Lent. 139

(Jno. i. 16.) We have all drawn from his
source, and all our graces are only drops and
little rivulets which flow to us from the
streams that were given him without measure
for himself and for us.

Now, if we ought to unite ourselves with
our Lord in all his mysteries, I add here that
it is in the mystery of his passion and death
that we ought chiefly to do so, and that it is
with him suffering and dying that we should
form our principal and closest ties. In the
same manner as our body, while it is united in
all its members to our soul as the principle
of its life, is in a more intimate manner in
the nobler parts, and especially in the heart ;
whence Aristotle says that the heart is the
part of the body which receives life first and
loses it last. Even so we should be united to
our Lord in all his mysteries, and in a most
especial manner in that of his cross, because
it is in his cross and by his cross that he has
planned and decreed our predestination, that
he has obtained our conversion, that he has
secured our justification, that he has paid
our debts, merited for us all the gifts of grace
and glory we shall ever receive, and negoti-
ated and concluded the whole business of our
salvation. This is why our salvation and our

140 Practice of Union with Our Lord

happiness are attached to our union with him
in this mystery.

To be predestined and saved it is necessary
to be united with our Lord not only when he
has the power and the will to predestine and
save, but when he actually does predestine and
save, offices which he properly and only exe-
cuted on the cross ; for, as theologians, sup-
ported by the Sacred Writings, teach, while
all our Lord's acts, even the least, were of
an infinite excellence on account of the infin-
ite dignity of his person, they were not infin-
itely meritorious to acquire for men the
blessings. of grace and glory, nor infinitely
satisfactory to discharge their debts towards
the Divine Justice, until they had been sprink-
led with his blood and consummated by his
death, to which God his Father had attached
the salvation of the human race as to the
perfection and crowning of the whole great
work. (Cs. Becan. Part iii., c. 14.)

Isaiah says : " If he shall lay down his life
for sin, he shall see a long-lived seed, and
the will of the Lord shall be prosperous in his
hand." (Is. liii. 10.) If he gives his life for
the remission of sin, he shall see a long line
of the just, and God's design to save men shall
be executed bv his hands nailed to the cross.

For the Season of Lent. 141

"We have redemption through his blood,"
says St. Paul. (Eph. i. 7.) We are purchased
with the price of his blood. And St. John
declares : "Jesus Christ loved us, and washed
us from our sins in his own blood. " (Apoc. i.
5.) The whole Church militant proclaims the
same truth when she says in the preface of the
Mass of the Holy Cross : "Who didst effect
the salvation of mankind on the wood of the
Cross." And the Church triumphant sings
to our Lord, according to the narrative
of St. John : " Thou wast slain, and hast
redeemed us to God in thy blood." (Apoc.
v. 9.) Thou wast put to death, and, .by the
merit of thy death and of thy blood, thou hast
purchased us and acquired for us the eternal
blessings we now enjoy.

God might have pardoned men their sins in
a thousand other ways, but he preferred the
way of the Cross, as being to him and even to
his Son incomparably more honorable, and to
us more useful. Inasmuch as God had been
dishonored and offended by the sins of men
it was necessary that his honor should be
restored and his justice satisfied. This un-
doubtedly was accomplished more fully and
with an infinitely greater advantage by the
sufferings and death of his Son, than if he

142 Practice of Union with Our Lord

had refused to accept anything, or had de-
manded the death of criminal men or the
destruction of innocent angels, because there
is nothing which as a reparation could com-
pare with the death of a God ; still more,
because the Son of God in dying surmounted
forever his enemies, sin and the devil, and
triumphed over them gloriously, and by his
victory made us his booty and his conquest
and acquired us to himself, and gave us many
more reasonsto honor him, to thank him, and
to love him, than if he had not suffered for
us.

The blessings which we derive from our
Lord's death are infinite, because by it he has
delivered us from the servitude of sin and given
us our liberty ; he has trampled the devil under
his feet, so that, unless we are willing, he can
no longer injure us ; he has closed the gates
of hell and opened to us those of paradise ;
and he has shown his great regard for us and
the perfect love he bears us, by buying us so
dearly and giving infinitely more than was
necessary, since he might have ransomed us
with a single glance of his eye or one word
from his lips. A man who gives a hundred
thousand dollars for something which he might
buy for one cent, shows in the strongest man-

For the Season of Lent. 143

ner his high estimate of it, his deep affection
for it, and his violent desire to possess it.

Therefore we must infer that the mystery
of the Cross is the mystery of predestination,
of justification, of salvation, and of the entire
happiness of mankind ; it is there, in it, that
our Lord became truly ours and made us his ;
it is in it that he espoused the Church, "which
he hath purchased with his own blood," as St.
Paul declares. (Acts xx. 28.) There he made
himself our Head and us his members ; there
he pours upon us his salutary influences and
exercises, in a most admirable manner, his
functions as Chief, and desires that we should
acquit ourselves of the submission and other
duties that followers owe their Chief.

When St. Paul speaks of the body of the
Church, and of our Lord's union with the faith-
ful as the Head with the members, (Rom. vi.
5 ; Gal. ii. 19 ; Coloss. i. 24.) he almost always
makes mention of the Cross and death of our
Lord as the means and bond of this union,
just as our members are united with the head
by the nerves and muscles. From this we
should conclude that we ought to exert our-
selves to our utmost to unite ourselves with
our Lord, especially in this mystery of his
passion, and that it should be the part of our

144 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

devotions to which we should apply ourselves
more than to all the rest.

Let us imitate St. Paul, who, writing to the
Corinthians, said : "I judged not myself to
know anything among you but Jesus Christ,
and him crucified." (i Cor. ii. 2.) To this I
reduced all my science. And let us copy St.
Bernard, who, speaking of our Lord's death
and passion, renders this testimony of him-
self:" I believed that true wisdom consisted
in meditation on the sufferings and death of
my Saviour ; I chose it as the most efficacious
means to acquire virtues and attain perfection ;
I relied upon it for the completion of my
knowledge, for the riches of my salvation,
and for the abundance of my merits. Behold
my highest philosophy, to know Jesus Christ,
and Jesus Christ crucified." (Serm. 43, in
Cant.)

In order to practice this most important
exercise and unite yourself with our Lord
crucified, you must perform carefully and with
great earnestness what wre shall now direct ;
taking for the food of your understanding and
the occupation of your will, not the whole
together, but sometimes one thing and some-
times another, according as you feel disposed,
dwelling upon it until it makes an impression

For the Season of Lent. 145

on your soul, or you find it powerless to move
you, when you may pass to another point that
may produce more effect upon you.

II.— THE AFFECTIONS.

Taking it for granted that the soul has a.
lively faith and a perfect conviction that he
who was fastened to the Cross for us is the
true and only Son of God, which faith and
conviction must be the foundation and basis
of all the rest, the first affection will be :

. 1. Admiration.

As what is great, new, and strange, excites
admiration and astonishment in the beholder,
and in the same proportion in which it is
great, new, and strange, so we cannot doubt
that the first affection that should touch our
hearts at this holy time should be extreme
admiration and profound astonishment at
seeing God fastened to a gibbet and dying
upon it. God fastened to a gibbet ! God
dying ! What an object ! What a spectacle !
Neither eternity nor time has ever seen, or
will ever see, anything like it, or that ap-
proaches a resemblance to it. Truly here we

should cry out with the Prophet : " Who bath
13

T46 Practice of Union with Our Lord

ever heard such a thing ? and who hath seen
the like to this ?" (Is. lxvi. 8.)

The friends of Job seeing- that holy man
fallen from a high and happy position into an
abyss of misery, and seated upon a dunghill
scraping with a piece of pottery the matter
•which flowed from the sores on his body, were
•so terrified that for seven days they were quite
out of their senses and powerless to address
.'him a single word. Yet he was only a man,
and his afflictions were but figures and

shadows of those of the Son of God.

■

Therefore what should be our astonishment,
and with what awe should we not be filled at
>the sight of the Creator of heaven and earth,
the King of kings, the Lord of lords, the God
of glory, the Infinite Majesty and Holiness
itself, taken as a criminal, treated as a male-
factor, cruelly cut with whips at a pillar, and
made frightful with his own blood, crowned
writh sharp thorns, struck, his face spat upon,
the hair plucked from his head and his beard
torn, all imaginable outrages heaped on him,
and then dying upon an infamous cross be-
tween two thieves ! God suffering such indig-
nities and dying in such a manner ! Is it not
enough to cause our hearts to faint and our
souls to sink to nothingness ?

For the Season of Lent. 147

The prophet Daniel having" seen only in
the person of an angel a figure of this truth,
and heard from his lips some words which
gave him a knowledge of it, says of himself :
4' There remained no strength in me, and the
appearance of my countenance was changed
in me, and I fainted away and retained no
strength. And I heard the voice of his words ;
and when I heard I lay in a consternation
upon my face, and my face was close to the
ground." (Dan. x. 8, 9.) If the figure made
so powerful an impression upon a man of the
Old Law, what may not, and what ought not
the reality to effect upon us in the New
Law ?

To speak with all reason, there is nothing
in the passion and death of the Son of God,
the consideration of which is not capable of
ravishing our souls, and of plunging and
engulfing them in an abyss of astonish-
ment, because all in this mystery is of unpre-
cedented grandeur ; the dignity of the Person
who suffers is infinite ; the torments of body
and soul which he endures are innumerable
and excessive ; the insignificance and the
lack of merit of those for whom he suffers
is extreme, and the love with which he suffers

148 Practice of Unio?i with Oar Lord

is boundless. If we do not admire these won-
ders, what shall we admire ?

2. Compassion.

It would be terrible for us to have no com-
passion for our Lord's woes, since the elements
and inanimate things had so much ; we must
indeed be heartless if we can look upon his
horrible sufferings without pity.

The afflictions of an amiable and beloved
person move us to compassion and excite our
pity. If wre should see a young prince,
eighteen or twenty years of age, of an ex-
tremely delicate and sensitive constitution,
beautiful as the day, faultlessly gentle and
gracious, liberal, magnanimous, who had never
injured any one, but had ever done good to
all, and who was innocent of any crime, ex-
tended upon a wheel and an executioner
breaking his arms and legs, would it be pos-
sible, even if our heart were like a rock, to
witness such a sight without experiencing
deep emotions and shedding an abundance
of tears ? Most men would not even have
the courage to be present at so painful an
.execution and to behold so lamentable an
object. Now, all these qualities are found in
unequaled perfection in the person of our

For the Season of Lent. 149

Lord, whose sufferings consequently ought to
touch us far more and to make incomparably
deeper impressions upon our souls.

Let us represent to ourselves this only Son
of God, this Sovereign Monarch of the uni-
verse, in the Garden praying under circum-
stances so pitiful that the consideration of
them must needs move the hardest hearts.
Let us see him prostrate with his face to the
earth before his Father angered against us ;
let us hear the words he utters in the extrem-
ity of his weariness and distress: "My soul
is sorrowful even unto death !" And then let
us behold issuing from his whole body that
bloody sweat which makes him an object of
extreme commiseration, and obliges his Father
to send one of his angels to comfort him.

Or let us contemplate him bound, naked, to
a column, and exposed to the gaze of a crowd
of insolent spectators ; executioners enraged
and animated by the devils, discharge furi-
ously and with all their might a shower of
blows upon that virginal flesh and that most
delicate body, sparing neither the limbs, nor
any part which they do not bruise to blood,
and upon which they do not leave horrible
marks of their cruelty and diabolic rage.

Or again, let us look upon him hanging

150 Practice of Union zvitJi Our Lord

from a gibbet between two thieves, rendering
up his soul in a depth ot opprobrium, of
anguish, and of every species of suffering ;
and as the crown of all, let us remember that
we are the cause of his sufferings, that he
endures them for our sakes, and that it is his
perfect love for us which has brought him to
this extremity.

Is it possible that not being able to see a
man broken upon the wheel, nor even, which
is much less, a beast suffer and moan, without
being moved to pity, we can look tearlessly
and without emotion upon the inexplicable
sufferings of our Lord, sufferings v/hich we
have caused him ? The sight is so touching
that the prophet Isaiah says it causes even the
angels to weep. " Behold they that see shall
cry without, the angels of peace shall weep
bitterly." (Is. xxxiii. 7.) Behold the angels
who enjoy perfect peace in their beatitude,
are troubled, if wre may so say, and though
far removed from tears by the happiness of
their condition, shed them in torrents when
they contemplate the Son of God dishonored,
bathed in blood, torn, and outraged to the
degree that he was throughout the course of
his passion ; that is, they would melt into
tears if they were capable of them and if their

For the Season of Lent, 151

nature were like ours, although they are not,
as we are, the subject and cause of our Lord's
sufferings.

It is true that the love the angels have for
our Lord contributes much to their compas-
sion ; for if one loves, one has pity for the
woes of the person beloved, pity which in-
creases in proportion to the love. Thus a
mother cannot see her only son whom she
greatly loves, suffer even a pain in the end of
his finger without sharing that pain ; and if
his affliction is more serious, she feels her
whole soul moved and fainting ; she sighs,
she weeps, she laments, she is inconsolable,
she looks at her dear son with pitying eyes,
she mourns over him with bitter words, and
she comforts him as best she can — all this
she would not do if she did not love him.

Alas ! if we loved our Lord nearly as much
as we ought we wrould not be so indifferent
and insensible to his afflictions and sorrows,
but they would certainly pierce our hearts,
while now we see representations and hear
descriptions of them and are not touched ever
so slightly, because we do not love him.

Let us begin to love him, and compassion
for his excessive woes which he suffers through
us and for us, will soon follow, and will

152 Practice of Union with Our Lord

enable us to fulfill the famous prophecy of
Zachariah through whom our Lord says :
" They shall look upon me whom they have
pierced, and they shall mourn for me as one
mourneth for an only son." (Zach. xii. 10)
They shall look upon me fastened to the
Cross, and considering who I am and what I
suffer, from whom and for whom, that it is
they themselves who have brought me to
this state, and that I submit to it for their
salvation, they will break forth into great
lamentations and will weep as bitterly as a
mother who has lost her only son.

J. Regret for Sin.

It will be very easy as a consequence of our
compassion and the reasons we have con-
sidered in order to excite ourselves to it, to
conceive an extreme regret and to have a
true contrition for our sins.

We are the cause of all the woes and tor-
ments which our Lord suffered ; our sins
produced his pains, and apart from them he
would not have endured his passion and death.
The Prophet tells us : " He was wounded for
our iniquities, he was bruised for our sins."
(Is. liii. 5.) He was stricken for our ini-
quities ; for our crimes he was seized, buf-

For the Season of Lent. 153

feted, scourged, torn with rods, crowned with
thorns, and crucified. Is this not sufficient,
and more than sufficient, to transpierce our
hearts with sorrow and to chill our souls with
regret for having sinned ?

We have caused the Son of God to suffer,
to be scourged, buffeted, crucified. We are
the reason why the Infinite Majesty before
whom the highest Cherubim and Seraphim
prostrate themselves in adoration, has been
dishonored, why Sanctity itself has been
counted among criminals, Innocence con-
demned, Wisdom taken for folly, and the
Living God reduced to that extremity which
terrified the whole universe, of dying ignomin-
iously and cruelly on a gibbet between two
thieves.

Alas ! if on our account and for some fault
committed by us the meanest slave should be
whipped, or have his hand cut off by an exe-
cutioner, or even if through carelessness we
should break a dog's leg and should hear him
howl, it would be impossible for us not to be
sorry, and not to regret the harm we had done.

This is why the afflicted prophet Jeremiah
thinking of this incomparable subject for
regret, exclaims in his Lamentations: "Let
tears run down like a torrent day and night ;

154 Practice of Union with Our Lord

give thyself no rest, and let not the apple of
thy eye cease." (Lam. ii. 18.) My heart, be
filled with sadness and weariness, break with
sorrow ! And you, my eyes, open to torrents
of tears which shall never cease, that you may
regret and mourn for my sins that have caused
the sufferings and death of the Son of God !
Even the Jews, who were the immediate-
cause of our Lord's death, and who were pres-
ent at it with the pagan officers of justice,
returning from Calvary beat their breasts,
touched with sadness and repentance for the
evil deed they had just accomplished. (Luke
xxiii. 48.)

But, to enter still further and more perfectly
into the spirit of regret for our sins, we ought
for several consecutive days during this season
of Lent, which is properly the season for peni-
tence, to unite ourselves with particular care
to our Lord sorrowing and afflicted for our
sins, and to inhale him and draw him into us
in this disposition.

In order to understand this well we must
know that among the most remarkable acts
that our Lord performed for our salvation, one
was the extreme affection with which he gave
himself up to obtain the pardon of our sins
and to reconcile us with his Father. We had

For the Season of Lent. 155

all offended God ; we were all loaded with
crimes ; and for this the Divine Justice had
condemned us to eternal flames without hope
of ever being able to enter paradise. God
regarded us as his enemies upon whom he was
to exercise his vengeance forever, when his Son
through a goodness and love for which we can
never throughout all eternity be sufficiently
thankful, undertook to restore us to friendship
with his Father, to induce that Father to for-
get his injuries and pardon us our offences, so
that he might receive us again into his favor,
and from the enemies we were make of us his
children and open to us his paradise instead
of the hell we had merited. St. Paul says :
"When we were enemies we were reconciled
to God by the death of his Son." (Rom. v.
10.) Though we were enemies of God, we
have been happily reconciled to him and re-
stored to his favor by the mediation of his Son
and the merits of his death. And again :
<( God hath reconciled us to himself by Christ.
God indeed was in Christ reconciling the
world to himself, not imputing to them their
sins." (2 Cor. v. 18, 19.) God has restored
us to his friendship by means of Christ, in
whom he worked this ^reat undertaking of

l 56 Practice of Union until Our Lord

the reconciliation of mankind with himself
and of the forgiveness of their sins.

For this object our Lord did four things :
first, he took our sins upon himself; second,
he exercised deep sorrow and perfect contri-
tion for them ; third, he begged God, his
Father, to forgive them ; and fourth, he
performed a terrible penance for them.

As regards the first of these things, it is
most certain and an article of our faith that
the Son of God took our sins upon himself.
Isaiah says : " Surely he hath borne our ini-
quities and carried our sorrows. The Lord
hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He
hath borne the sins of many." (Is. liii. 4, 6,
12.) He has in reality, not merely in appear-
ance, taken upon himself our weaknesses, our
sorrows, and our miseries ; he has charged
himself with our faults, our crimes, all that
makes us sinners and consequently displeas-
ing to his Father, who has laid on him our
iniquities in order to relieve us of them.

As a figure of this the prophet Zachariah
saw the high-priest Jesus, son of Josedech,
who represented our Lord, according to the
explanation of Tertullian, Origen, St. Am-
brose, St. Jerome, and several other Fathers,
covered with a miserable robe full of stains

£or the Season of Lent. 157

and clothed in a tattered and filthy garment.
" The Lord showed me Jesus, the high-priest ;
and Jesus was clothed with filthy garments."
(Zach. iii. I, 3 — 2 cf. Cornel, a Lap. Ibid.) This
filthy robe covered with stains and dirt, sig-
nifies our sins that Christ took upon himself.
" Delieta meet" says St. Jerome, " appellantilr
vestimenta sordida." And St. Ambrose,
" Stabat Jesns et Jiabebat vestimenta sor-
dida ; me a enim peccata portabat!' (Hieron.
lb., Ambr. in Ps. cxviii.) That soiled garment
that Jesus had on his shoulders, was my sins
with which he charged himself. And the
Prince of the Apostles says the same thing :
"Peccata nostra ipse pertulit in cor pore sno
super lignum" "Who his ownself bore our
sins in his body upon the tree." Or, as the
Syriac version gives it : " Bajidavit omnia pec-
cata nostra, eaque sustidit in corpore sno ad
crucem." (1 Pet. ii. 24.) He took upon him-
self our sins, that is the punishment due them,
and by the torments he suffered in his body
and on the cross, he satisfied for us the Divine
justice. And when he went to Calvary, bear-
ing his cross, we should see in that cross all
our sins which he carried and which weighed
him down, and which he was going to wash

and efface in the streams of his blood.
14

158 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

That mysterious goat spoken of in the
Book of Leviticus (Levit. xvi.), on the head
of which the priest placed both his hands
while making a public confession of all the
sins of the people with which he charged it,
and which was then led away into the desert
to be torn to pieces by wild beasts and expi-
ate by its blood and death in some manner
the sins of the people, was a visible picture of
this truth.

For this reason our Lord, in the Psalms,
calls our sins his sins, our offences his offences,
(Ps. xxi., xxxix., lxviii.,) not in the sense of
having committed them, but because he has
charged himself with them and made them
his own burden ; just as a person who has
become security for another makes the debts
of that other his own, and is the one to whom
the creditor applies, forcing him to pay instead
of the real debtor.

As to the second point, our Lord's sorrow
and contrition for our sins, it is to be remarked
that the first obligation of every man who has
committed a fault is to regret that fault and
repent of it. Therefore, our Lord, who took
upon himself all our faults and all our sins,
and all the consequences of them, experienced
the same sorrow and repentance for them

For the Season of Lent. 159

as if he had himself committed them. " Him,
that knew no sin, for us he hath made sin,
(2 Cor. v. 21, cf. Corn, a Lap. Ibid.) says St.
Paul. Likewise the prophet Isaiah says,
according to the Septuagint version: "He
bears our sins, and has regret and sorrow for
them." (Is. liii. 4.) And St. Ambrose says :
"Our Lord having nothing in himself to
regret, regretted my sins." (Ambr. in c. 22,
Luke.)

Now, this regret and sorrow our Lord had
for our sins was a true and continual act of
most lively, most intense contrition, a contri-
tion so deep as to have no parallel, and which
without a miracle would have caused his death
each moment of the day. Assuredly if, as we
read, several famous penitents unable to bear
their excess of sorrow, died of grief for their
sins, we may with much greater reason say
that the same thing would have happened to
our Lord if he had not by his omnipotence
prevented it in order to reserve himself for
his last sacrifice.

The reason of this is evident. Sorrow is
greater in proportion as the evil that causes
it is greater and afflicts a being dearer and
more tenderly beloved. Our Lord's sorrow
was for sin, which is the greatest of all evils,

160 Practice of Union with Oztr Lord

the sovereign evil ; the sins of men, countless
as they are in- number, offend the Divine
Majesty which he loved with an infinite love
and which he knew to be worthy of infinite
honor and respect, and are besides injurious
to men whom he loved most ardently and
earnestly desired to save. Therefore, his
sorrow and contrition for our sins exceeded
anything that we can conceive ; on account
of its bitterness and abundance, Jeremiah com-
pared it to the sea : "Great as the sea is thy
destruction." (Lam. ii. 13.) Thy contrition.

It was this sorrow that caused the Son of
God to weep frequently and bitterly, it was
this contrition for our sins that drew rivers of
tears from his eyes and sobs from his heart.
He says, by Jeremiah : " My eyes have failed
with weeping" (Lam. ii. 11) ; and by David :
" My life is wasted with grief, and my years
in sighs." (Ps. xxx. 11.)

In the third place, we cannot doubt that
our Lord asked pardon for us of God his
Father, since Isaiah says : " He hath borne
the sins of man)^ and hath prayed for the
transgressors." (Is. liii. 12.) And St. Paul :
44 Who in the days of his flesh with a strong
cry and tears offering up prayers and suppli-
cations" to God his Father. (Heb. v. 7.)

For the Season of Lent. 161

He prayed for us often during the whole
of his life from the moment of his concep-
tion to his death, because from that first
moment he had a perfect knowledge of all
the sins of men, of the dishonor God would
receive from them and the misfortunes they
would bring on men ; this knowledge fur-
nished him a subject of continual regret, of
unceasing prayer for pardon for us. And
even now in Heaven, seated at the right hand
of his Father he still intercedes for us, show-
ing his wounds and recalling his merits. St.
Paul says : " He maketh intercession for us "
(Rom. viii. 34) ; and, as St. John says (1 Jno.
ii. 1), " he is our advocate, pleading our cause."

But he prayed in an especial manner on the
Cross where he said : \' Father, forgive them,
for they know not what they do " (Luke xxiii.
34) ; and St. Paul declares that he said it
"with a strong cry and tears." (Heb. v. 7.)
These words of St. Paul must refer to our
Lord's prayer on the Cross, as the Evangel-
ists relate that he died "crying with a loud
voice" (Matt, xxvii. 50), and that as he yield-
ed up his spirit he bowed his head (Jno. xix.
30), as if to render his prayer more effectual.
An ancient Father tells us that "all the acts
of Jesus Christ during his mortal life were as

162 Practice of Union with Our Lord

so many prayers and supplications to God
his Father for the sins of the human race,
and the blood he shed had a strong voice and
a powerful clamor to obtain their pardon,
and did truly obtain it." (Primas. lb.)

Notice his prayer in the Garden of Olives.
With what affection, with what earnestness,
with what gestures, and in what a posture he
prays ! How sad and imploring is his prayer !
He prays to his Father not alone for himself,
but for us ; he kneels, bows his head even to
the earth, humbles himself as deeply as pos-
sible in body and still more in soul ; he is
seized with an extreme sadness and weariness
which are like the pangs of death and causes
him to sweat blood. He is in some sort like
a poor father, who, seeing his only son, the
object of all his affections, condemned to
death for a crime, is transported with sorrow
for his son's misfortune and guilt ; his grief is
inexpressible. What does he not do, what
does he not say to the king to obtain the
son's pardon ? With what entreaties, what
supplications and pleadings, with what emo-
tions and floods of tears, does he not beg
for mercy ? Even thus our Lord prayed to his
Father for us in the Garden. The prophet
Jeremiah says of him : " He shall put his

For the Season of Lent. 163

mouth in the dust, if so there may be hope.''
(Lam. iii. 29.) He will bow his head to the
ground and put his mouth in the dust, to see
if in that posture he may find hope.

Fourthly, our Lord, having loaded himself
with our sins, not only had sorrow for them
and prayed his Father to forgive them, but he
performed penance for them during his whole
life and especially in his passion and death.

" He was wounded for our iniquities, he was
bruised for our sins," says Isaiah. (Is. ■ liii. 5.)
He was wounded for our sins, he suffered ex-
cruciatingly to obtain the remission of our
crimes, he performed for them a most severe
penance.

St. Bonaventure says likewise : " He was
by nature the son of the house, and through
goodness he made himself the servant ; and
he was not content to take the form of a
servant to obey, but he took the form of a
wicked servant to be beaten and scourged ;
and he made himself not only the servant of
the servants of God, as his Vicar on earth
calls himself, but still more the servant of the
servants of the devil, rendering service to the
vilest of sinners, in order to expiate our sins
by his sufferings and death." (Bonav. de Perf.
vit. c. 6.)

164 Practice of Union zvith Onr Lord

St. John Climacus mentions (Jno. Clim. Grad.
5.) some illustrious penitents whose violent
regret for their sins, and extreme desire for
pardon and penance, enabled them to do
things truly most terrible ; but after all, their
penances bore no comparison with our Lord's.
For what a penance was it not for him, the
only Son of God, to be born a little child in a
stable in the depth of winter, to be laid in
a manger upon straw, and to be deprived of
every comfort ! to be circumcised the eighth
day and spill his blood with excessive pain
and extreme dishonor ! to suffer all that he
suffered in his flight into Egypt and his tarry-
ing there ! What a penance was it not for
him to lead a hidden and laborious life for
thirty years, exercising the trade of a carpen-
ter and gaining his bread by the labor of his
hands and the sweat of his brow !

But finally what a penance did he not per-
form for our sins in his passion and death,
when he was taken and bound as a malefac-
tor, cruelly scourged at a pillar, crowned with
sharp thorns, mocked, buffeted, and then fas-
tened to a gibbet to die amid inexpressible
torments between two thieves !

The prophet Isaiah says: "There is no
beauty in him nor comeliness ; and we have

For the Season of Lent. 165

seen him, and there was no sightliness — de-
spised, and the most abject of men, a man of
sorrows and acquainted with infirmity/' (Is.
liii. 2, 3.) He was so disfigured and so hideous
to look upon on account of the stripes he had
received, his wounds, the plucking out of his
hair and beard, the blows that had been given
him, the spittle with which his face was
smeared, the blood, partly flowing, partly
congealed, that covered his whole body, that
he was unrecognizable ; we saw him in a most
contemptible condition, and we took him for
the most afflicted of all mankind, a man filled
with sorrows, and who well knew from his
own experience what it is to suffer. What a
penance ! Jesus Christ, the only Son of God,
and perfect Innocence, dying, dead upon a
gibbet ! What a penance !

Jesus Christ performing penance, and such
a penance, for our sins ! Is it not most just
that we who have committed them, should
have some part in it ?

Represent to yourself our Lord clothed in
that miserable robe that Zachariah saw, and
loaded with our vanities, our bursts of anger,
our intemperances, and all our sins ; he feels
unceasingly a deep regret and extreme dis-
pleasure for them ; without intermission and

1 66 Practice of Union zvitJi Our Lord

with inconceivable vehemence he implores
God his Father to pardon us, and he per-
forms a frightful penance in our behalf.

Seeing our Lord in this state for you, what
should be your sentiments ? What should
you say? What should you do? Should
you be insensible and stupid, doing nothing?
Or should you not endeavor to imitate him,
to experience according to your capacity his
feelings, and to participate in the penance he
performed for you ? If you do otherwise you
will be very unfortunate. And what a reason
for terror you will have when he shall in his
character as your security demand of you all
he has paid in discharge of your debts ! Rest
assured that it is to you he has said : " Ex-
cept you shall do penance, you shall all like-
wise perish" (Luke xiii. 5), and that it is for
this that God his Father has appointed him
the Judge of mankind.

Therefore, as our Lord being loaded with
your sins had his heart filled with sorrow and
repentance for you, enter into that afflicted
heart, and uniting your heart with it conceive
a true sorrow, and produce acts of perfect
contrition for all your sins.

If you should see your friend, your brother,
or the son of the king, sad and desolate, shed-

For the Season of Lent. 167

ding copious tears for a fault you had com-
mitted and that had deserved the penalty of
death, would your eyes remain dry, would you
be unmoved ? Consider now that you owe
much more to our Lord, who is afflicted and
weeping for your sins.

He has asked pardon of God his Father ;
ask it also with him. " Mercy prays," says
St. Augustine, " misery does not pray. Inno-
cence implores pardon for guilt, guilt utters
not a word. He wTho has not sinned assumes
the posture of a suppliant, and the sinner
loaded with crimes does not prostrate himself
to the earth." (Aug. I. de orat. Dom.) Surely
the criminal son of that poor afflicted father
of whom we have spoken, and who asked the
king to pardon his son, would if he were at
liberty follow his father, be sad and afflicted
with him, weep with him, pray with him, and
do all he could according to his age to help
the father obtain his pardon.

In the same manner, in union with our
Lord, ask God his Father for the remission
of your sins, ask it in his light, not in your
own — that is to say, in his perfect knowledge
of their multitude and enormity which is
quite different from what you think ; for, as
to the multitude of your sins, if you are aware

1 68 Practice of Union ivitli Onr Lord

of one there are fifty you do not see ; and to
understand their enormity, you should know-
how great God is, because the offence derives
its magnitude chiefly from the greatness of
the person offended.

Finally, do penance for your sins with our
Lord, practising in union with him the pain-
ful exercises of Lent, the fasts, the longer
prayers, the greater silence, the withdrawal
from society and seeking of solitude in order
to dwell more with God, the greater watch-
fulness over yourself, the combat of your
passions, and the giving of alms.

And after all this offer to God the sorrow
and repentance which our Lord had for your
sins, the prayers he addressed to his Father
to obtain your pardon, and the long and rude
penance he performed to appease him "and to
make up for your deficiencies in prayer and
penance.

Say to him with David : " Look on the face
of thy Christ." (Ps. lxxxiii. 10.) Cast thine
eyes upon the face of thy Son ; see the sad-
ness of his heart and his regret for my sins ;
hearken to the prayers he offered with tears
to obtain my pardon. I know I do not deserve
that thou shouldst hear me ; but he is infin-
itely worthy to receive what he asks, because

For the Season of Lent. 169

he asks what he has dearly bought and at a
price vastly more than its worth, and because
he loves thee with an infinite love, and is by
nature sovereignly elevated and of an abso-
lutely infinite excellence. Wherefore the
Apostle says that when he prayed to thee for
sinners, thou didst render him the respect
to hear his prayer : " He was heard for his
reverence." (Heb. v. 7.) Consider all he
has suffered to move thee to have mercy
upon me. In his heart, repentant and stung
with remorse for my offences, I am deeply
sorry for them ; I ask thee pardon through
his lips, and I perform my penance in. that he
was pleased to perform for their expiation.

^ Hope.

The Cross is our great hope, and Jesus
Christ crucified is our strongest support.
This is why the Church sings : " O crux ayey
spes unica" I salute thee, O Cross, my only-
hope ! And St. Crysostom calls it " the hope
of Christians, the safety of the world, the
guide of the blind, the right road of travelers,
the riches of the poor, the sword, the shield,
the offensive and defensive arms of soldiers,
the bulwark of the assailed, and the glorious
trophy of the victory which the Son of God
15

170 Practice of Union with Our Lord

gained over the devil and all our enemies."
(Crysost. Or. in Cruc. et Serm. 8 et 22, de
Div.)

The reason on which this hop$ is founded,
is the fact that our Lord paid our ransom on
the Cross, and paid infinitely more than was
necessary to discharge all our debts and
remedy all our miseries. If our debts are
paid we no longer owe anything ; nothing
can be demanded of us if the satisfaction of
this payment has been truly applied to us.
St. Paul says, in this sense, that God "hath
delivered us from the power of darkness, and
hath translated us into the kingdom of the
Son of his love." (Coloss. i. 13.) God has
rescued us from the tyrannical power of the
prince of darkness, and has placed us in the
blessed state and kingdom of his beloved Son
who bought us with his blood, the least drop
of which is of an infinite value and conse-
quently more than sufficient to efface all our
sins, to deliver us from all our miseries, and
to acquire for us every blessing.

On this subject, Father Avila wrote to an
afflicted person as follows: "We ought to
establish our -hope in the passion and death
of our Lord, and trust ourselves to his merits,
banishing from our spirits all uneasiness, and

For the Season of Lent* 171

closing our eyes to all occasions for mistrust ;
because our merits are as great as is the virtue
of his passion and death, since it is ours and
he has given it to us, having suffered for us.
In this I confide, here I place my salvation ;
here I take courage and mock at my enemies ;
here, offering to the Eternal Father his Son,
I ask whatsoever I need ; here I pay what I
owe, and have something left besides ; and
although my miseries are numerous and ex-
cessive, I nevertheless find here a most potent
remedy and a subject of joy greater than is
that of my grief."

And to another the same Father writes this
advice: " Do not forget that our Lord Jesus
Christ as our Mediator, stands between the
Eternal Father and us, and that for his sake
we are beloved and bound to his Father by
so close a tie of perfect charity, that nothing
could loosen it did not man himself cut it with
the blade of a mortal sin. Have you ceased
to remember that the blood of Jesus Christ
cries for mercy for us, and that it cries so
loud that it drowns the noise of our sins and
prevents their being heard ? Do you not
know that if our sins are still in existence,
the death of Jesus Christ who died to kill
them, must be of little worth since it could

172 Practice of Union with Our Lord

not destroy them ? Try to impress this truth
deeply upon your mind, that Jesus Christ
took upon himself the affair of our redemp-
tion and salvation as his own business, and
that we are so closely united with him that he
and we must be loved or hated together ; and
as it is not possible that being what he is he
should be hated by his Father, so also it is
not possible that we should be if we remain
united to him by faith and charity. On the
contrary, as he is loved and cherished we are
also in him and by him, and with reason,
because he weighs more in the balance of
Divine Justice to make us loved than we do
to make him hated. Undoubtedly the Father
has more love for his Son than he has hatred
for sinners who are converted to him. May
Jesus Christ be praised and blessed forever,
he who is, and whom we can with a loud voice
call our hope ; there is nothing in the world,
that can- intimidate and terrify as so much
as he can reassure us.'' Thus says Father
Avila.

Of a truth it is easy for a sick man to form
a strong hope of his cure when he knows he
has a sovereign remedy vastly more powerful
than his disease, and that the one who ad-
ministers it has a great love for him and a

For the Season of Lent. 173

wondrous desire for his recovery. We have
all this, and much more, in Jesus Christ.

This is why when you behold him attached
to the Cross you ought to gaze upon him with
eyes full of trust, and say to him with David :
" My mercy, and my refuge ; my support, and
my deliverer ; my protector, and I have hoped
in him." (Ps. cxliii. 2.) Behold my mercy
and my refuge, my support and my liberator ;
behold my great confidence. It is upon this
Cross, upon this dear crucified One, that I
found all my hope.

Say to him again with the same David :
0 In thee, 0 Lord, have I hoped. My lots
are in thy hands." (Ps. xxx. 2, 16.) Yes, my
Lord, in thee I hope, and all my confidence is
in thy hands pierced and nailed to the Cross
for my salvation.

5. Dwelling in the wounds of our Lord ; and
particidarly in that of his side.

The Holy Ghost, speaking in the Canticle
of the just soul, says : " My dove in the clefts
of the rock." (Cant. ii. 14.) My dove dwells
in the clefts of the rock. This rock is Jesus
Christ, according to these words of St. Paul :
''And the rock was Christ." (1 Cor. x. 4.)

174 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

And the clefts are his wounds. St. Bernard,
explaining this passage, says : " The dove
hides herself there as in a safe place, and looks
without danger or fear at the hawk flying
around her ; the sparrow builds there her
nest, and the turtle-dove also, and there
hatches and nourishes her little ones."

The just soul takes pleasure in dwelling in
the wounds of her Saviour, because they are
magnificent palaces, cities of refuge, impreg-
nable fortresses, boxes of precious perfumes,
gates of salvation, sources of graces, tribunals
of mercy, fountains of life, mines of gold,
furnaces of charity and of the charms of
benevolence.

And she dwells in them m her thoughts
and affections, producing acts of faith in their
excellence and necessity for our salvation, in
their priceless value and infinite merit ; acts
of admiration, adoration, gratitude, hope, joy,
love of her Saviour who was pleased to re-
ceive them for her sake, and prayers to him
to apply to her their fruits.

But she makes her most usual and most
agreeable dwelling in the wound of his side,
because it is the wound of love ; since it was
received in the heart, for love, after his death,
to show that his death and his life and all his

For the Season of Lent, 175

mysteries had love and charity for their prin-
ciple and their end, proceeding from the love
he bears our souls- and tending to make him
loved by them in return. Still more, it is not
only the most loving place, but the most
delightful, and the strongest and most secure ;
so that the just soul says what St. Elzear
sent as a message to St. Delphina, his wife :
" If you want to find me you must seek me in
the wound of our Lord's side, for it is there I
dwell."

It is there the soul exercises all the func-
tions of the purgative, the illuminative, and
the unitive life. It is there she ponders, ex-
amines, and weeps for her sins, and in that
Heart which once conceived an inexplicable
regret and was pierced with sorrow for them,
she implores God to pardon them. It is in
that infinitely pure and holy Heart that holds
in aversion and extreme horror the smallest
venial sin, that she avoids the least offences
and the lightest faults. It is in that penitent
and afflicted Heart that she performs her
mortifications and penances. It is in that
generous and invincible Heart that she at-
tacks her vices, combats her evil inclinations,
resists the assaults of her enemies, and gains
glorious victories. And if sometimes she falls

176 Practice of Union with Our Lord

into desolation and aridity, into weariness
?nd heaviness of spirit, she suffers as she
should in that Heart which in the Garden of
Olives was desolate and weighed down with
sadness even unto death.

It is in that most humble, most patient,
and most perfect Heart that she exercises
humility, patience, virtues and good works ;
there she prays mentally and vocally, there
makes her preparation for Holy Communion
and her thanksgiving afterward, being unable
to select a holier, a more devotional and
more recollected oratory.

It is in that Heart, all burning with love for
men, that she loves her neighbor, that she
bears the imperfections of his body and soul,
and suffers the injuries he does her, imitating
St. Paul, who wrote to the faithful of Philippi :
" God is my witness, how I long after you in
the bowels of Jesus Christ." (Philipp. i. 8.)
God is my witness how I love you all in the
bowels and in the Heart of Jesus Christ. It
was thence he, the Apostle, spoke to them,
wrote to them, instructed them, reproved
them, consoled them, and treated with them
in everything ; and consequently he acted in
a holy and godlike manner, tracing for us an

For the Season of Lent. ijj

excellent pattern for our intercourse with our
neighbor.

Finally, it is in that Heart, in perfect sub-
mission to its inspirations and motions, that:
the just soul performs all her actions both
interior and exterior, with moderation, meek-
ness, calmness, and pure intentions.

It is also in that Heart, as in the true sanc-
tuary and home of the unitive life, that she
practices its peculiar functions, that she pro-
duces the acts of the love of choice, the love
of complacency, the love of good-will, the
love of preference and of aspiration ; that she
makes acts of adoration, glorification, praise,
purity of intention, gratitude, offering of self,
abandonment to the guidance of God, detach-
ment of affection from all creatures, and
elevation above all the things of earth, and
that she possesses and enjoys repose and
delight in God as in her centre.

Behold the occupation of the soul in the
wound of the Heart. Like one admitted into
some beautiful palace, looking curiously above,
below, and all around him, at the rare and
wonderful treasures, she considers attentively
what she finds in that Heart, remarks therein
hatred for sin, the price of her salvation, our
Lord's esteem for her, the love he has shown

178 Practice of Union with Our Lord

her, and a thousand other admirable and most
beautiful things.

Therefore let us go to that Side pierced for
us, let us enter that Heart burning with love
for us, let us dwell there night and day, never
coming out, and let us there perform all our
actions. " This is the gate of the Lord, the
just shall enter into it" (Ps. cxvii. 20), says
David. Behold the gate of the Lord, the
wound of his side ; the just shall be careful to
enter and make there their dwelling.

6. Jear.

As the Cross of Christ is the surest founda-
tion of our hopes, it is also the greatest source
of our fears. The Cross will be the infallible
cause of our salvation if we live well ; but if
we live an evil life and do not correct our
vices, it will be the certain instrument of our
ruin. Our Lord's death is the mystery of our
redemption and of our condemnation, and it
is by the Cross that both the predestined and
the reprobate insure their end, according as
they make use of it.

To speak truly, what could the Eternal
Father have given us more precious and more
efficacious for our salvation, than his Son ?
And what could the Son have done and

For the Season of Lent.- 179

suffered greater and more difficult than he
did do and suffer ? Could the Father and the
Son have shown more clearly the excess of
the infinite love they bear us, and have given
us more positive proofs of their extreme desire
to save us ? Had the Father aught more per-
fect and that he loved more dearly than his
Son, and the Son anything better, and that
he valued more than his honor, his life, and
himself? By the prophet Isaiah they ask us :
"Now judge between me and my vineyard.
What is there that I ought to do more to my
vineyard that I have not done to it ?" (Is. v.
3, 4.) What more could I have given men,
what more could I have endured to procure
their salvation ?

Therefore, what must remain for those who
refuse to profit by the goodness of God, unless
it be his justice ; for those who abuse the
Cross as a means of their salvation, unless it
be to experience it as the instrument of his
vengeance and of their damnation ? This is
what St. Paul very plainly shows us in his
Epistle to the Hebrews, where he says :
" Having therefore, brethren, a confidence in
the entering into the Holies by the blood of
Christ ; a new and living way which he hath
dedicated for us through the veil, that is to

180 Practice of Union with Our Lord

say, his flesh." (Heb. x. 19, 20.) We have a
hope of one day entering the sanctuary of
God which is in Heaven, and of enjoying the
felicity of the Saints through the merits of the
blood of Jesus Christ, provided that to attain
it we follow the path he has marked for us by
his life while here below clothed with our
flesh. " But, if we sin wilfully after having
received the knowledge of the truth, there is
now left no sacrifice for sins ; but a certain
dreadful expectation of judgment, and the
rage of a fire which shall consume the adver-
saries." (lb. x. 26, 27.) If after the know-
ledge of so important a truth, after so perfect
a love, so great a mercy, and so powerful a
remedy, Ave take no thought of saving our-
selves, but continue to offend God, we may
look forward to being infallibly lost ; we may
consider our salvation gone, because we can-
not expect a new Saviour, we have no right
to hope that the Son of God will come again
for us ; that he will be seized, scourged, nailed
to a cross, and spill his blood again for our
sins. He has done this once — it is more than
enough ; he will not do it a second time. This
is why, if we are not witling to make a good
use of his death, we must hold it a certain
thing that we will be judged by God with

. For the Season of Lent. \ o (

extreme severity and terrible rigor, and con-
demned with all his enemies to eternal flames.

And let no one say that this punishment is.
too great ; for the Apostle adds : '■ A man
making void the law of Moses, dieth without
any mercy under two or three witnesses. How
much more do you think he deserveth worse
punishments, who hath trodden under foot
the Son of God, and hath esteemed the blood,
of the testament unclean by wThich he was
sanctified ? It is a fearful thing to fall into
the hands of the living God." (Heb. x. 28,
29, 31.) If the breakers of the law of Moses
convicted by two or three witnesses, found no-
mercy, but were put to death without leniency,
how much more rigorously should not he be
punished, who through an execrable impiety
tramples under foot the blood of the Son of
God that was spilled to wash away his sins,.
to sanctify and save him ? Oh ! wrhat a ter-
rible thing it is to fall into the .hands of the
living God when he is angered by the abuse
of such mercy, and by contempt of the death
of his Son !

Jesus going to Calvary said to the weeping

women : " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not

over me, but weep for yourselves and for your

children. For if in the green wood they do

16

1 82 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

these things, what shall be done in the dry ?'!
(Luke xxiii. 28, 31.) If they treat so rudely
the green wood which is still alive and there-
fore should be preserved, what will the}' do to
the dry wood which is dead and is no longer
•good for anything but the fire ? If the father
chastise so severely his only and innocent
::son for the sake of his wicked and rebellious
slave, with what severity and fury will he not
'Chastise the slave himself if he does not
correct his faults ?

Not wishing to fall into the hands of God
avenging the death of his Son, and being wise
betimes, let us think seriously of making an
excellent use of that death and applying to
ourselves its merits and fruits, so that what is
-the basis of our salvation may not become the
■ occasion of our ruin. "When our Lord shall
come to judge us," says St. Augustine, ''he
will surely give us what he has promised, but
he will likewise demand an account of what
ihe has already given us and of what he has
'done to redeem us. Remember that having
been ransomed with mercy you will be judged
with justice." (Aug. Serm. xliv. 8.)

For the Season of Lent. 183

7. Prayers and requests.

Since the Cross is the mystery of our salva-
tion, the arsenal that contains our arms, and
the treasury whence we must draw our riches,
we should constantly beseech our Lord to
attach us to it, to communicate to us its
salutary effects and impress upon us its grace
and spirit ; we should very frequently breathe
and inhale our Lord suffering, dying, dead for
us.

And as we are in a life wThere there is much
to suffer, every day, and in many ways,
why should we not fulfill the words of our
Lord: "If any man will come after me, let
him deny himself and take up his cross daily,
and follow me." (Luke ix. 23.) If any one
would be my disciple he must renounce him-
self and carry his cross each day, and in that
manner follow me. Moreover, if our cross is
not well carried, and our sufferings well borne,
instead of being useful to us, they will be
injurious ; but our Lord's cross and sufferings
are able to sanctify ours and render them
salutary. We ought in our crosses, in our
trials, both interior and exterior, in our sick-
nesses, and still more in our death, to take
great pains to unite ourselves to our Lord
afflicted, suffering and dying, and to beg him

184 Practice of Union with Our Lord

to bless, to purify, to sanctify and deify our
afflictions and sufferings.

We ought to conjure him to distil from his
sufferings over ours, and from his death ovcr
our death, a spirit of salvation, grace and life ;
to shed upon us a dew cf patience, fortitude,
humility, respect, submission, devotion, silence,
love, and joy ; so that we may suffer and die
in a certain degree as he did, that our suffer-
ings may be, to speak with St. Paul, the
filling up of his (Coloss. i. 24), and our death
as it were a sequel and continuation of his ;
that as we are dead in his death and in him
as in our head, so he may also die in our death
and in us as in his members.

This prayer is of very great importance,
because our death is the decisive point of our
salvation and the grand moment on which
depends our eternal happiness or misery ; for
this reason it will be very wrell to repeat it
frequently during the whole time of Lent, and
still more frequently during Holy Week, espe-
cially on Good Friday, which is particularly
consecrated to the remembrance of our
Lord's death.

When in the morning service of that day
you adore the Cross, recollect yourself and
summon all your powers to the performance

For the Season of Lent. 185

of that devotion, bend the knees of your body
and still more those of your soul before that
sacred wood, and beholding upon it the image
of a crucified One, make first a great act of
faith in the truth that he who was fastened to
the cross, whose representation you see, is
the true God and your sovereign Lord whom
you worship.

Secondly, make an act of sincere regret for
your sins, recognizing and avowing that t hex-
were the cause of his torments and death ;
that it was your offences much more than the
executioners that bound him to the column
and tore him with scourges, that crowned
him with thorns, that gave him blows and
spat in his face, and that finally nailed him to
the gibbet and caused his death. Conceive a
penetrating sorrow7 and perfect repentance,
and earnestly beg his forgiveness ; say to him
with the prophet : "What are these wounds
in the midst of thy hands ?" (Zach. xiii. 6.)
Why these wounds in thy hands ? Wherefore
these torments and this death ? Is it not to.
efface my sins, to pardon them ? Then, I
beseech thee, efface them, and pardon me !
Thou dost sacrifice thyself for me ; thou givest
me thy blood and thy life ; I cannot give thee
nearly so much ; but at least I give thee

1 86 Practice of Union with Our Lord

a heart contrite and humbled, and a soul
grieved at having offended thee. "A con-
trite and humble heart, 0 God, thou wilt not
despise." (Ps. 1. 19.) Behold the sacrifice
thou dost ask of me, and which I give thee
with a firm resolution of never offending thee
again, but of loving thee with all my strength,
since I am so strictly bound to do so.

In the third place, offer your crucified Lord
countless acts of thanksgiving for all the
trouble he has taken, all the evils he has
suffered for your salvation, without which you
would inevitably be lost forever, and through
which you may be eternally happy if you
desire.

In the fourth place, hope from his bounty
the grace and all the aids you need ; and
then in detail ask them of him, recommend-
ing to him your salvation and the hour of your
death, and supplicating him by his wounds,
his blood, and his death, to apply their virtue
and merits to yours and to render it pleasing
to him — to render it for you the gate of lite
and the entrance into that abode where you
can honor him, adore him, praise him, love
him, and thank him eternally for all he has
done and suffered for you. After this, in the
•same spirit of faith, adoration, repentance,

For the Season of Lent. 187

love, gratitude, hope, and supplication, kiss
his sacred wounds.

III.— THE VIRTUES.
i. Imitation.

It would be something terrible indeed, and
worthy of severe punishment if, after God has
taken so much pains, and has been pleased to
suffer so many evils to give us examples and
patterns of virtue, we should pass them by,
caring not to make use of them.

This is why we are exhorted to " Look, and
make it according to the pattern that was
shown thee in the mount." (Exod. xxv. 40.)
Look, look attentively at what is passing on
the mountain of Calvary, and imitate as closely
as thou canst what is there shown thee. Con-
sider the excellence of the model, the perfec-
tion of the acts he shows thee, the mercy
with which he shows them, and his design.

His excellence is infinite since he is God ;
the perfection of what he shows, of the virtues
he teaches, is complete in every way ; his
mercy is extreme since it moved him to sub-
ject himself to so much misery and to endure
so many sufferings ; and his design is thy
salvation and beatitude. " Jesus Christ," says

1 88 Practice of Unioii zvith Our Lord

St. Peter, " suffered for us, leaving you an
example that you should follow his steps."
(I. Pet. ii. 21.)

It is a sovereign honor to imitate God be-
cause he is the most excellent model that can
be proposed ; if there is more glory in painting
after an Apelles or a Raphael than after an
ignoble artist, it is certainly infinitely more
honorable to take our Lord for our pattern
than man in whom there must always be some
fault.

Moreover, it is infinitely useful and advan-
tageous to us to follow such a model, not
only because there is nothing in him for us to
fear, he being the highest degree of all possible
perfection/but also because he inspires us with
the strength and gives us the skill to imitate
him ; still further, because the sign and assur-
ance of our predestination and salvation con-
sist in our resemblance to our Lord, and
particularly to our Lord crucified who has
merited for us on the cross the graces of pre-
destination and salvation, and all the blessings
we shall ever possess. St. Paul says : "May
I be found in him . . . being made con-
formable to his death." (Phil. iii. 9, to.) If I
would find myself in Jesus Christ and have in
him my salvation and my beatitude, I must

For tJie Season of Lent. 189

assume the figure of his death, I must bear
the likeness of his passion, I must exhibit in
myself the virtues he practiced on the cross.

This is absolutely necessary to whosoever
desires to be saved, and it is the reason why
the same Apostle wrote to the Romans :
ki Heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs with
Christ ; yet so if we suffer with him, that we
may be also glorified with him." (Rom. viii.
17.) You have received in baptism the spirit
of adoption of the children of God, of whom
consequently you are heirs, and co-heirs with
his Son Jesus Christ, provided always that you
suffer with him, for except on this condition
the thing is impossible. And St. Paul writes
the same thought to his disciple Timothy : "A
faithful saying. For if we be dead with him,
we shall live also with him. If we suffer, we
shall also reign with him." (II. Tim. ii. 11.)
It is an indisputable truth and one of the
chief articles of our faith, that if we die to sin
with Jesus Christ we shall live gloriously with
him, if we share his sufferings we shall be
admitted to the enjoyment of his blessings.
St. John says the same: " Partner in trib-
ulation, and in the kingdom and patience
in Christ Jesus." (Apoc. i. 9.) Participating
in the tribulation and in the kingdom ! These

190 Practice of Union zvitli Our Lord

two things are inseparable, the one from the
other ; the first cannot be without the second,
nor the second without the first. Tribulation
borne in the patience of Jesus Christ leads
most surely to the kingdom, and the kingdom
surely follows tribulation well borne. This
should greatly console and strengthen us in
our sufferings.

See, then, the union of the cross and salva-
tion, the participation of the afflictions and
blessings, the pains and pleasures, the infamies
and honors of our Lord, necessary to be mem-
bers of such a head and to bear the marks of
cur predestination and eternal happiness. We
must be crucified with him, we must say with St.
Paul : " With Christ I am nailed to the cross/'
(Gal. ii. 19.) I am crucified with Jesus Christ
as a member is with the head. When our
Lord was fastened to the cross, his whole
body was fastened to it ; not only his head
was upon the cross, but his arms, his legs, all
his members, not excepting a single one. The
same thing holds with his mystical body ; all
its members must be crucified with him, and
consequently you, too, unless you would re-
nounce the glorious quality of being of the
number of his members.

For the Season of Lent, 191

2. Humility.

Our Lord on the cross has given us most
excellent and finished patterns of all the vir-
tues, as is easy for any one willing to pay ever
so slight attention to remark ; but I shall
confine myself to the four principal ones, hu-
mility, obedience, patience, and charity, which
St. Bernard says correspond to the four ex-
tremities of the cross — humility to the foot,
obedience to the right arm, patience to the
left, and charity to the top.

To commence with humility which St. Paul
calls the particular virtue of Jesus Christ.
Was it not unequaled in him when he abased
himself at the feet of his apostles, and yet
more, at the feet of a traitor, to wash them ?
when he was seized and sold for only thirty
pieces of silver, and thus was horribly con-
temned since the least thing in him was worth
more than all imaginable worlds, was of a
value absolutely infinite on account of the
infinite dignity of his person ? when he was
placed beneath Barabbas, when the people
cared more for an infamous murderer than for
him who was innocence and sanctity ? when
they gave him blows which are the most cut-
ting insults a man of position and spirit can

1 92 Practice of Union with Our Lord

receive ? when they plucked out his beard
as though he were a knave who did not de-
serve to be a man nor to bear the sign of
manhood ? when they bandaged his eyes to
tell him that, instead of being the prophet he
thought himself, he could not see further than
his nose ? when they put on his shoulders an
old scarlet robe and in his hand a reed, making
him appear a ridiculous mock king whose king-
dom was a true reed, frail, shaky, and hollow ;
and then a white robe as though he were a
fool of whom they were making a plaything ?
when they put on his head a crown of thorns
as painful as it was infamous ? when they bent
their knees before him to mock him with gro-
tesque salutations ? when they harshly struck
him on his head with the reed, addressing him
insolent and coarse words ? when they spat in
his face, and offered him all the other indigni-
ties their enraged hearts could invent ?

Finally, they nailed him to a gibbet, which
was the most ignominious of all punishments
and deaths ; and this on the Feast of the
Passover, the most solemn feast of the year,
in presence of an almost innumerable multi-
tude of spectators, not in a prison but on a
mountain, not at night and by the light of
torches, but at noon in the full light of mid-

For the Season of Lent. 193

day ; and between two thieves as though he
were the most unworthy, the most criminal,
and the most wicked of all men.

Behold a part of the humility our Lord prac-
ticed in his passion ! Reflecting upon it St.
Paul had good reason to say uHe humbled
himself." (Philipp. ii. 8.) And our Lord him-
self, speaking by the mouth of David, says :
" I am a worm, and no man ; the reproach of
men, and the outcast of the people." (Ps.
xxi. 7.) Seeing me so abused and disgraced,
who would take me for a man ? Isaiah calls
him "the most abject of men (Is. liii. 3), be-
cause he was abased and humiliated more than
any man of any condition ever was before.

And has not our Lord performing such pro-
digious acts of humility and lowering himself
to such depths, a good right to say to us :
" Learn of me, because I am meek and humble
of heart ?" (Matt. xi. 29.) And have not we
a strict obligation to imitate him ? If we do
not, are we not worthy of severe punishments ?
God humbled himself and put himself beneath
all to give us an example, and wTe still wish to
raise ourselves up ? What pride can be found
in any human heart that the humility of a God
cannot cure ?

"When," says St. Bernard speaking to our
17

TQ4 Pi' act ice of Union zvith Onr Lord

Lord and then to us, W when, my Lord, thou
didst kneel before Judas who thou didst know
had formed the horrible design of betraying
thee and plotting thy death, and with thy
most holy hands didst touch, didst bathe and
wipe his accursed feet that wrere impatient to
go to shed thy blood — O man ! O dust ! O
ashes, who seest this ! canst thou yet be
proud and have a haughty spirit ? Consider
Jesus Christ, the Creator of the universe and
the dread Judge of the living and the dead,
in his humility and meekness bending the knee,
prostrating himself before a man, the most
villainous, the most perfidious of all men, the
man who betrayed him ; learn how he is truly
meek and humble of heart, and be confused
at thy pride." Thus discourses St. Bernard.
(Bern. Serm. de Passione.)

In another place, considering the power of
our Lord's humility to make us embrace that
virtue, he says: "Why, think you my bre-
thren, did the God of Majesty humble and
annihilate himself, if it were not to oblige you
to do the same ? Therefore I earnestly entreat
you not to permit that he should give you use-
lessly so precious an example, but to endeavor
to form yourself upon it. Love humility which
is the foundation and guardian of all the vir-

For the Season of Lent. 195

tues ; practice it in your thoughts, your affec-
tions, your words and works, not letting it
appear that man should find it difficult .to
humble himself when God stooped so low."
(Bern. Serm. I. in Nat. Dom.)

Our Lord after having humbled himself
before his apostles, and having washed their
feet, said to them: "I have given you an
example, that as I have done to you, so you
do also. Amen, amen, I say to you, the serv-
ant is not greater than his lord" (Jno. xiii. 15,
16.); neither are you more exalted than I.

Likewise St. Paul says : " Let this mind be in
you, which was also in Christ Jesus." (Philipp.
ii. 5.) Adopt the sentiments of humility which
Jesus Christ had, follow the example he has
given you, repeat frequently to yourself these
words : " He humbled himself." (Philipp. ii. 8.)
See him in his humiliations, see him loaded
with opprobrium and contempt, and realize
that he says to you again and again : " Learn
of me, because I am meek and humble of
heart " (Matt. xi. 29), in order that you should
do your best to imitate me.

j. Obedience.

Saint Paul speaking of the obedience our
Lord practiced in his passion, says: " He

196 Practice of Union with Our Lord

humbled himself, becoming obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross." (Philipp.
ii. 8.) See in what manner, and how far our
Lord teaches us to obey.

He obeyed his Father so far as to suffer
death, which is what nature dreads most ; and
not an ordinary death, but the most frightful
of all, the death of the ci oss. He obeyed
most wicked judges, doing and enduring what-
ever they commanded ; he obeyed the soldiers
and executioners, going and coming as they
wished, standing or sitting according to their
pleasure, giving his hands, his feet, his head,
his shoulders, and all parts of his body without
any resistance, for them to exercise upon
them all their rage could suggest.

Whence he tells us by Isaiah : " The Lord
God hath opened my ear, and I do not resist ;
I have not gone back. I have given my body
to the strikers, and my cheeks to them that
plucked them. I have not turned away my
face from them that rebuked me and spit upon
me." (Is. 1. 5, 6.)

The Lord God has opened my ear as the
organ of obedience to hear his will and exe-
cute it ; he has made me know he desired that
after having suffered extreme agonies, I should
die on a gibbet for his glory and the salvation

For the Season of Lent. 197

of men. I have heard with respect this de-
cree ; although so terrible I have not contra-
dicted nor opposed it, but have received it
with submission, and have accomplished it
heartily. I have abandoned my soul to sad-
ness, my body to torments, my brow to thorns,
my shoulders to scourges, my eyes to tears,
my ears to insults, my tongue to gall, my
hands and feet to nails, and I have not turned
away my face from those that spat upon it
and covered it with blows, "becoming obedi-
ent unto death, even the death of the cross. "
(Philipp. ii. 8.)

Adam would not obey God his Creator and
his Sovereign Lord, by abstaining from a for-
bidden fruit, though in the midst of an abund-
ance of others the use of which was permitted
him. The Son of God obeyed wicked judges
and cruel executioners even to suffering all
possible severities, even to death, and to the
death of the cross ; he obeyed so far for love
of us.

After this, ought we to find any difficulty in
obeying, and submitting for love of him to
small and reasonable requirements ? St. Ber-
nard says on this subject : " Learn, O man, to
obey ; learn, O earth, to submit thyself ; learn,
O dust, to do the will of others ! God has

198 Practice of Union with Our Lord

done man's will, and thou desirest to rule !
And by this means thou presumest to prefer
thyself to thy Creator, since he humbled him-
self beneath man!" ''Would to God," con-
tinues this saint, " that as often as I have the
accursed thought of esteeming myself more
than others, of preferring myself to any one,
our Lord would make me the reproach he
made his apostle : ' Go behind me, Satan,
because thou savorest not the things that are
of God.'" (Matt. xvi. 23.)

Let us learn, then, from the example of our
Lord to subject ourselves ; and when an occa-
sion presents itself of performing an act of
obedience, and we find it difficult either on the
part of our judgment or our will, or as regards
the exterior execution, let us* represent to
ourselves our Lord submissive and obedient.
Let us breathe him into us in his heroic prac-
tice of that virtue, and let us stifle all our
feelings- of resistance by the strength and
sweetness of these words which we should
repeat many times : " He humbled himself,
becoming obedient unto death, even the death
of the cross" (Philipp. ii. 8), and that for me.

Let us accustom ourselves to break our will
in everything, disregarding its tenacity ; let us
look upon it as our most dangerous enemy, as

For the Season of Lent. 199

the source of all our troubles, the principle of
all our sins, and the root of all our evils.

</. Patience.

y Patience is necessary for you, that doing
the will of God, you may receive the promise,"
says St. Paul. (Hebr. x. 36.) You need pa-
tience to do the will of God, and thus become
worthy of the beatitude he has promised you

No one ever practiced patience more per-
fectly, nor taught it to us in a more excellent
manner, than our Lord during his life, and
still more in his passion. "All the actions of
Christ," says St. Cyprian, "from his entrance
into the wrorld, were accompanied and marked
by patience." St. Cyprian goes on to prove
this by the details of our Lord's life and death,
and then concludes with these words : " Our
Lord suffered without any interruption until
his death, until patience attained in him the
height of its perfection." (Cypr. 1. de bona
Patient.)

Truly his life was but a continual suffering,
a tissue of all sorts of sorrows ; for he suffered
from the first moment of life until it was cut
off by the violence of most cruel torments
upon a gibbet ; he suffered the privation of
earthly goods, living always in extreme pov-

200 Practice of Union with Our Lord

erty ; he suffered 'in his honor a thousand
opprobriums, being called a blasphemer, an
exciter of sedition, a drunkard, a man pos-
sessed by the devil ; he suffered in his doc-
trine, passing for an idiot, a fool, and an
imposter ; in his power, being taken for a
magician holding communication with the
devil, through whose art he worked his mira-
cles ; in short, he suffered in all parts of his
body, and in all the faculties of his soul.

For this reason Isaiah calls him " A man of
sorrows and acquainted with infirmity." (Is.
liii. 3.) A man filled with sorrows and who knew
well from experience what it was to suffer and
be afflicted. He was in so pitiful a condition,,
so disfigured, that the same prophet assures
us he could not be recognized and might be
taken for a leper. " And we have seen him
and there was no sightliness, and we have
thought him as it were a leper." (Is. liii. 2, 4.)
There being no part of his body from the soles
of his feet to the crown of his head that was
not afflicted and sick.

He himself utters by the mouth of the
prophet Jeremiah these sad words : " O all ye
that pass by the way, attend, and see if there
be any sorrow like to my sorrow." (Lam. i. 12.)
All ye that pass through this mortal life, look

For the Season of Lent. 201

upon me, see if ever person of any age or con-
dition suffered so much as I, if ever there was
sorrow to be compared to mine.

Let us then bear our crosses and afflic-
tions after the model of our Lord whom we
ought very frequently to picture to ourselves
in the mystery of his passion, and to inhale
in his suffering state in order that we may
receive from him strength and courage to sus-
tain us when we are called to suffer. " Christ
having suffered in the flesh," says St. Peter,
"be you also armed with the same thought."
(i Peter iv. I.) Arm yourself with the thought
and the remembrance of what Jesus Christ
suffered during the course of his life and par-
ticularly in his death, when you have need to
combat the enemies of your salvation, so that
you may have courage to gain the victory ;
this remembrance will serve you as most pow-
erful offensive and defensive weapons.

The history of the blessed Elzear relates
that he had attained such a degree of patience
that no insult or injury could wound him ;
whence St. Delphina, his wife and a most pure
virgin, one day gently reproached him as
being too insensible. The Saint replied that
he had not ceased to feel in his interior attacks
of impatience and motions of anger when

202 Practice of Union with Our Lord

injuries were done him, but that he stifled
them, immediately fixing his thoughts on the
injuries and outrages our Lord suffered /or
him, whom desiring to imitate and to do some-
thing for his love, he said to himself: Ah!
well, Elzear, when thy servants shall give
thee blows, when they shall pluck out thy
beard and spit in thy face, even that will not
approach what the Son of God endured for
thee. He repeated to himself again and again
these words, and kept his mind applied to
this thought until the imperfect feeling was
quenched and his spirit calmed.

This practice is excellent ; and the advice
is very good, when you feel attacks of impa-
tience, anger, pride, or disgust, to consider the
patience, meekness, humility, and charity of
our Lord, and to apply these virtues to your
soul as antidotes and sovereign remedies until
the vicious motion passes and the temptation
has vanished ; it certainly will vanish if you
make good use of this means.

When we endure some evil in body or soul
our mind naturally turns immediately to think
of the evil, to reflect upon it, to examine it,
to consider its causes, circumstances, and con-
sequences, and we dwell upon it ; hence arise
trouble, vexations, impatience, anger, desires

For the Season of Lent. 203

of vengeance, and many other wrong feelings
that do not cure the evil but rather make it
worse. A most important counsel is, when
you are seized by some affliction to wisely
turn your mind from it and promptly fix your
attention on something that will sustain,
strengthen, and console you, such as the
paradise that awaits you, the reward that is
prepared for you if you make a good use of
this suffering, but especially on our Lord suf-
fering and crucified for you.

5. Active Charity.

Such was the charity of our Lord, who, not
content with simple affections and words only,
testified it to us by the most wonderful effects
and the most undeniable proofs possible ; and
thus he showed us how we ought to love him :
" Learn from Jesus Christ," says St. Bernard,
" how you should love Jesus Christ." St. John
says he loved us to the end: "Jesus having
loved his own who were in the world, he loved
them unto the end." (Jno. xiii. 1.) He loved
us to the end, to the last extremities, doing
and suffering for us all that he could do and
suffer. To love, according to the universal
opinion, is to desire and to do good to the
person beloved ; and, if you do him good only

204 Practice of Union with Our Lord

by doing- yourself injury and causing yourself
much suffering, you prove by this that you
love him more than you love yourself.

Our Lord has given us his body and his
soul, his humanity and his divinity, all the
fruits of his life and death ; he has delivered
us from all evils and loaded us with all bless-
ings. This is to love, and to love to the end.

We must love a man very much in order to
resolve to die for him, because we have nothing
that is naturally dearer to us than our life.
Thus our Lord says that to lay down life for a
friend is the most evident and perfect sign of
perfect love. (Jno. xv. 13.) And it is a still
greater sign of love to die for that friend a
most painful and infamous death ; and yet
greater if it is a person of exalted rank who
dies for a man of low degree from whom he
has received extreme indignities and cruel
injuries. You know that our Lord has loved
us in this manner, and that his love has had
qualities beyond all that we can imagine.

He has loved us in ftnem, that is to say for
a most pure and most disinterested end, re-
garding only our good. God was not less
happy before the creation of the world, when
he lived hidden in himself, than at present,
when he is honored, praised, and loved by

For the Season of Lent. 205

angels and men. As all the hatred and blas-
phemies of the damned do not diminish his
felicity, so all the praises and benedictions of
the saints do not increase it. "If thou sin,"
said Eliu to Job, "what shalt thou hurt him ?
If thou do justly, what shalt thou give him,
or what shall he receive of thy hand ? " (Job
xxxv. 6, 7.) If thou sin, dost thou think to
do harm to God ? And if thou livest well,
what wilt thou give him, what will he receive
from thy hand that will benefit him ? It is to
us, not to him, that the life and death of our
Lord has been useful and salutary.

He has loved us in finem, to the end, with,
on his part, an inviolable constancy, without
change or relaxation. As God he has loved
us from eternity to continue his love through-
out eternity ; thus he says by Jeremiah : "I
have loved thee with an everlasting love."
And as man he has loved us from the first
moment of his life till his death, and' he will
love us always.

He is our model. Learn then, O man, learn
from Jesus Christ how thou shouldst love Je-
sus Christ. Consider that his charity toward
thee was active, and his love effective ; con-
sider what effects he produced, what proofs
he has given thee of his love, and endeavor to

18

206 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

make return to him in the same proportion.
An ancient writer very justly says : " Sau-
guinem dedit, sanguinem debes." He gave thee
his blood, thou oughtest to give him thine.
He gave thee his honor, his comfort, his body,
his soul, and all he possessed ; thou oughtest
then to return him thy honor, thy comfort,
and all thou hast. Is this too much ! Is thy
blood worth his ? Is thy honor equal to his ?
What comparison is there between thee and
him ? Do then for him what he has done for
thee ; and since he has loved thee to these
extremes, if thou canst not go so far, at least
love him with all thy heart and with all thy
strength.

As a help to this it will be very useful to
look at our Lord crucified, and to pause to
consider him attentively ; for as it is not pos-
sible to remain near a great fire without feel-
ing the heat, so you cannot see our Lord
loving you so much as to die for you without
being touched with love for him.

Beholding him in his dying state, keeping;
your eyes for some time fixed upon him, say
and say again these words, calmly and atten-
tively : There is my God, my Creator, and
my Saviour. What has .he done for me, and
what am I doinsr for him ? What has he

For the Season of Lent. 207

suffered for me, and what do I suffer for
him ?

What has he given me, and what do I give
him ?

How does he love me, and how do I love
him ?

How do I intend to love him for the future,
and as a testimony of my love what will I do
and suffer for him ?

And since for this you have need of his
assistance, earnestly beg him by his excessive
love for you to grant it to you.

Gazing upon him, and even taking him in
your arms, say with St. Ignatius the martyr :
44 My love has been crucified!" (Ignat. M.
Ep. ad Rom.) God has been crucified for
me! Jesus Christ has been hanged on the
cross for me ! If I should see. a miserable
man hanged for my sake, I would be touched,
and I could not help having extraordinary
feelings for him. This is not a mere man
who is hanged for me, but the true God,
the Creator of the universe, Jesus Christ.
What a powerful motive for contrition and
love !

Therefore, as Jesus Christ has been crucified
for love of me, I desire also for love of him to
be crucified, and to nail to his cross my love

208 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

of honors, of pleasures, of riches, of all crea-
tures, and especially of myself; so that I may
say with St. Paul : "With Christ I am nailed
to the cross." (Gal. ii. 19.) My body, my
soul; my thoughts, my affections, my words,
and my actions, are nailed to the cross with
Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ.

So it was that Saint Clare, having, by think-
ing of our Lord crucified, engraved his image
on her mind, gazed upon him incessantly, and
through this gaze felt her heart languish
and die to all the things of earth, and become
enkindled with the love of our Lord and the
desire of poverty and opprobrium, and at the
same time grow strong to practice, in a heroic
degree, humility, patience, forbearance, and
all the virtues.

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

(Under this heading Father Saint-Jure re-
fers to certain chapters of a work called " La
Vie Illuminative" The Illuminative Life, as
suitable subjects for the meditations. He also
suggests that it will be very useful to meditate
from the Horologe, or Clock of the Passion,
another part of this book, which is about to
follow.)

For the Season of Lent. 209

V.— READINGS.

(We again refer the reader to what has been
said under this heading in Chapter III.)

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

"With everlasting kindness have I had
mercy on thee, said the Lord thy Redeemer."
(Is. liv. 8.)

" O man of sorrows, and acquainted with
infirmity." (Ex. Is. liii. 3.) O man of sorrows
and experienced in suffering, what compassion
and regret is ours to see thee endure so much !

44 What are these wounds in the midst of
thy hands ? And he shall say : ' With these
I was wounded in the house of them that
loved me.'" (Zach. xiii. 6.) "In the house of
my beloved." (Ibid, juxta septuag.) Lord,
who has made these wounds that we see in
thy hands ? He shall reply : It is those who
ought to love me, and whom I love, who have
made them and have treated me so outrage-
ously.

" From the sole of the foot unto the top of
the head there is no soundness therein." (Ex.
Is. i. 6.) From the soles of the feet to the
crown of the head there is nothing in thee
which does not suffer, no part, either internal
or external that is not afflicted.

2IO Practice of Union ivitli Our Lord

f ■ He was wounded for our iniquities, he was
bruised for our sins." (Is. liii. 5.) He has
been tormented for our sins ; our iniquities
have brought him to this state, and we are
the true causes of all his sufferings. What a
reason for sorrow and contrition !

"I am a worm and no man, the reproach
of men and the outcast of the people/' (Ps.
xxi. 7.) I am a worm and not a man ; I have
not been treated as God, nor even as a man,
but as a worm of the earth, as the reproach
of men and the outcast of the people.

u He shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter,
and shall be dumb as a lamb before his
shearer, and he shall not open his mouth."
(Is. liii. 7.) He shall go to sufferings, to
ignominies, and to death, as a gentle sheep
that is led to the slaughter, and as an inno-
cent lamb that is sheared and makes no cry ;
he shall not open his lips to defend himself
nor to complain. "Jesus held his peace," says
the Holy Gospel. (Matt. xxvi. 63.) Jesus did
not reply to the questions of the wicked
judges and the calumnies of his enemies ; and
in his great suffering and misery he said not a
word, but preserved a profound silence, a
wondrous meekness of spirit, and a perfect

For the Season of Lent. 211

forbearance toward his persecutors — he opened
not his mouth.

"Greater love than this no man hath, that
a man lay down his life for his friends." (J no.
xv. 13.) No one can give his friends a greater
or a more certain proof of love, than to die
for them. What then is it to die for enemies,
and for abject and contemptible enemies as
all sinners are in God's sight.

"He humbled himself." (Philipp. ii. S.)
He humbled himself. But how far ? To what
depths ?

il Becoming obedient unto death, even the
death of the cross." (Ibid.) He made him-
self obedient even unto death, and the death
of the cross.

THE CLOCK OF THE PASSION OF OUR LORD
JESUS CHRIST.

While the passion and death of our Lord
Jesus Christ, as the living sourcp of all the
graces that flow from Heaven for our salva-
tion, and the general cause of all the blessings
we possess or ever will possess, is very useful
at all times when we apply it to ourselves by
considerations, affections, and acts of virtue ;
nevertheless, we must believe that it is espe-
cially so on the days and at the hours when

212 Practice of Union with Our Lord

it was accomplished, just as the sun has more
light and heat at certain hours of the day than
at others.

Expressing" this idea the Book of Ecclesias-
ticus says : " The sun when he appeareth
showing forth at his rising, an admirable in-
strument, the work of the Most High. At
noon he burneth the earth ; and who can
abide his burning heat ? As one keeping a
furnace in the works of heat." (Eccl. xliii. 2,
3.) The material sun, that admirable in-
strument of God to produce the operations
of nature, gives light to the world at its
rising, and again when it declines and sets,
but at noon it burns the earth, and we cannot
endure the intensity of its rays. The Sun of
Justice, so the doctors of the Church explain,
the master-piece of the skill of the Most
High, illumines and warms us at his rising
which is his birth, and still more at his setting
which is his death.

At his meridian, when he was nailed to the
cross, he fired men with his love. The tor-
ments he suffered for them are as so many en-
kindled furnaces ; and where is the soul that
can endure their heat and not be burned and
changed into flames ?

To enlighten you on this subject, we have

For the Season of Lent. 213

fashioned and wound up this Clock of the Pas-
sion of our Lord : if you listen you will hear it
strike, not two or three strokes, but an infinite
.number; the incomparable love of our Lord
for men, performing so many things, and en-
during so many woes for them ! It will warn
you to also do and suffer something for his
love, and to imitate the virtues of which he
has given you examples.

This clock will begin to strike at six on
Thursday evening, and will continue till six
on Friday evening, for between these hours
our Lord's passion was accomplished.

Each hour will contain four things : —

First, one, and sometimes more than one
mystery of the passion which- you must repre-
sent to yourself not as though it took place
sixteen (eighteen) hundred years ago, but as
if it were now passing before your eyes, and
which you must regard with great attention,
and with a simple, affectionate, silent gaze.

Secondly, the spirit of the mystery and the
virtue to be imitated. If we often propose the
same virtues, do not be astonished ; it will be
because they are the most important and the
most necessary, and are not sufficiently under-
stood and practiced.

214 Practice of Union with Oar Lord

Thirdly, the prayer to ask for that spirit and
that virtue.

Fourthly, some aspiratory verses having re-
lation to the mystery.

You must at each hour apply yourself to
these four things according as you are able ;
and because sleep will rob you of some hours,
you may occasionally vary the order, and
after having sufficiently occupied yourself
with the exercises of the day, may leave them
for some time, and take in their place those
of the night hours, so as not to be deprived
of their fruit ; or at least on Thursday even-
ing before going to rest, or on Friday morn-
ing at your rising, say the prayers of the hours
of sleep ; and doubtless you will abridge your
sleep, if you feel as you ought toward the pas-
sion of our Lord.

Father Avila used to say that whoever could
permit himself to sleep during the whole of
Thursday night, knowing that our Lord was
seized Thursday evening, that he spent that
night in suffering, and that on Friday he died
on a gibbet for us, was an ingrate toward his
Saviour, and did not correspond to the magni-
tude of such a benefit.

I add as a final suggestion that souls parti-
cularly attracted to devotion to the passion,

For the Season of Lent. 215

need not confine themselves to one hour to
consider the mystery and perform the other
exercises assigned to each hour, but may
devote one, or even several days, if they wish,
and if they feel their hearts opening, so as to
draw more nourishment and profit.

PREPARATION.

Persuade yourself that our Lord addresses
you these words of the prophet Jeremiah to
move you to remember his passion, to look
upon him in his- sufferings, and to listen to
this clock: " Remember my poverty and
transgression (Afflictionis, Heb.), the worm-
wood, and the gall." (Lam. iii. 19.) Remem-
ber my poverty, my persecutions, and my af-
flictions ; Gonsider the gall, the bitterness, and
all the evils I have endured for thee. Reply
in the words that immediately follow: "I
will be mindful and remember, and my soul
shall languish within me. These things I
shall think over in my heart, tnerefore will I
hope. The mercies of the Lord that wTe are
not consumed, because his commiserations
have not failed." (Ibid. iii. 20, 21, 22.)

Yes, I will remember and consider them ;
and I do not doubt that this will produce in
me strong impressions and that my soul will

2i6 Practice of Union with Our Lord

be, as it were, withered by the wonderful
•grandeur of the things I recall.

This poverty, however, these afflictions and
woes of my Saviour, are sweet to me, because
they are the foundation of my hopes, and the
greatest effect of the mercy of God which has
not failed us and without which we would be
lost beyond recovery.

Prayer.

O Jesus, my dearest Saviour, only hope of
my soul, grant me grace to bear continually
and to celebrate worthily the memory of thy
sacred passion, to enter through the gates of
faith, hope, charity, and imitation of thee,
into thy wounds ; where, establishing my
dwelling, I may forget myself and all crea-
tures and remember thee alone, to live in thee
and thee in me all the rest of my days. Amen.

SIX O'CLOCK THURSDAY EVENING.

Jesus Christ Washing the Feet of his Apost
i. The Mystery.

Our Lord seeing his apostles greatly afflicted
by the news he had given them that he would
soon leave them, was touched with compassion,
and said to them with extreme gentleness and

For the Season of Lent. z « ;

tenderness : " Let not your heart be troubled,
nor let it be afraid. I will not leave you
orphans. It is expedient to you that I go. £
go away, and I come unto you." fjno. xiw
27, 18 ; xvi. 7 ; xttr: 28.) Because I have told
you that I must leave you, sadness has taken*
possession of your hearts ; but be not troubled
nor afraid ; I will not leave you orphans,
neither will I abandon you. It is for your
good that I go ; but I will go in such a man-
ner that I will soon return to you.

After having celebrated with them the legal
Passover, and eaten of the Paschal Lamb, a
figure of himself in the mysteries of his life
that were immediately to follow, he desired as
a sequel to his exemplification of all the vir-
tues, to unite and condense them into two
as the principal ones, namely, humility and
charity.

And beginning with humility : he rises from;
the table, lays aside his robe, girds himself
with a towel, pours water into a basin, and
then kneeling, washes the feet of his apostles.

Who would not be astonished and touched
with devotion at seeing the King of kings and
the Lord of lords at whose name every knee
bends and the very columns of heaven trem-
ble, abased, humiliated, kneeling before his

19

2 1 8 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

disciples who are seated, bathing with his
most pure and most holy hands their unclean
and offensive feet, carefully and tenderly wip-
ing them with the towel with which he was
girded, and then kissing them with his divine
lips ; passing thus from one to another, mak-
ing himself their valet in an act so low, in a
service so abject ? What abasement, what a
humiliation of the Infinite Majesty of heaven
and earth, to be thus prostrate before rough,
coarse persons, before poor sinners, and, what
is still more astonishing, before a traitor and
the most wicked of men !

2. The Spirit and Virtue of tJie Mystery

The spirit of this action and its special vir-
tue are evidently humility, which we are under
obligation to imitate ; for our Lord, after hav-
ing performed it, said to his apostles, and to
us through them.: "-J have given you an
example, that as I have done to you, so you
do also." And he had already told us : " Learn
of me, because I am meek and humble of
heart." (Matt. xi. 29.)

j. Prayer.

O perfect Model of humility ! my Lord
Jesus Christ, who hast been pleased to assume

For tJie Season of Lent. 219

the nature, quality, and employment of a ser-
vant, and who in that condition didst wash
the feet of thy apostles ! I pray and beseech
thee to cleanse me from my pride, my vanity,
and my good opinion of myself, and to give
me the spirit and sentiments of true humility
of heart. Amen.

4. Aspiratory Verses.

"He humbled himself." (Philipp. ii. 8.)
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Creator of
the universe, humbled himself so far as to
wash the feet of men and of sinners.

Let us ask with St. Peter: "Lord, dost
thou wash my feet?" (Jno. xiii. 6.) Dost
thou abase thine infinite majesty to this ?
Dost thou thus perform the duties of the
meanest servants ?

" If I wash thee not, thou shalt have no
part with me." (lb. xiii. 8.) If I wash thee
not, and if by my example and grace I do
not purify thee from pride, the source of all
sins, thou shalt never have part with me, but
I will cut thee off from my society for ever.

" Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands
and my head." (lb. xiii. 9.) Ah ! Lord, lest
that horrible misfortune should befall me, wash
not only my feet, but even my hands and my

220 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

head. Wash my feet for my affections, my
hands for my works, my head for my thoughts,
and purify my whole body, my whole soul
from my pride and all my stains.

SEVEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Instituting the Blessed Sacrament.

i. The Mystery.

Our Lord intending to leave his apostles,
before withdrawing and bidding them the last
farewell, gave them the most magnificent
banquet ever known on earth, since he gave
himself as the food, his body, his blood, his
soul, and his divinity, saying to them : " Take
ye, and eat: This is my body. Drink ye all
of this, for this is my blood." (Matt. xxvi.
26, 27, 28.) Take and eat ; what I give you
is my body. Drink ye all of this chalice ; it
contains my blood.

2. The Spirit and Virtue of the Mystery.

These are chiefly charity and love. Love
has for its characteristic to desire, and to pro-
cure by every possible means, the union of
the person who loves with the one who is
loved. Our Lord loved men infinitely, and
this infinite love caused him to invent this

For the Season of Lent. 221

admirable and surprising means of uniting
himself to them as their food ; and food forms
with the one who receives it, the most inti-
mate, the most inseparable, and the closest
of all natural unions.

Thus St. John speaking of this mystery,
says : " Having loved his own who were in the
world, he loved them unto the end." (Jno.
xiii. 1.) Jesus having loved his own during
his whole life, loved them still more at its
close, when he instituted the- Blessed Sacra-
ment and made of himself, their nourishment,
so that he might unite himself to them ; he
desired this union so ardently that he told
them : " Withr desire I have desired to eat
this pasch with you before I suffer." (Luke
xxii. 15.) I have earnestly desired to cele-
brate this Passover with you before I die and
leave you.

The spirit, then, and the special virtue of
this mystery, 'are the infinite love our Lord
bears us, and the burning desire this love
kindles in his heart to unite and give himself
to us. We ought to exercise the same senti-
ments toward him with all the fullness of our
affections, and so much the more as all the
glory and profit of the union will be for us.

222 Practice of Union with Our Lord

j. Prayer.

O most loving" and most amiable Jesus,
who, through the excess of thine infinite
love for us, didst place thyself under the
species of bread and wine in order to come
to us, and to unite and give thyself to us ! I
implore thee by this sacrament of love and
union, and by all that can move thee, to
deign to unite me inseparably with thee, to
transform me into thyself, and by this union
and transformation to oblige me to give thee
my body and my soul, so that I may cease
to belong to myself and may be wholly thine.
Amen.

,/. Aspiratory Verses.

u He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my
blood, abideth in me and I in him." (Jno. vi.
57.) We are intimately united.

44 Eat, O friends, and drink, and be inebri-
ated, my dearly beloved." (Cant. v. 1.) Eat,
my friends, and drink ; and you, my dearly
beloved, be inebriated with love, so that the
unequaled testimony I give you of my love
may produce in a holy manner in your souls,
forgetfulness of creatures and satisfaction of
heart.

For the Season of Lent. 223

" And after the morsel, Satan entered into
him." (Jno. xiii. 27.) But we must carefully
prepare for this divine food, learning wisdom
at the expense of Judas, into whose soul after
he had eaten, the devil entered and took new
possession, thus rendering the Blessed Sacra-
ment not a communion with Jesus Christ, but
a disunion and an eternal separation.

EIGHT O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ giving the New Commandment of Love of
our Neighbor, and Praying for the Elect.

/. The Mystery.

Our Lord, after the washing of the feet of
his apostles and the institution of the Blessed
Sacrament, commanded the apostles to love
one another, saying to them : "These things
I command you, that you love one another."
(Jno. xv. 17.) "By this shall all men know
that you are my disciples, if you have love
one for another." (Jno. xiii. 35.) I command
you to love one another, and I desire that by
this it may be known whether you are my
disciples or not.

"A new commandment I give unto you:
That you love one another as I have loved
you." (Jno. xiii. 34.)

224 Practice of Union with Our Lord

Then jesus prayed to his Father for his
elect, that they might be protected, sancti-
fied, and united among themselves by a per-
fect and entire charity. "Lifting up his eyes
to Heaven, he said : \ I pray for them ; I
pray not for the world, but for them whom
thou hast given me, because they are thine.' "
(Jno. xvii. 1,9.) I pray not for the world, for
those who have the spirit of the world, and
whose hearts are on earth, whose bad life ren-
ders them unworthy of the happiness thou
hast prepared for them ; I pray not for them
as I do pray for the predestinate whom thou
hast given me, because they belong to thee
in a particular manner.

"Holy Father, keep them in thy name,
whom thou hast given me. I pray not that
thou shouldst take them out of the world, but
that thou shouldst keep them from evil." (Jno.
xvii. 11, 15.) Holy Father, take under thy
protection those whom thou hast given me ;
defend them against all the enemies of their
salvation, so that they may not be lost. I do
not ask thee to take them from the world, nor
to deliver them from their afflictions, but to
give them grace to suffer well, and to preserve
them from sin.

"Sanctify them in truth. For them do 1

For the Season of Lent, 225

sanctify myself, that they also may be sancti-
fied in truth." (Jno. xvii. 17, 19.) Sanctify
them in truth, making them virtuous and
holy, with a solid virtue, with a true, not an
apparent holiness. And more, ma'ke them
virtuous and holy in me who am the truth,
so that all their virtues may be expressions
of mine, and all their actions may be animated
with my spirit, and modeled after my actions.
I sanctify and sacrifice myself for them, so that
they may be sanctified and may become holy
likewise.

" That they may be one, as we also are ;«
that they all may be one, as thou, Father, in
me, and I in thee,; that they also may be one
in us, that the world may believe that thou
hast sent me. That they may be one, as we
also are one ; that they may be made perfect
in one, and the world may know that thou
hast sent me." (Jno. xvii. 11, 21, 22, 23.) I
pray thee, Father, that they may be perfectly
united, that they may be one in divine char-
ity, even as we are ; so that the world seeing
among them such great charity, such perfect
love, such intimate union, far surpassing the
weakness of their corrupt nature, may believe
that I am the true Messiah whom thou hast
sent, who have obtained for them this grace

226 Practice of Union witJi Our Lord

without which it would be impossible for them
to love one another with such great and such
pure love.

2. The Spirit and Virtue of the Mystery.

They are charity toward our neighbor ; but
— since it is a new commandment — practiced
in a new fashion, that is to say, with new
ardor and after the pattern of our Lord's
charity. As our Lord has not loved us for
any natural perfection of either body or soul,
nor for any worldly advantage we may pos-
sess, but only in God, for God's glory and
our salvation, even though we are filled with
faults ; and as he has loved us so much as to
suffer for our sakes the death of the cross, we
ought to love our neighbor in the same man-
ner and to the same extent.

Our Lord having come from Heaven to
earth to establish a law of charity and grace,
not only between God and men, but also be-
tween men and their fellow-men, and having
just instituted for men the Blessed Sacrament,
and given them as a token of his infinite love
his body and soul to be their food ; being
about to endure for their salvation horrible
torments, and to suffer on a gibbet the most
painful and ignominious death that was ever

For the Season of Lent. 227

known, had undoubtedly a good right to com-
mand them to love one another, and a most
certain right to exact their obedience to this
commandment.

j. Prayer.

O my dear and sovereign Lord ! I return
thee a thousand thanksgivings for this com-
mandment of love, by which thou hast ac-
quired for me as many friends, as many pro-
tectors and benefactors as there are men in
the world. I beg thee to engrave it deeply in
their hearts and in mine, so that we may love
one another as thou hast loved us. May we
have each for the other a cordial, sincere, dis-
interested, patient, humble, and discreet char-
ity. May Ave have but one heart and one soul
in thee, being ready and disposed, after thy
example, to bear from one another, and for
one another, whatever may be necessary for
the salvation of all. Amen.

4. Aspiratory Verses.

The three most celebrated of the apostles
have left us these remarkable exhortations to
fraternal charity.

St. Peter says : " Before all things, have a

328 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

constant mutual charity among yourselves."
(I. Pet. iv. 8.)

St. Paul : " Above all things, have charity,
which is the bond of perfection." (Col. iii. 14.)

And St. John : " Dearly beloved, let us love
one another ; in this the children of God are
manifest and the children of the devil." (1. Jno.
iv. 7, iii. 10.)

NINE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Praying in the Garden.

I. The Mystery.

Our Lord having withdrawn from his three
disciples about a stone's throw, began to pray
to God his Father with most profound respect
and singular humility. (Luke xxii. 41 ; Matt,
xxvi. 39; Mark xiv. 35.) He commenced his
prayer in a kneeling posture ; but after a lit-
tle he bent his sacred body and placed his
face against the earth, so great w7as his rev-
erence for the majesty of God.

His solicitude for his disciples having caused
him to leave his prayer once, and twice, to go
and see what they were doing, and having
found them overcome by weariness and sleep
on account of watching with him, he awakened
them and encouraged them to pray, then re-

For the Season of Lent. 229

turned to continue his supplications. And
while he prayed he was desolate beyond our
power of expression, and assailed by that
fearful sadness and that horrible anguish of
heart which reduced him to the agony of
death, and caused him to lose, in the form of
sweat, pure blood ; still he did not abandon
his prayer, but on the contrary continued it
with increased earnestness, and the more he
was combated and attacked by sadness the
more he prayed and persevered in praying.

2. The Virtue.

It is clear that it is prayer.

Our Lord desiring to open the bloody com-
bat of his passion, and to do the grandest and
most difficult thing that was ever done, that
is, to destroy the devil, sin, and death, and to
save the human race, entered the arena by
supplication and armed with prayer.

His prayer was humble, respectful, fervent,
persevering, and resigned in the most perfect
degree.

And this was to teach us that in our strug-
gles and temptations, in our times of sadness
and in all. our trials, wre should have recourse
to prayer, and should accompany our prayer
with humility, reverence, devotion, fervor, per-

20

230 Practice of Union with Our Lord

severance, and resignation, making it resemble
our Lord's prayer in the Garden.

J. Prayer,

0 my dear Saviour and my divine Master,
all of whose actions are my instructions and
my riches ! I beg thee by the merit of thy
prayer to teach me to pray, and thus fulfill in
me the promise thou didst make by thy pro-
phet when thou didst say: " I will pour out
upon the house of David, and upon the inhabi-
tants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace, and of
prayers." (Zach. xii. 10.) Grant that all my
prayers may be animated with thy spirit, and
accompanied by the conditions of thy prayer.
Amen.

^. Aspiratory Verses.

Watch ye, and pray, that ye enter not into
temptation." (Matt. xxvi. 41.) To be overcome
by it.

" Pray without ceasing." (l. Thess. v. 17.)
As you have constant need of the grace and
assistance of God to enable you to avoid sin,
to practice virtue and save your soul, therefore
ask for it constantly and pray without ceasing.

" Cry to me, and I will hear thee." (Jerem.

For the Season of Lent. 231

xxxiii. 3.) Cry to me in prayer and I will
answer thee ; if thou do not cry, I will not
hear thee ; my ears are shut up and deaf to
all voices save clamors and petitions made
with affection and effort.

TEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Disposed and Resigned to Suffer.

I. The Mystery.

Our Lord considering all the torments of
soul and body which he was about to suffer,
the inferior part of his nature was exceedingly
alarmed and filled with terrible apprehensions ;
whence that prayer to God his Father to spare
him those torments and not to oblige him to
drink that chalice of bitterness. But the su-
perior part rising above that alarm and appre-
hension, made a heroic act of resignation,
'of absolute abandonment to his Father's will,
saying: "But yet not my will, but thine be
done." (Luke xxii. 42.) Behold me ready to
suffer all that shall please thee. " I am ready
for scourges, and my sorrow is continually
before me." (Ps. xxxvii. 10.) I have con-
tinually before my eyes my sorrow and all the
woes thy justice dost prepare for me to expiate

232 Practice of Union with Our Lord

the sins of men ; I am disposed to receive
them. He saw his sufferings, the insults that
would be offered him, all his torments one
after the other, and looked upon them with
submission and respect, desiring them, and
welcoming them in spirit.

2. The Virtue,

It is resignation, annihilation of our will in
everything. In order to imitate our Lord, re-
present to yourself all possible ills of body
and soul, exterior and interior, temporal and
eternal, excepting sin only; after having con-
sidered them attentively, make in union with
our Lord a generous act of resignation, and of
offering of yourself to endure them, even though
you see among them the loss of your property,
the deprivation of your comfort, the ruin of
your honor, and your complete annihilation.

Continue to regard these objects of terror
until you feel your interior growing calm, your
resistance dying, and your will submitting ab-
solutely to God's will to suffer whatever he
shall desire. And later when it becomes ne-
cessary for you to practice this submission, re-
member the example of our Lord, and remem-
ber your resolution ; and reflect how God's

For the Season of Lent. 233

will is the wisest, the holiest, and the best
in every way, and that you cannot perform a
more prudent action, nor one more honorable
and useful, than to follow it blindly.

J. Prayer.

O good Jesus, who for love of me didst re-
sign and submit thyself to thy Father's will,
to endure the excessive sufferings of thy pas-
sion and death ! I beseech thee by the merit
of thy resignation and submission to give me
the grace to never resist God's providence in
my regard, but to yield to him entire author-
ity over my body, my soul, and all that in
time or eternity may belong to me. Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

"Thy will be done on earth as it is in
Heaven." (Matt. vi. 10.) May thy will be
done on earth and in me, as it is in Heaven — ■
all that thou wiliest, and in the manner thou
wiliest.

"Yea, Father ; for so hath it seemed good
in thy sight." (Matt. xi. 26.) Yes, Father,
let it be so, since it pleases thee.

234 Practice of Union with Our Lord

ELEVEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ in his Sadness, his Agony, and his Bloody
Sweat.

I. The Mystery.

One of the saddest and most lamentable
objects that was ever beheld, was our Lord
in the Garden of Olives, where he was assailed
by extreme sadness and weariness, and a de-
solation so terrible, caused by the clear and
distinct vision of all the woes he was about to
suffer, of all the sins of men, of the misfortunes
they were bringing upon themselves, of the
injuries God would receive from them, of the
small number of those who would profit by
his death and would be saved, and of the im-
mense multitude who would be lost, that he
said to his three most confidential apostles
whom he had taken with him : " My soul is
sorrowful even unto death." (Matt. xxvi. 38.)
My soul suffers such distress and such violent
anguish of heart, that if I did not by my omni-
potence restrain it in my body it would depart,
and you would see me fall dead before you.

The inferior part of his soul which had a
horror of death, and was terribly alarmed and
frightened by the vision of the cruel sufferings,
the bloody insults, and the multitude of fear-

For the Season of Lent. 235

ful woes prepared for him, and the superior
part which was resolute and submissive to the
will of the Eternal Father, sustained a combat
so great and furious that our Lord fell beneath
the struggles in agony, and, as it were, faint-
ing ; so that his Father sent him an angel
to console and comfort him. And notwith-
standing this succor, he experienced such a
disturbance and such an overthrowing in his
soul and body, because of the terrible encoun-
ter of the adverse parts of his human nature,
that the pores of his body opened, and his
blood flowed forth abundantly until it stained
the ground, just as the perspiration issues from
the pores of a sick man in the crisis of his
disease.

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

It is compassion for so mournful a condition
of a person so eminent, so holy, and so near
to us, and whom our sins have brought to this
pitiful state.

This should cause us to conceive an extreme
regret and to experience a most lively repent-
ance.

And as our sins and vices are the true causes
of our Lord's desolation, agony, and bloody
sweat, the healing and consoling angel that

236 Practice of Union with Our Lord

we can and ought to send him, is the correc-
tion of our vices and the reformation of our
life. Therefore, do not neglect to console him
thus.

j. Prayer.

0 most desolate Jesus, overwhelmed by
sorrow for me and through me ! I implore
thee to give me grace to enter into the know-
ledge and appreciation of thy sadness and
agony, and by their merit to bear in imitation
of thee, all my sadness and desolations. I
behold thy blood flowing abundantly from thy
body. Ah ! Lord, do not permit that most
precious liquor, that sovereign balm, capable
of saving ten thousand worlds, to fall use-
lessly upon the earth. But4et it fall upon my
soul to purify and sanctify it, upon my under-
standing to dissipate its darkness, upon my
will to break its obstinacy, upon my passions
to rule them, and upon all my wounds to heal
them. Amen.

^. Aspiratory Verses.

" He began to grow sorrowful and to be
sad." (Matt. xxvi. 37.) uHe began to fear
and to be heavy." (Mark xiv. 33.) Our Lord

For tJie Season of Lent. 237

entering the Garden of Olives, began to be
sad, to have fears and terrors.

"My soul is sorrowful even unto death;
stay you here and watch. " (Mark xiv. 34.)
My soul is sad and desolate even unto death ;
stay here and watch the lamentable state to
which I am reduced for your sakes, in which
your sins have placed me ; if I pour out from
my whole body tears of blood to efface your
sins, you ought at least to shed a few tears
from your eyes to wash them away.

MIDNIGHT.

Jesus Christ Betrayed by Judas and Seized by the
Officers of Justice.

1. The Mystery.

Judas taking no care to guard his heart or
to rule his passions, but allowing himself to
be overcome by his avarice, gave entrance to
the devil, who prompted him to form the
accursed and unfortunate design of betraying
and selling his good Master. (Luke xxii, 3.)
Thereupon he went to find the chief priests
and the magistrates, and made a bargain wTith
them to deliver Jesus to them for the sum of
thirty pieces of silver ; after which he returned
to the company of our Lord, concealing his

238 Practice of Union with Our Lord

perfidious plan and awaiting an occasion to
execute it.

Our Lord having finished his prayer in the
Garden of Olives, went to waken his three
disciples whom he had allowed to sleep for a
little while, saying to them : \\ Arise now, you
have slept enough. Behold the hour is come
in which the Son of Man will be betrayed into
the power of sinners. Behold the traitor who
has sold me and will deliver me, approaches."
Then he advanced boldly before them.

Judas, who marched at the head of a band
of soldiers, of officers of justice, and servants,
approaches our Lord and addresses him :
44 Hail, Rabbi ! And he kissed him." (Matt.
xxvi.49.) Our Lord replied : " Friend, where-
to art thou come ?" (lb. xxvi. 50.) Judas,
dost thou betray the Son of Man with a kiss ?"
(Luke xxii. 48.) Here, behold the blackest
malice, the most horrible perfidy ever on
record, and which was to our Lord an atro-
cious injury.

First : because it was done to him by his
disciple, his apostle whom he had singularly
loved and honored, and to whom he had con-
fided the ?alms he had received.

Secondly : because it was accomplished

For the Season of Lent. 239

with a kiss which is one of the most certain
ways men have of expressing friendship.

Thirdly : because by a kiss it betrayed him
and placed him in the power of his mortal
enemies, wrho intended to subject him to the
painful and ignominious death of the Cross.

But what did our Lord do ? As Judas ap-
proached to kiss him, our Lord, who penetrated
that disloyal heart and saw its wicked design,
did not draw back nor turn aside his face, did
not get angry and call him a traitor, a per-
fidious monster, or any other name worthy of
his crime, but paused to await him, allowed
him to come near, to touch and kiss him with
his infamous and accursed lips, and with inef-
fable sweetness and unparalleled gentleness,
said to him : " Friend, why art thou come ?
what brings thee here ?" As though wishing
to say : "Even while thou dost come to me
as my mortal and most cruel enemy, I have
for thee the heart and the affection of a true
friend ; I offer thee my friendship and my
grace if thou wilt accept it ; I present it to
thee gladly ; on my part, I desire thee to take
it and use it for thy salvation."

And desiring to warn him of his sin chari-
tably and sweetly, wishing to make him re-
cognize it and then conceive regret for it, and

240 Practice of Union with Gur Lord

to ask and obtain its pardon, he said to him :
"Judas, is it thus that thou dost betray the
Son of Man with a kiss ? " As though mean-
ing to say: " Consider what it is thou art
doing, what thou art undertaking. Reflect
upon what I have done for thee, and what
thou art doing against me ; how since the
time I took thee into my company, and made
thee my apostle, I have, by my doctrine, my
example, and my benefits, not ceased to do
thee good ! What evil have I ever done thee ?
And now thou betrayest me ! And with a kiss,
the sign of love, thou dost exercise toward me
the most cruel hatred that was ever known !
Thou dost deliver me to the fury of my ene-
mies who will kill me ! "

After this, the soldiers of all those agents
of hell having power over our Lord, fell upon
him like so many hungry wolves upon a gentle,
innocent lamb, seized him, and bound him.

2. The Virtues, Humility and Fear.

A man abandoned by God is a fearful ob-
ject. The atmosphere illumined by the sun
at midday is not more different from the same
atmosphere in the obscurity and darkness of
midnight, than is a man in that state from the
same man -in the state of grace — whatever may

For the Season of Lent. 24 1

have been the degrees of grace, of light, of
supernatural gifts, and of holiness to which he
was raised, his fallen state is not less terrible
on their account. Judas, the servant of our
Lord, the familiar friend of Christ, honored by
him with the high dignity of the apostleship,
instructed by his lessons, loaded with his gifts,
filled with his graces and working miracles,
sells his Lord, his Benefactor, and his God !
sells him for thirty pieces of silver ! and after
betraying him with a kiss ! delivers him into
the hands of his enemies ! and thus commits
the greatest crime that wras ever perpetrated
by man ! from his high elevation falls into
the profoundest depths of the abyss ! Let the
thought of this fill us with fear, let us humble
ourselves, let us carefully watch over ourselves
in even the smallest things, lest we fall. Ju-
das did not reach his state by a first leap ; he
fell gradually, little by little ; light faults led
him on to graver, and these to the most hor-
rible of all.

J. Prayer.

O good Jesus, my only ' liberator, who
through an excess of kindness didst allow
thyself to be taken and bound for me ! I im-
plore thee by the merits of thy bonds to break

21

242 Practice of Union with Our Lord

the bonds of my sins, of my affection for crea-
tures and for myself, and to bind me closely,
to unite me inseparably to thee, so that I may
never offend thee. O my Lord ! how the trea-
son of Judas, how the bargain he made of thee,
and the kiss he gave thee, affright me ! Hold
me fast, bind me closely to thee, so that I
cannot fall. Amen.

4. Aspiratory Verses.

" The breath of our mouth, Christ the Lord,
is taken in our sins." (Lam. iv. 20.) The
breath of our mouth, our Lord Jesus Christ,
has been taken in our sins, and our iniquities
are the cords that were used to seize and bind
him.

"He hath sold the just man for silver, and
the poor man for a pair of shoes." (Amos ii.
6.) He hath lowered the just, the most ex-
alted of the just, and the infinite Majesty of
God to the value of silver, and hath sold the
poor, Jesus Christ, at a vile price, the price of
a pair of shoes ! Alas ! have you never sold
our Lord for a vapor of honor, for a trifling
gain, or for a shameful pleasure ?

"Judas, dost thou betray the Son of Man
with a kiss ? (Luke xxii. 48.) To make an
unworthy Communion is to give our Lord the

For the Season of Lent. 243

kiss of a traitor, the kiss of Judas. Will you
become a second Judas ? To make reparation
in some sort,' and as is in your power, for the
outrageous and treacherous kiss of Judas, give
our Lord in your Communions and in your
devotions, kisses of faith, of reverence, adora-
tion, offering of yourself, confidence, and love.

ONE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ before Caiphas.

7. The Mystery.

The soldiers leading our Lord with great
noise and loud shouts into the city of Jerusa-
lem, brought him first to Annas, who after
having feasted his eyes till they were satisfied
on the agreeable spectacle, sent him still
bound to his son-in-law Caiphas, who was
the high-priest of that year. Caiphas having
already had news of this capture which he had
so long desired, had assembled in his house the
priests, the scribes, and the ancients of the
people ; before these our Lord was presented,
maliciously questioned, falsely accused, most
unjustly condemned, and judged to be worthy
of death as a wicked man, a villain, and a
blasphemer ; then his eyes were bandaged,
the soldiers and servants gave him blows,

244 Practice of Union with Our Lord

spat in his face, mocked him, and heaped on
him all kinds of insults. "They blind-folded
him, and smote his face. And they asked
him, saying : ' Prophesy, who is it that struck
thee ? ' And blaspheming, many other things
they said against him." (Luke xxii. 64, 65.)
"Then did they spit in his face, and buffet
him, and others struck his -face with the
palms of their hands." (Matt. xxvi. 6j.)

2. The Virtues of the Mystery.

Represent to yourself the modesty, the
meekness, the patience, the silence, and
humility of our Lord, under those false ac-
cusations, those iniquitous judgments, that
condemnation to death, and all those out-
rages ; and remember he is your model. Can
you profess to be the disciple of such a Mas-
ter, you who are so delicate, so sensitive to
the least thing that is done or said against
you, and offends ever so slightly your honor,
or your pleasure and interest ?

3. Prayer.

O perfect Mirror of patience and humility !
I pray thee by the merit of the virtues thou

For the Season of Lent. 245

didst exercise before Caiphas, to give me the
grace to imitate them when I have occasion,
and to profit by thy example. Amen.

/. Aspiratory Verses.

" Unjust witnesses rising up, have asked me
things I knew not." (Ps. xxxiv. 11.) They
brought false witnesses against me who ac-
cused me of crimes I had never thought of ;
and they asked me things I had no knowledge
of.

''When the sinner stood against me I was
dumb, and was humbled, and kept silence
from good things." (Ps. xxxviii. 2, 3.) When
the sinner accused me falsely, and endeavored
to defame my innocence with his calumnies, I
replied nothing ; he said to me most sharp
and humiliating things, and although I might
have replied much to justify myself, I spoke
not a word.

"Jesus held his peace." (Matt. xxvi. 63.)
Jesus through all his persecutions kept silence,
even when he was urged to reply.

246 Practice vf Union with Our Lord

TWO O'CLOCK.

Jeuss Christ Abandoned by his Apostles and Denied
by St. Peter.

/. The Mystery.

The disciples seeing our Lord seized, all
abandoned him and fled. " The disciples all
leaving him, fled." (Matt. xxvi. 56.) St. Peter
is more prominent in this mystery because he
denied our Lord three times in the house of
Caiphas ; at the question of a servant he swore
not only that he was not one of his disciples,
but that he did not even know him. i% He
denied with an oath : That I know not the
man." (Matt. xxvi. 72.) " He began to curse
and to swear, saying, I know not this man of
whom you speak." (Mark xiv. 71.)

2. The Virtues of the Mystery.

Humility, fear, mistrust of self, and flight
of occasions of sin.

Who will not fear and mistrust his strength,
seeing the apostles so weak, and on so impor-
tant an occasion, when it was necessary, if
ever, to show courage and fidelity ? They
abandoned their Master like cowards, after
having spent three years in his company,

For the Reason of Lent, 247

after having" heard such holy instructions, seen
so many miracles', received so many graces,
and after having quite recently communicated
and been strengthened with our Lord's body
and blood given to them by his own hands.

Who will not fear still more at seeing St,
Peter, Christ's first minister and chief apostle,
who from the benefits and favors he had re-
ceived was under even greater obligations of
fidelity than the others, who had promised so
solemnly that he would be faithful, though all
the rest should deny their Lord — at seeing him
deny that same Lord three times, and not in
simple language, but with an oath, with horrible
imprecations and curses — -and not at the threat
of a severe judge, or of an armed soldier hold-
ing a sword over his neck, but at the voice of
a miserable servant-maid ? O wonderful weak-
ness ! O extreme frailty of man ! Alas ! if
the pillars of the Church fall so lamentably,
what wrill become of feeble reeds ? If giants
are thus overthrown, how can little children
stand without a most special grace from our
Lord ? Therefore we must ask for this grace
constantly and earnestly.

So long as St. Peter was with our Lord he
did not fall ; soon as he left him, behold him
in the dust. " Thou turnedst away thy face

248 Practice of Union with Our Lord

from me, and I became troubled " (Ps. xxix.
8), said David. Thou didst turn thy face from
me so that I no longer saw thee, and at the
same moment I felt my spirit troubled and
my strength failing. Let us keep ourselves
close to Jesus Christ and look upon him con-
stantly, so that he may always preserve us.

The principal cause of Peter s fall was his
confidence in himself, and the good opinion
he had of his own strength. What will pre-
serve us will be our consciousness of our ex-
treme weakness, which will produce in us fear
and mistrust of ourselves.

j. Prayer.

O Jesus, Saviour of men, my sole Help, and
my only Support ! I implore thee to hold me
fast, for without thee it is impossible for me to
stand an instant. Make me see myself, show
me my absolute powerlessness for all good
without thy grace, so that I may be afraid
of myself, that I may not rest upon myself,
but may mistrust my own strength, and may
be humble. I conjure thee to look upon me
with the eyes of thy mercy, as thou didst
look upon St. Peter, so that like him I may
conceive a true regret for my sins, and may
weep for them all the rest of my life. Amen.

For the Season of Lent. 249

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

" Lo ! thou trustest upon this broken staff of
a reed." (Is. xxxvi. 6.) Leaning upon thyself,
thou dos'; lean upon a reed.

" He that thinketh himself to stand, let him
take heed lest he fall." (1 Cor. x. 12.) He
* that thinketh to stand and be firm, let him
take care lest he fall, seeing that the apostles,
and the chief and most resolute among them,
fell so heavily.

" Blessed is the man that is always fearful."
(Prov. xxviii. 14.) Blessed is the man who is
always fearful of himself. And who would not
be fearful considering such falls ?

THREE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ before Pilate.

I. The Mystery.

Our Lord having passed the entire night in
sufferings, the morning being come, the Jews
led him bound and in the guise of a criminal,
to Pilate who was the administrator of justice
for the Romans. In presence of Pilate they
charged him with several crimes, but espe-
cially with two : the first, that he was a dis-
turber of the public peace, who excited the

250 Practice of Union with Our Lord

people to sedition by calling himself the Son
of God ; the second, that he refused to pay
tribute to Caesar, arrogating- to himself the
quality of King. Thus they pretended he
was a criminal against religion and against
the State, and made him guilty of high-trea-
son alike in the divine and human order.

The Jews made these accusations against
him with extreme violence and furious pas-
sion, and he replied not a single word to jus-
tify himself, at which the judge was greatly
astonished, and urged him to speak in his
own defence ; but still our meek Saviour kept
silence. a He answered him not to any word,
so that the governor wondered exceedingly."
(Matt, xxvii. 14.) " But Jesus still answered
nothing, so that Pilate wondered." (Mark
xv. 5.) Pilate questioned him about his roy-
alty and his kingdom, and asked him if he
were a king. Our Lord replied : " Yes, I am,
but my kingdom is not of this world." (Jno.
xviii. 36.)

2. The Virtues.

They are patience, silence, and fortitude
under false accusations and calumnies.

Our Lord gives us an admirable example
of their practice on an occasion so urgent,

For the Season of Lent, 251

when he was accused so falsely and could so
easily have justified himself. " He shall be
led as a sheep to the slaughter, and shall be
dumb as a lamb before his shearer, and he
shall not open his mouth." (Is. liii. 7.) Be-
ing thus pursued and led to death, he will act
like a gentle sheep ; and like a lamb that is
sheared, he will not open his mouth.

Examine what is your state in regard to
these virtues, notice what emotions you ex-
perience when you are accused, when some
bad report is made of you, when your honor
is attacked ; and profit by what our Lord en-
dures for love of you, and from the example
he gives you.

Endeavor to penetrate the meaning, the
sublimity, and the fulfillment of these words
of our Lord: " My kingdom is not of this
world." My power, my glory, my riches, are
not on earth. My subjects are inhabitants of
a world other than this wherein they do not
form their plans nor found their hopes of Hap-
piness. Speaking of them to his Father, our
Lord says twice : " They are not of the
world." (Jno. xvii. 14.) And speaking to
them in the persons of his apostles who re-
present them all, he says: "You are not of
the world." (Jno. xv. 19.) You are not in-

252 Practice of Union with Our Lord

habitants of this world nor people of this
earth, but of Heaven.

Be, then, of that kingdom, and consequently
consider yourself in this world as a pilgrim so
as not to fix your affections upon it. And in
your poverty and all your privations, console
yourself with the thought that you are only a
stranger here.

it>v

3. Prayer.

O my Lord ! grant me the grace not to be
a citizen of this world, as thou dost under-
stand it ; and as a sign, not to excuse nor
defend myself when I shall be blamed or
accused either justly or wrongfully ; that I
may imitate thee, O my divine Exemplar, who
being so falsely and dangerously accused be-
fore Pilate, preferred to be silent rather than
justify thyself; and that I may suffer this
humiliation courageously for love of thee.
Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

u In silence and in hope shall your strength
be." (Is. xxx. 15.) Your strength when you
are accused and calumniated, shall be in keep-
ing silence and hoping in God.

For the Season of Lent.

"DP

Vs Thy kingdom come." (Matt. vi. 10.) May
thy kingdom, the kingdom of thy grace and
glory, come to us.

FOUR O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ before Herod.

I. The Mystery.

Pilate having learned that our Lord was a;
Galilean, sent him to Herod, the tetrarch of
Galilee (who had come to Jerusalem, as well
as the other Jews, for the feast), as being his
legitimate subject.

This prince, who was very wicked, and guilty
of the death of St. John the Baptist, and cor-
rupted by infamous pleasures, was glad to see
our Lord whom he had long desired to meet,
hoping he would work some miracle in his
presence. But so far from being willing to
satisfy this vicious and curious man and thus
gain some consideration from him, our Lord
would not even answer a single word to the
many questions Herod asked him. " He an-
swered him nothing." (Luke xxiii. 9.) Neither
would he utter a syllable in denial of the
crimes the Jews with stubborn hatred and
rage, kept on urging against him. So Herod,

losing his esteem for him, joined with the cour-

22

254 Practice of Union with Our Lord

tiers in contemning him, and as a mark of
scorn, and a sign that he took him for a fool
and an idiot who had not sense enough to
speak, had a beautiful white robe put on him
as if he were a person of rank, and then
mocked him. After this he sent him back to
Pilate. " He mocked him, putting on him a
white garment, and sent him back to Pilate."
(lb. xxiii. II.)

2. The Virtue.

It is to suffer meekly after our Lord's exam-
ple, contempt that may be shown you for
your mind, your judgment, your knowledge
and your talents, remembering that our Lord,
the uncreated and incarnate Word in whom
are contained, as St. Paul says (Col. ii. 3), all
the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, was
treated as an idiot and a fool.

It is also not to desire, nor seek, nor procure
in any way, the reputation of being a person
•of intelligence, possessed of good judgment,
wise, learned, skillful, and industrious, but to
renounce all such desires of reputation and
esteem ; and to believe that without contra-
diction he has the best spirit who has the
spirit of God, which consists in humility, sim-
plicity, innocence, holiness, and elevation

For 'the Season of Lent. 255

above the things of earth, recalling how our
Lord said to his Father : " I praise and bless
thee because thou hast hidden thy mysteries
and secrets from the prudent and wise of the
world, and hast discovered then\ to the little
and humble."

j. Prayer.

O Word of the Father and Eternal Wisdom,
who keeping silence before Herod wast taken
by him for a fool ! grant me the grace to
understand in what a good mind and judg-
ment truly consist, to contemn the false wis-
dom of the world, and to highly esteem and
embrace with all my heart thy wise folly, and
clothe myself with its precious garments which
are humility, simplicity, and innocence. Amen.

/f.. Aspiratory Verses.

" The simplicity of the just man is laughed
to scorn. The lamp despised in the thoughts
of the rich, is ready for the time appointed."
(Job. xii. 4, 5.)

The simplicity of the just is derided, it
passes for an extinguished lamp in the opin-
ions of rich worldlings ; but it will not be
always thus, it will give light at its appointed
time.

256 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

44 1 am become a laughing-stock all day;
all scoff at me." (Jer. xx. 7.) I have served
as a subject for ridicule all the day long ; they
all have mocked me.

FIVE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ again before Pilate, and Esteemed less
than bar abb as.

i. The Mystci-y.

Pilate seeing our Lord brought back to him,
told the Jews that they might know very well
he was innocent since neither he himself, nor
Herod, had found him guilty of any crime de-
serving death ; and as he must, according to
custom, release a prisoner for the feast of the
Passover, he would give them their king,
would set him at liberty. The Jews imme-
diately cried out that they did not want him,
and demanded Barabbas, a famous criminal,
who in a riot had committed murder. After
a great deal of contesting on both sides, Pilate
desiring to deliver our Lord, and the Jews re-
fusing to receive him, Pilate finally granted
them Barabbas.

2. The Virtue.

It is to conduct yourself as a true disciple
of Jesus Christ when in questions of preference

For the Season of Lent. 257

and precedence, others are placed before you ;
when more account is made of your equals
and even of your inferiors than of you, and
offices and charges are conferred upon them
which you wrould be much more capable of
filling ; when they are put forward and you
are kept back ; when they are talked of, and
not a word is said about you ; when all they
do is approved and praised, and some fault is
found with all you do.

In these trials of your virtue and perfection,
think of the Incarnate Wisdom, the Sanctity
of our Lord, and how with horrible contempt,
with extreme injustice and fearful blindness,
Barabbas, an infamous robber and notorious
murderer, was preferred to him.

3. Prayer.

O my sovereign Lord, who didst teach that
if we would be exalted, we must humble our-
selves, and that to be great v/e must become
the least of all ! (Matt, xxiii. 12 ; Luke xxii.
26.) I beg thee by the merit of thy abase-
ment below Barabbas, that, when in any man-
ner I am less preferred than others, I may
conduct myself with the patience, silence, and
humility, necessary to make me thy imitator
and thy disciple. Amen.

25S Practice of Union with Our Lord

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

"To whom have you likened God?" (Is.
xl. 18.) "To whom have you likened me, or
made me equal, saith the Holy One ?" (lb.
xl. 25.) "To whom have you likened me,
and made me equal, and compared me, and
made me like ?" (lb. xlvi. 5.) To whom have
you likened God ? Is there anything that is
not infinitely below him? To. whom have
you compared me and made me equal, saith
the Holy One, the Infinite Sanctity ? you
have made me equal to Barabbas, you have
even esteemed me less than him.

" Death shall be chosen rather than life by
all that shall remain of the wicked kindred in
all places." (Jer. viii. 3.) All those that shall
remain of that most wicked race, shall choose
death rather than life, a homicide rather tha.n
the Saviour.

SIX O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Taken and Scourged.

I. The Mystery.

Pilate, seeing that the Jews were eager for
the death of our Lord, to satisfy them and in
some degree appease their fury, condemned
him to the scourge.

For the Season of Lenti 259

This punishment caused our Lord extreme
suffering- : first ; by reason of his very delicate
and sensitive constitution ; secondly ; on ac-
count of the cruelty of the instruments used,
which were, it is said, of three kinds — cords
armed at the ends with little bones shaped
like stars, cords made of ox hides, and rods
covered with thorns; thirdly; from the pro-
digious number of blows he received, which,
it is believed, amounted to five thousand.

Our Lord endured this horrible and long
torture without complaining, without mur-
muring, and without manifesting the least
sign of irritation ; but, on the contrary, with
meekness, tranquility, and invincible patience,
thinking meanwhile of you, and offering to
God his Father those streams of blood that
were drawn from his torn body, for the pardon
of your sins.

2. The Virtue.

It is mortification of the flesh, which con-
sists in performing corporal penances with
courage accompanied by discretion ; in not
dreading so much bodily pains and discom-
forts, and not taking such care to avoid them ;
in not being so eager and active when we do
suffer them, to get rid of them, but in bearing

260 Practice of Union ivitk Our Lord

them with a patient and calm spirit, in imita-
tion of our Lord, and for the sake of enduring
something for his love,- to offer him in some
degree suffering for suffering, and to expiate
the disorders of our senses and the sins com-
mitted by our flesh.

Behold how rigorously our Lord treated his
flesh which was most pure, most innocent and
holy, and • learn how you should act toward
yours which is full of corruption, and has
caused you to commit so many faults. You
should regard it as the enemy of your salva-
tion, as a domestic thief, as a furnace of wick-
edness, a principle of irregularity, a source of
corruption, a vestment of ignorance, and a dark
veil that hinders you from perceiving and tast-
ing the things of God, and you should govern
it as the slave of the dwelling, which it is, and
should train it to its duty.

J. Prayer.

O my dear Saviour, who wast willing that
thy most sacred body and thy virginal flesh
should be torn with whips for my salvation !
I beg thee to apply to my flesh the merit of
.that precious blood thou didst shed to ex-
piate the disorders of my senses, and to was:
out all the sins of which they ever have been

For the Season of Lent. 261

the instruments. I implore thee to purify my
senses, to sanctify my body, and to grant that
it may no longer be an obstacle, but rather a
means and an aid to my salvation and perfec-
tion. Amen.

^. Aspiratory Verses.

it They that are Christ's have crucified their
flesh with the vices and concupiscences." (Gal.
v. 24.) Those that belong to Jesus Christ, and
are his true disciples, have crucified their flesh
with its vices and concupiscences.

" Always bearing about in our body the
mortification of Jesus, that the life also of
Jesus may be made manifest in our bodies."
(il Cor. iv. 10.) Let us practice and bear
about continually the mortification of Jesus
in our bodies, so that they may reflect his
life.

SEVEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Crowned with Thorns and Outraged in
Several Other Ways.

I. The' Mystery.

Pilate understanding that the enraged Jews
were not satisfied with the cruel punishment
he had just condemned our Lord to suffer,
were not satiated with the quantity of blood

262 Practice of Union with Our Lord

the scourges had drawn from him, but desired
his last drop, to appease still more their diabol-
ical animosity, abandoned him to the soldiers
who, calling all their comrades at the time
on duty, crowded around him like so many
wolves about an innocent lamb, and began
to laugh at and mock him whom the angels
adore and salute as the King of kings and the
Creator of the universe. Each tried to find
words more insulting to address him, acts
more outrageous to inflict on him.

They first despoiled him of his garment,
and this not without tearing off the skin in
several places, because the blood he had just
shed in such abundance had dried the gar-
ment to the skin ; then they threw over his
shoulders a miserable old cloak of faded pur-
ple, and placed on his head a crown woven
of very sharp thorns, pressing it down so that
the points pierced his brows, causing him in-
expressible suffering ; and for a sceptre they
put a reed in his right hand, thus making him
a comedy king, to signify that he was a fan-
tastic and ridiculous sovereign, and that his
royalty was like thorns and reeds, satirical,
void, and useless.

"And bowing the knee before him, they
mocked him, saying : ' Hail, king of the

For the Season of Lent. 263

Jews.' And spitting upon him, they took
the reed, and struck his head." (Matt, xxvii.
29, 30.) Having thus arrayed him, they knelt
before him as though in adulation ; then burst-
ing into shouts of laughter, exclaimed : " All
hail, King of the Jews!" at the same time
spitting in his face, and striking him on the
head with the reed, each blow renewing and
increasing the torture of his crown.

2. The Virtue.

Our Lord manifested in his endurance of all
these sufferings and insults, an invincible pa-
tience, made more resplendent by a singular
meekness and a wondrous submission in per-
mitting them to do with him" whatever they
would, never complaining, murmuring, or ex-
pressing any emotion. They pressed the thorns
into his brows, and he said not a word ; they
presented him a reed for a sceptre to mock
him, and he did not refuse it, did not draw
back his hand indignantly, as our corrupt
natures would have done ; but he took it in
his blessed hand, and grasped it with rever-
ence and love, as the cherished instrument of
his opprobrium. Oh ! what a model of pa-
tience, and how admirably does such an ex-
ample instruct us in that virtue !

264 Practice of Union with Our Lord

Patience is what is most necessary in suf-
ferings and adversities ; it is a virtue of which
we have extreme need by reason of the mise-
ries with which this life is filled ; it consists in
not permitting the understanding to conceive
any thought, the will to produce any emotion,
the tongue to utter any word, nor the whole
person that suffers, to manifest any sign of
impetuosity, impatience, indignation, or vexa-
tion, as though unwilling to suffer, but to
receive and bear the suffering peacefully and
with a quiet spirit.

Thus Tertullian describing patience and
painting it in his own colors, says : " It has a
countenance mild and tranquil, a brow serene
and unfurrowed by any wrinkle made by sad-
ness or 'anger, lips sealed with the seal of a
wise and honorable silence, and a com-
plexion such as we see in persons who are
innocent and confiding." (Tert. 1. de Patient.
<c. 15.)

You should undertake with great care the
acquisition of this virtue, without which you
cannot acquire the others, inasmuch as they
cannot be gained without trouble ; whence
St. Gregory said that a man shows himself as
much less virtuous as he is less patient.

For the Season of Lent. 265

j. Prayer.

O King of glory, who for love of me didst
suffer so patiently so many indignities and so
much infamy ! give me the spirit of thy pa-
tience to bear contempt and opprobrium.
Sanctify by the merit of thy crown of thorns
that so terribly afflicted thy brows, all my
thorns and my afflictions, and purify my mind
and my spirit from all bad thoughts ; and as
I am of myself only a feeble reed, light and
inconstant, take me in thy holy and powerful
hand to strengthen me, to establish and de-
fend me. Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

" Let us examine him by outrages and tor-
tures, that we may know his meekness and
try his patience." (Wis. ii. 19.) Let us sound
him with outrages and torments to see how
deep is his equanimity and patience.

" I do not resist ; I have not gone back. I
have given my body to the strikers, and my
cheeks to them that plucked them ; I have
not turned away my face from them that re-
buked me, and spit upon me." (Is. 1. 5, 6.)
I have given my body to be beaten and torn
with scourges, and my cheeks to those that

23

265 Practice of Union with Our Lord

buffeted them and plucked out my beard ; I
have not turned away my face when they
wished to insult it and cover it with spittle ;
I have not refused to suffer all these outrages,
I have not drawn back to avoid them.

" For thy sake I have borne reproach ; shame
hath covered my face." fPs. lxviii. 8.) I have
received insults, I have borne opprobrium, and
my face has been covered with confusion for
my love for thee. Consider what thou art
willing to do for me.

EIGHT O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Presented to the People.

/. The Mystery.

Pilate having the secret desire to deliver
our Lord because he believed him innocent,
and because his wrife had intimidated him by
a relation of certain visions she had had in the
night, and wishing to prevail upon the Jews
to let him go, gave them for that purpose b.
spectacle capable of moving to compassion
the most cruel hearts, of softening tigers. It
was this :

He took our Lord whose body was naked,
torn, and covered with blood, whose face was
disfigured, livid, swollen from the blows, soiled

For the Season of Lent. 267

with spittle, scratched by the thorns, whose
eyes were bruised and half dimmed, whose
hair and beard w,ere plucked out, and with his
wrists tied, the crown of thorns on his head,
the reed in his hand, and the purple cloak of
scorn on his shoulders, he led him to the steps
of his palace, and showed him in this condition
to the people, saying : Ecce homo ! — Behold
the man !

As if meaning to say : Behold this man
against whom you are so exasperated, and of
whom you are afraid ; see in what a state he
is. You accuse him of calling himself the Son
of God, and of having designed to be your
king. Be assured that far from bearing any
mark of divinity, he must be considered the
vilest and most miserable of all men ; and as
to his being a king, look what a crown, what
a sceptre, and what purple he wears ! He
need not excite your fear, but rather your
pity.

2. The Spirit of the Mystery .

It is to make a good use of Jesus Christ,
and to remember these remarkable words of
the holy old man Simeon, when he held him
in his arms : " Behold this child is set for
the fall, and for the resurrection of many."

268 Practice of Union with Our Lord

(Luke ii. 34.) Behold this child will be to
many the occasion of their fall and damna-
tion, and to many others the cause of their
salvation ; and this will be according to the
use they make of him.

As Pilate presenting our Lord to the Jews
said to them with his own meaning: "Be-
hold the man! so persuade yourself that God
the Father presents him to each one of us,
saying with his meaning : Ecce homo ! Be-
hold the man ! Look at this man who is not
only a man, but also the true God, my only
Son by nature, born of my substance, and
whom I love infinitely.

BeJiold the man ! Behold my well-beloved
Son ! I have been willing that he should be-
come man for thee, that he should endure all
sorts of evils for thy salvation. See in him
the love I bear thee, my esteem for thy soul,
the malice of sin, my hatred of it, and the
chatisement I inflict upon it, and then judge
from this how thou shouldst love me, and the
service thou shouldst render me ; how thou
shouldst hate sin, how avoid it ; and if thou
committest it what reason thou hast to fear
my justice.

Behold the man ! This Man-God whom I
give thee to be thy Saviour, thy Redeemer,

For the Season of Lent. 269

thy Mediator, thy Protector, thy Exemplar,
thy wisdom, thy strength, thy hope, and thy all.
You ought also to say to yourself: My
soul, behold the man ! the Man-God in whom
thou must believe, hope, and trust, whom thou
must honor, adore, and love above all things.

j. Prayer.

O new Adam and Chief of all the Elect!
who wast pleased to appear so deformed and
hideous that none could recognize thee, and
they took thee for a leper, or a monster rather
than a man, in order to make me see to what
a state I have by my sins reduced the image
of God engraven within me, and how hide-
ously I have disfigured it, and how thou, the
first, the essential and personal Image of God,
didst come here below to repair it and restore
it to its beauty. Grant that I may efface the
image of Adam that is within me, whose fea-
tures are sins, vices, and imperfections, to
replace it by, and to bear always, thy image,
which is the representation of charity, pa-
tience, gentleness, and all virtues. Amen.

</. Aspiratory Verses.

"We have seen him, and there was no
sightliness ; despised and the most abject of

270 Practice of Union with Oar Lord

men, a man of sorrows ; and we thought him
as it were a leper." (Is. liii. 2, 3, 4.) We saw
him, and he appeared to us so changed and
so mutilated that we could not recognize him ;
an object of extreme scorn, the lowest of men,
a man subject to every affliction ; and we took
him for a leper.

"Look on the face of thy Christ." (Ps.
lxxxiii. 10.) God the Father bids us : Look
on the face of Christ thy Saviour, to make of
it, as thou ought, the means of grace and
salvation.

And let us address the same words to God
the Father in all our needs : Eternal Father,
look upon the face of thy Son Jesus Christ, to
pardon our sins, to give us strength to con-
quer our passions, to practice virtues, and
following in his footsteps to reach the per-
fection to which thou dost call us, and to aid
us in all our necessities. Amen.

NINE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Condemned to the Death of the Cross.
i. The Mysteiy.

Pilate having tried to save our Lord and to
appease the hatred the Jews had conceived
against 'him, they, instead of being melted to

For the Season of Lent. 271

some sentiments of humanity, cried out :
44 Crucifigatnr" — let him be crucified ! But
what evil has he done that he should be cru-
cified, asked Pilate. They, unwilling to listen
to any reason, only redoubled their cries : Let
him be crucified. But I find nothing in. him
worthy of death, continued the governor. Do
you wish me to crucify an innocent person ?
To this, they only cried the more. " They
were instant with loud voices requiring that
he might be crucified ; and their voices pre-
vailed." (Luke xxiii. 23.)

Then Pilate convinced that he could make
no impression on their enraged spirits, had
water brought and washed his hands before
them, saying : " I am innocent of the blood
of this just man. Look you to it. And the
whole people answering, said : His blood be
upon us and upon our children." All the
people replied contemptuously : Yes, yes, wTe
care nothing about that ; we are content that
the chastisement of his blood fall on us and
on our children ; but we are not afraid of it,
for he is only a rogue and a scoundrel.

Pilate, however, having not yet quite lost
all hope, made a last attempt, showing them
our Lord in the state we have described, a
sight that might have melted even hearts of

272 Practice of Union with Our Lord

stone, saying : " Beheld the man /" But their
furious voices only shouted louder than ever :
" Tolle, tolle, cmcifige eum /" Away with him,
crucify him ! Take this man away from before
our eyes, we no longer want to see him except
on a gibbet ; let him "die, the wretch, the
rebel, the cheat, the blasphemer, the profaner !
Crucify him, crucify him ! Then the iniquitous
judge, betraying the cause of the innocent,
outraging justice, yielding as a coward to
human respect, abandoned our Lord to the
rage of the Jews to be crucified.

2, The Spirit of the Mystery.

It is to learn -how far in sin souls abandoned
by God, go — even tc refusing, to scorning, to
hating, and holding in horror and execration,
their Saviour, their Redeemer, the remedy ios
all their ills and the source of all their bles-
sings. What blindness ! What perversity !

It is to see the untold injury that human
respect does to the salvation of a soul, since
it caused Pilate to condemn to death innocence
itself. And even now there are those who
daily condemn Jesus Christ to death and com-
mit grievous sins through cowardly human

For the Season of Lent. 273

respect, in order not to displease, not to offend,
and for other temporal considerations that
ought to be generously trampled under foot.

j. Prayer.

O sweet Jesus ! with still more affection,
more zeal, and more respect, I wish to possess
thee, I acknowledge thee as the only Son of
God, as my Lord and my Saviour ; I believe
in thee, I hope in thee, and I intend to love
thee still more than the Jews held thee in
hatred and contempt, who did so to the de-
gree of not wanting thee and of even looking
upon thee with horror. I ask thee, I suppli-
cate thee that thy blood may not fall upon
me as upon the Jews, to condemn me, but to
absolve me ; not to stain me, but to wash me ;
not to lose me, but to save me. Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verse.

You should make the celebrated confession
of St. Peter: "Thou art Christ, the Son of
the living God." (Matt. xvi. 16.)

You should repeat these words in opposition
to the perverse sentiments of the Jews, with
faith, reverence, devotion, hope, and love.

274 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

TEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ bearing his Cross, goes to Calvary.

i. The Mystery.

In execution of the sentence of death, our
Lord was taken by the. soldiers, his mantle of
ridicule was torn off causing him new suffer-
ing, and he was clothed in his own garments ;
then loaded with the cross to which he was
to be nailed, he was led outside the city to
the place of his sacrifice which was the hill of
Calvary. And for fear lest, being worn out
and weakened by the tortures he had under-
gone and the loss of so much blood, and from
having neither eaten, drunk, nor slept since
the preceding day, he might fail under the
weight of his heavy burden and lose the rest
of his strength, and perhaps die, they forced a
man named Simon, a native of the city of
Cyrene, to help him carry it ; but this was not
through any pity they felt for him, but to re-
serve him for the last torture.

He was followed on this sad journey by a
vast multitude of persons, and among others
by several devout women, who through com-
passion for his sufferings lamented bitterly,
shedding floods of tears. Our Lord turning

For the Season of Lent. 275

toward them, said to them: "Daughters ot
Jerusalem, weep not over me, but weep for
yourselves and for your children ; for if in the
green wood they do these things, what shall
be done in the dry ?" (Luke xxiii. 28.) Daugh-
ters of Jerusalem, weep not so much for me as
for yourselves and your children ; for if they
treat the wood that is alive so rudely, what
will they do to the dead wood ? If the fire ,so
greedily seizes the green wood, how will it
take hold of the dry ?

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

You should regard attentively our Lord go-
ing from Pilate's palace to Calvary, which was
outside the city, bearing on his shoulders the
wood of his cross, and in that cross all your
sins and all the punishment they deserve,
with which he charged himself in order to
relieve you, although they were so heavy that
they weighed him down, and were to cause
his death.

What compassion you should have for him
seeing him walking through the streets, toil-
ing and moaning beneath the insupportable
burden of your sins, and thus going to death !
What gratitude ought you to render him for
such a benefit, what love for such great love !

276 Practice of Union zvitli Onr Lord

But will you not aid him in his travail, v ill
you not lighten the weight of his cross ? The
way is, since your sins make it heavy, to have
a lively sorrow for them, and to change your
life.

j. Prayer.

O innocent Isaac, dear and amiable Saviour,
who loaded with the wood of thy sacrifice,
didst go to death like a gentle lamb ! listen,
I beseech thee, to my humble prayer to be
allowed to bear after thee, like Simon the
Cyrenean, the figure of thy elect, the cross
thou hast destined for me ; and to bear it
with thee in thy patience, thy strength, thy
humility, thy gentleness, thy love, and in all
thy virtues. Amen.

^. Aspiratory Verses.

"Go forth, ye daughters of Sion, and see
King Solomon in the diadem wherewith his
mother crowned him." (Cant. iii. 11.)

Daughters of Sion, pious souls, go forth from
yourselves, from the sentiments of the flesh,
and see with the eyes of the spirit the peace-
ful king Solomon crowned with the crown of
thorns, which his cruel mother, the Syna-

For the Season of Lent. 277

gogue, and still more your sins, placed on his
head, see him going to death for you ; and
accompany him with faith, respect, love, com-
passion, regret for your sins, and a determined
resolution to lead a better life. Otherwise, ex-
pect the fulfillment of these words which you
ought to meditate and frequently repeat :
"If in the green wood they do these things,
what shall be done in the dry ? " (Luke xxiii.

3I-)

If such extreme severity is exercised toward
the green wood which is worthy of being pre-
served, what will be done with the dry wood,
which is good for nothing but to burn ? If
God punishes so fearfully his only and most
innocent Son for the sins of his rebellious
slave, how will he punish the slave himself
if he does not reform ?

ELEVEN O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ put to Death between two Thieves.

1. The Mystery.

Two criminals were brought out of the city
with our Lord to be crucified with him ; one
was crucified on his right hand, and the other
on his left. (Luke xxiii. 32, 33.)

24

278 Practice of Union zvitk Our Lord

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

It is to admire, adore, and fear the abysses
of God's judgments, and to take great care to
live well.

Two robbers, one as guilty as the other,
were condemned to the same kind of death,
on the same day and in the same place. One
was taken, and the other left ! (Matt. xxiv.
40.) One was predestined, the other rejected ;
one saved, the other lost ; one went from his
cross to paradise, the other descended from
his to hell.

These two thieves, figures of the predesti-
nate and the reprobate, were both on the
cross and suffered extreme torments ; but the
bad one suffered even more than the good,
because besides the tortures of the body, he
had also to endure those of the soul, impa-
tience, spite, fury, rage, hatred, the desire of
vengeance, and his other wicked sentiments ;
whilst, if the good one was tormented in body,
his soul bore his torments patiently, he en-
dured them as a satisfaction for his sins which
he deeply regretted, and he was cheered by
the hope of his salvation.

The history of these two men teaches us
that all, the good and the bad, are afflicted in

For the Season of Lent, 279

this life, the bad even more than the good ;
and also, that all we have to do is to accept
our afflictions in a good spirit, because an af-
fliction well received, a cross well carried, is,
as it was to the good thief, a token of predes-
tination and a cause of a thousand blessings ;
on the contrary, badly received and borne, as
in the case of the bad thief, it is a sign of re-
probation, and a source of an infinity of evils.

j. Prayer.

O God whose judgments are abysses ! show
me grace and mercy, look upon me favorably
as thou didst look upon the good thief, so
that like him I may have strength to be en-
tirely converted, to bear my sufferings and
hang upon my cross as he did, and also like
him to ascend from the cross to paradise.
Amen.

(4.. Aspiratory Verse.
" Lord, remember me when thou shalt come
-

into thy kingdom." (Luke xxiii. 42.) Ah !
Lord, remember me when thou shalt be in
thy kingdom ; and as thou art already there,
remember me now to forgive my sins and
show me mercy.

280 Practice of Union with Our Lord

MIDDAY.

Jesus Christ on the Cross.

/. The Mystery,

Our Lord was nailed to the cross with inex-
plicable torture, and then elevated and ex-
posed with extreme infamy to the gaze of a
great multitude of spectators, who continuing
their hatred and cruelty, and delighted to see
him where they had so much desired him to
be, vomited forth against him blasphemies
and outrageous words, and shaking their
heads in mockery and disdain, exclaimed :
Go to, wicked wretch ! who boasted to be
able to destroy the temple of God and rebuild
it in three days, now use your power for your-
self, save yourself. If you are the Son of God,
prove it by coming down from the cross. He
saved others, and he knows not how to save
himself! If he is, as he has pretended, the
king of Israel whom we await, let him come
down from his cross and we wrill believe in
him and receive him. He has put his trust in
God, let God now deliver him if he owns him
for his Son. " They blasphemed him, wagging
their heads and saying : Vah ! thou that de-
stroyest the temple of God, and in three days

For the Season of Lent. 281

dost rebuild it, save thy ownrself ; if thou be
the Son of God, come down from the cross.
He saved others, himself he cannot save. If
he be the king of Israel, let him now come
down from the cross and we will believe in
him. He trusted in God ; let him now deliver
him if he will have him ; for he said, I am the
Son of God. (Matt, xxvii. 39, 40, 42, 43.)

While our Lord was plunged and submerged
in that most bitter sea of agonies, to sustain
him in some degree they offered him a glass
of myrrh mingled with gall ; but he would
only taste it to experience its bitterness ; and
would not drink it to mitigate his sufferings,
as other victims of the cross wTere accustomed
to do, to whom this mixture w7as given as a
narcotic to stupefy and deaden their senses,
so that they would not feel their tortures so
acutely.

2. The Spirit of the Mysteiy.

It is to regard with close application of
spirit our Lord crucified ; to look at him with
faith, believing that he is your Creator and
your Sovereign Lord ; with extreme regret
for your sins that have brought him to this
state and have cost him so much suffering
after he has bestowed on you so many bles-

282 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

sings ; with great hope of obtaining pardon,
since he suffers to give it to you and pours out
his blood to wash you ; with ardent love, con-
sidering what he does and endures for you,
what he gives you, and how lovingly he gives ;
and finally with great fear of being severely
punished if you do not correspond to such
excessive love, and if you do not make a
good use of so precious a means of salvation.

You must unite yourself to our Lord cruci-
fied, and apply yourself above all to the mys-
tery of his cross, because it is the mystery
of the predestination, the justification, sancti-
fication, and salvation of men — in fact, the
means whereby our Lord has predestined,
justified, sanctified, and saved them. It was
there, on the cross, that he purchased them,
that he paid their ransom and discharged
their debts ; it was there that he conquered
sin, the devil, death, and all their enemies ;
there he closed the gates of hell and opened
the doors of paradise ; and there he merited
for them grace, glory, and all the blessings
they will ever enjoy.

Finally, you should apply yourself to the
mystery of the cross with the resolution of
imitating the humility, patience, obedience,
charity, and other virtues our Lord there ex-

For the Season of Lent. 283

erased, and there taught us ; remembering
that he exercised and taught them for the
express purpose that you should imitate
them, and that you cannot in any other way
. unite yourself to him crucified and receive the
fruits of his cross.

j. Prayer.

O Jesus, my Saviour and my Redeemer !
grant me this grace which I beg of thee with
my whole heart ; that, as all the members of
thy body were fastened to the cross, and as I
have the honor, unworthy though I am, to be
one of the members of thy mystical body, it
may please thee to attach me to thy cross, to
render me a recipient of its merits, and to give
me its true spirit to enable me to live the rest
of my days as a man crucified with thee, prac-
ticing the humility, patience, gentleness, obe-
dience, charity, forgiveness of injuries, poverty
of spirit as well as of body, and all the other
virtues thou didst there exemplify. Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verses.

" They shall look upon me whom they have
pierced." (Zach. xii. 10.) Those who have
crucified me shall behold me on the cross
where they have placed me, and shall stay

284 Practice of Union with Our Lord

their gaze to consider what I suffer, for whom,
and with what love.

"With Christ I am nailed to the cross."
(Gal. ii. 19.) I am nailed to the cross with
Jesus Christ as one of his members that
shares the affliction of his head.

" The world is crucified to me, and I to the
world." (Gal. vi. 14.) We are dead, the one
to the other.

ONE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Speaking on the Cross.

7. The Mystery.

Our Lord on the cross spoke seven words
which wTere heard ; doubtless he spoke others
which were not heard ; it is believed that he
recited the twenty-first Psalm which clearly
refers to his passion.

I.

The first word our Lord spoke on the cross
is redolent of most admirable charity, because
it had for its object those who had crucified
him. He asked his Father to pardon them,
saying : " Father, forgive them, for they know
not zv hat they do." (Luke xxiii. 34.)

He included in this prayer not only those
of the Jewish and Roman people wrho had

For the Season of Lent. 285

crucified him, but us, and all men, because
we have all fastened him to the cross with
the nails of our sins.

Let us learn from such an example love of
our enemies and the forgiveness of injuries.

O my Saviour, say once more to thy Father,
there in highest Heaven, say now and always
for me and for all men : Father, forgive them,
for they know not what they do.

II.

The second word was to promise paradise
to the good thief, telling him : " Amen, I say
to thee, this day thou shalt be with me in parei-
dise" (Luke xxiii. 43.) I tell thee and I as-
sure thee that to-day thou shalt be with me
in paradise.

Who would not hope in our Lord after such
a pardon and such a grace ? Thus the Church
sings :

" Qui Mariam absolvisti^
Et latronem exaudisti,
Mild quoque spent dedisti. ' '

"Thou didst Mary's guilt forgive,
Didst the dying thief receive ;
Hence doth hope within me live."

III.

The third word was to give to his most
blessed and most afflicted Mother, Saint John

286 Practice of Union with Our Lord

for her son, saying : " Woman, behold thy son"
(Jno. xix. 26.)

Thou art losing the Son thou broughtest
forth. I give thee another, my most cherished
disciple, to assist thee and take care of thee.

And to St. John he said: "Behold thy
Mother!' (Jno. xix. 27.) My Mother shall
henceforth be thine.

O my Saviour, since thou art kind enough
to allow me to apply these words to myself,
I pray thee that, as I do not doubt thy holy
Mother exercises toward me all the care and
charity of a good and tender mother, *so I may
render her all the duties of honor, obedience,
and love a good son owes his mother.

IV.

The fourth word was to cry out to his Fa-
ther in the extremity of his agony: "My
God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me ? "
(Mark xv. 34.)

My God, my God, why hast thou thus aban-
doned me ? Why dost thou allow thy Son to
suffer so much ?

Who would not feel compassion for our
Lord, hearing him utter this mournful cry,
and at the same time experience deep sorrow

For the Season of Lent. 287

for sin, since it has reduced the Son of God to
this extremity ?

V.

The fifth word was : " Sitio, I thirst." (Jno.
xix. 28.) Yes, I thirst, but rather to suffer
more for the love of men than to drink some
liquid to refresh my body.

See the ardor of our Lord's love for you !
Had he not suffering enough without desiring
more to testify his love for you ? Correspond,
then, to that burning love, and suffer some-
thing for him.

VI.

The sixth word was : " Consnmmatnm est,
It is consummated T (Jno. xix. 30.) I under-
toojk an affair for the glory of God and the
salvation of men ; I have not left it in an im-
perfect state ; behold it is finished.

Do the same with regard to all your actions
so that you can say with our Lord : Consnm-
matnm est, the thing is consummated, and as
entirely as possible.

VII.

The last word was to say to God his ^Fa-
ther : " Father, into thy hands I commend my

288 Practice of Union with Our Lord

spirit. And saying this, he gave up the
ghost." (Luke xxiii. 46.)

After his example, say frequently these
words: "Father, I commend to thee my
spirit, and I place it in thy paternal hands
for thee to guide it, defend it, illumine it,
strengthen it, purify it, and at its departure
from my body, open to it the gates cf thy
paradise and reunite it to thee as to its first
principle.- Amen.

TWO O'CLOCK.

Our Lady at the Foot of the Cross.

7. The Mystery.

Our Lady stood near the cross of her cru-
cified Son. "There stood by the cross of
Jesus, his ^Mother." (Jno. xix. 25.) There is
no tongue that can express, nor mind capable
of conceiving the greatness of the affliction
and the excess of the sorrow that filled the
soul of that most desolate of mothers at the
foot of the cross of her Son ; because her
affliction and sorrow flowed from two sources,
the vastness of which can neither be understood
nor described ; these sources were, the suffer-
ings of her Son and the love she bore him.
Thus her grief is beyond our thoughts and 1

' For the Season of Lent. 289

words ; it is that sword not of iron, nor of
steel, but of sorrow, which the holy old man,
Simeon had predicted would pierce her heart-

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

It is to stand, not to fall, beneath the great-
est trials and the most bitter griefs, to bear
them with patience and fortitude after the ex-
ample of our Lady, who, in the extremity of her
affliction and when that sword of sorrow was
plunged in her soul even to the hilt, was not
conquered by her suffering .nor cast to the
earth, but stood at the foot of the cross,
where, as St. Anselm says : "She poured out
her tears and was immersed in a sea of sorrow,
but she remained constant and suffered with
invincible patience ; she stood gracefully, mod-
estly, and with a confusion full of strength
and wisdom." She stood, ever resigned to
the will of God for the death of her Son,
whom she would herself have crucified, so the
saints say, if it had been necessary for God's
glory and the salvation of men, since she had
no less obedience, and no less courage to
sacrifice her Son, than Abraham had to im-
molate his.

The spirit of this mystery is, moreover, to

recognize that we owe compensation to our
25

290 Practice of Union zvitJi Our Lord

Lady for the death of her Son ; for, as our sins
put him to death, we have not only offended
him, but also his Mother, and are under obli-
gation to repair the wrong we have done her,
just as in human society reparation must be
made to a parent for the murder of its child.

We ought, then, in compensation, to at
least share the sorrow of that desolate Mo-
ther, to compassionate her, to have a trne
repentance for our sins and the atrocious in-
jury they have done her, to most humbly beg
her forgiveness, to offer her a thousand thanks-
givings for having contributed to our salvation
by the sacrifice of her Son, and to promise that
we will love her and her Son more than ever.
This last is the satisfaction and reparation she
asks of us; for her most ardent desire, the
greatest pleasure that we can give her, is that
we should honor and love her Son ; as it is
also the dearest wish of the Son, the thing
most agreeable to him, that we should honor
:and love his Mother.

3. Prayer,

O holy Virgin and most afflicted Mother,
whom I behold beneath the cross. of thy Son,
crucified most cruelly with him ! I beg thee,
I conjure thee to give me a share in thy sor-

For the Season of Lent. 291

rows, since I am their cause. Let the point
of that swprd that pierced thy heart through
and through, enter mine, to make it feel thy
affliction and thy Son's torments. Holy Mo-
ther, impress, even on the quick of my soul,
the wounds of thy crucified Son, and give me
to lament and weep his death with thee, and
like thee, for the rest of my life. Amen.

4. Aspiratory Verses.

" Call me not Noemi (that is, beautiful), but
call me Mara (that is, bitter), for the Al-
mighty hath quite filled me with bitterness."
(Ruth i. 20.) The Almighty has filled me
with great bitterness ; and in fact the name
of Mary signifies, among other things, a sea
of bitterness.

" To what shall I compare thee, to what
shall I equal thee, O virgin Daughter of Sion ?
for great as the sea is thy destruction.'' (Lam.
ii. 13.) O Daughter of Sion, holy Virgin, to
what shall I compare thee, to what affliction
shall I liken thine ? There is none, because
thine is vast as the sea, which is almost limit-
less, and in which there is not a drop of sweet
water, but all is bitter.

292 Practice of Union with Our Lord

THREE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Dying in the Midst of Great Prodigies.

/. The Mystery.

Our Lord, " crying with a loud voice, yielded
up the ghost." (Matt, xxvii. 50.) And im-
mediately the veil of the temple, which sepa-
rated the two most holy places, was rent in
twain from the top to the bottom, the earth
trembled, the rocks were cleft, the tombs
opened, and the sun clothed itself in mourn-
ing, covering its face with shadows that spread
over all the earth. The centurion who com-
manded the. company of soldiers, and the sol-
diers themselves, witnessing these prodigies,
were sore afraid, and confessed that our Lord
was indeed just, innocent, and the Son of
God. And all the spectators returned greatly
astonished, and striking their breasts in re-
pentance. (Luke xxiii. 48.)

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

Consider the great prodigies that came to
pass at our Lord's death ; but persuade your-
self that it will be a still greater prodigy if,
beholding those rendings of the rocks, those
openings of the tombs, those phenomena of

For the Season of Lent. 293

nature, all those wonders that happened to
inanimate things for which our Lord did not
die, you who are endowed with reason, and
for whom he did die to deliver you from all
kinds of evil, and to load you with all bless-
ings, are not affected, if your heart is not
broken, if it does not open to God, if you do
not change your life.

Therefore, withdrawing into yourself, strike
your breast like the centurion, conceive re-
gret for your offences, beg God to pardon
them, and commence with a courageous and
firm resolution a better life, to which our Lord
unceasingly calls you by that loud cry he ut-
tered at his death.

j. Prayer.

O my dear and all-powerful Redeemer, who
at thy death hadst strength to tear away
the veils and disclose the hidden things, to
cause the motionless body of the earth to
tremble, to break the hard rocks, and to open
the sealed tombs ! I beg thee by the merit
of thy death to act thus powerfully upon my
soul, and to produce spiritually and holily all1
these effects in it for its salvation and perfec-
tion. Amen.

294 Practice of Union with Our Lord

4. Aspiratory Verse.

" Jcntsalem, Jerusalem, convertere ad Domi-
uum Deum tiium." (Ecclesia in offic. Parasc.)
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, O soul purchased by the
precious blood of Jesus Christ, be converted
to the Lord thy God, who has loved thee even
to dying on a gibbet for thy salvation, the
most painful and ignominious of deaths !

FOUR O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ Wounded in the Heart after his Death.

7. The Mystery.

One of the soldiers who had assisted at our
Lord's execution, after he wTas dead, opened
his side with a lance ; and immediately there
flowed out the little blood that remained, and
water. (Jno. xix. 34.)

2. The Spirit of " the Mystery .

Our Lord received after his death this wound
in his side, in his heart, to show that his death
and all his sufferings came from the heart, from
the love he bore us, as their source ; that they
tended to love, to make us love him, as their
end. Therefore, since it is in the wound of

For the Season of Lent. 295

his heart his love dwells, that wound is the
wound of love.

Our Lord permitted his heart to be opened
in order that we might enter it, might fix
therein our dwelling, and never leaving it,
might in it exercise all the works of the pur-
gative, the illuminative, and the unitive life.

St. Bernard addresses our Lord in these
words: "They pierced thy side so that we
might have a door to go to thee ; they made
a wound and cleft in thy heart so -that we may
find there a shelter from all the troubles and
embarrassments of exterior things. Let us then
approach and enter that heart ; we will there
enjoy marvelous pleasures, and will there find
our paradise on earth. Oh ! how good it is,
what satisfaction and comfort to dwell in the
Heart of Jesus \ (Bern, de Pass. c. 3.)

J. Prayer.

By thy Heart transpierced with the lance,
and much more with the love thou bearest us,
graciously deign, O sweet Jesus, to wound my
heart with thy love. And since thou wrast
pleased that thine should be opened so that I
might enter therein, give me grace to enter
that sanctuary, to dwell, to work in it, to im-

296 Practice of Union with Our Lord

bibe its purity, charity, meekness, and all its
holy and divine dispositions. Amen.

^. Aspiratory Verse.

" I shall die in my nest, and as a palm-tree,
shall multiply all my days " (like the phoenix.
Hebr. Tertul.) (Job. xxix. 18.) I shall die
in my little nest, and like a palm-tree, shall
there multiply my days and produce my fruits.

I desire to live to God and to die to myself
in my little nest in the wound of my Saviour's
Heart. There I will gain palms of victory
over my vices and the enemies of- my salva-
tion ; there I will -burn and be reduced to
ashes, and will renew myself, like the phoenix,
to perform all my actions in a new and excel-
lent manner.

FIVE O'CLOCK.

Jesus Christ taken down from the Cross and laid in
the Sepulchre.

I. The Mystery.

Our Lord, after having remained some
hours on the cross, was taken down by Jo-
seph, a native of Arimathea, and one of the
counselors of Jerusalem, who was a man of
wealth and rank. The sacred Body was

For the Season of Lent. 297

placed in the arms of the afflicted Moth-
er, who at sight of it redoubled her weeping
and experienced an increase of sorrow ; after
she had held it for some time, bathed it with
her tears, and kissed it over and over again,
it was embalmed with myrrh and aloes, and
then laid in a sepulchre which Joseph recently
had hewn for himself in the rock, and in which
no corpse had as yet been placed. It was a
grotto in a garden near Calvary.

2. The Spirit of the Mystery.

St. Paul teaches us what it is when he says,
writing to the Romans : uWe are buried to-
gether, with him by baptism unto death ; that
as Christ is risen from the dead by the glory
of the Father, so we also may walk in new-
ness of life." (Rom. vi. 4.) We have all
been buried with our Lord Jesus Christ in
baptism ; that is, as our Lord lay dead in the
sepulchre, so we die to sin by virtue of this
sacrament to lead afterward a new life of
purity, innocence, and elevation above the
things of earth, a life resembling our Lord's
life after his glorious resurrection. Whence
the person baptized is plunged three times in
che water to represent the three days our
Lord lay in the sepulchre, also to represent

298 Practice of Union with Our Lord

that person's death to sin and his burial to all
the vanities of the world ; for this reason like-
wise, the most suitable day for baptism was
considered in the primitive Church to be Holy
Saturday, the day our Lord spent in the tomb,
and the white garment the priest gave the new-
ly-baptized was a sign of the pure and innocent
life to which their baptism obliged them.

Let us, continuing the symbolism, consider
that the sepulchre newly hewn in the rock,
which our Lord requires, is a heart renewed
according to his spirit, and firmly and con-
stantly established in the resolution to love
him, to prefer him to all else, and to imitate
his virtues. But he desires to be laid there
embalmed with the aromatic and precious
gums of myrrh and aloes ; that is to say, we
must make use of mortification and must sub-
due ourselves ; then our heart will be a rich
and magnificent mausoleum in which our dead
Lord will repose willingly, and to which he
will abundantly apply the merits of his death
to purify it, sanctify it, and make it perfect
according to God.

3. Prayer.

O my dear Saviour ! I ask thee with all the
ardor and affection I am capable of, that, since

For the Season of Lent. 299

by my baptism I have been entombed with
thee as a member with the head, so I may
die entirely and perseveringly to sin, I may
renounce the pomps of the world and all com-
merce with the devil, according to the promise
I made, and may live a life truly and excel-
lently Christian, like a creature renewed in
thee and animated with thy spirit. Amen.

4.. Aspiratory Verse.

" And his sepulchre shall be glorious." (Is.
xi. 10.) His sepulchre shall be glorious by
reason of the concourse of Christians that
shall come to visit it from all quarters of the
earth.

But make still more glorious the one you
have prepared for him in your heart ; do this
by acts of the virtues, particularly by mortifi-
cation of your passions, and of all your irregu-
lar appetites.

CHAPTER VI. .

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD FROM
EASTER TO THE FEAST OF THE BLESSED
SACRAMENT,

I.— THE SUBJECT.

The Resurrection of our Lord, his Ascen-
sion, and the Descent of the Holy Ghost upon
the faithful, are the mysteries of this season,
and will consequently form the subject of our
considerations. ■

II.— THE AFFECTIONS.
i. Fat tit.

The Resurrection of our Lord, which, as St.
Paul says, carries with it as a necessary con-
sequence our resurrection, is the foundation of
our religion, because it establishes beyond a
doubt the doctrine of a future life where we
are to be happy forever.

Without the sure hope of this future life we
would be, says the same apostle, the most
miserable of men — the most foolish, to deprive
ourselves of the pleasures of the present life,
and to take so much pains to bear our cross

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 301

in obedience to our Lord's command, if there
were nothing better in reserve for us, if all
must die with us. (i Cor. xv. 19.) But with
this hope we are exceedingly consoled, power-
fully withheld from sin which is the only hin-
drance to our happy resurrection, strongly in-
cited to virtue which is the means of procuring
it, and fortified to endure patiently all the evils
of this life, remembering the truth that St.
Paul also teaches us : ■" The sufferings of this
time are not worthy to be compared with the
glory to come, that shall be revealed in us."
(Rom. viii. 18.) All the afflictions we are
capable of suffering now, do not approach in
greatness the glory that is promised us.

It was to strengthen faith in this mystery,
that our Lord did and said many things, that
he remained on earth forty days after his re-
surrection, and appeared so frequently to so
many persons. And the apostles in their
preaching and in their writings endeavored
to make it understood, and to impress it upon
the minds of their disciples.

For this reason also Easter is the greatest
of the Christian feasts. It is the Feast of
feasts, says St. Gregory Nazianzen ; it is the
celebration of celebrations, and the grandest
day of the year. Not that the resurrection
26

302 Practice of Union with Our Lord

of the dead is the greatest of all mysteries ;
nor that it equals in any degree the mystery
of the Blessed Trinity, the Incarnation, or
Pentecost ; but because all the other mys-
teries tend to it, and the whole economy of
our religion is directed to the glorious resur-
rection of our bodies, which will render us
afterward perfectly happy. We would not be
happy if our bodies as well as our souls did
not partake of our happiness ; for the soul
alone is^ not man, but the soul and body
united.

Therefore it is very important for us to be
well persuaded of our future resurrection, and
to firmly believe this truth. To effect this,
let us frequently make acts of lively faith,
saying with the apostles : " Credo resnrrec-
tionem mortuornm, et vitam ceternam. Amen.
I believe in the resurrection of the dead, and
life everlasting. Amen."

Let us say with the holy man Job: "I
know that my Redeemer liveth, and in the
last day I shall rise out of the earth. And I
shall be clothed again with my skin, and in
my flesh I shall see my God. Whom I myself
shall see, and my eyes shall behold, and
not another." (Job. xix. 25, 26, 27.) I know
with the infallible knowledge faith gives me,

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 303

that my Redeemer, from whom I expect my
salvation and happiness, liveth, and that at
the last day I shall go forth from my tomb
in the vigor of life ; that after my death my
bones will again be covered with their flesh,
and that in my own body and with my own
eyes I shall see the God whom I adore, and
that it will not be another who will see him
for me.

2. Hope.

Our Lord by his resurrection has given us all
a solid hope of rising one day with him, and
of enjoying a glory, in some degree, like his.
"God," says the apostle, "hath quickened us
together in Christ, and hath raised us up
together, and hath made us sit together in
the heavenly places." (Ephes. ii. 5, 6.) God
has given us in Jesus Christ and through his
merits the life of grace ; he has raised us
to glory, and has assigned us our places in
heaven. If he be risen to a glorious life,
doubtless we who have the honor of being
his members, will rise with him to the same
life ; for it is not possible that the head alone
should return to life without the body, but all
the members must necessarily partake of its
happiness, and rise with it.

304 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

The same apostle says again : " By a man
cam,e death, and by a man the resurrection of
the dead." (i Cor. xv. 21.) As death entered
the world by a man, that is by Adam when he
sinned, so the resurrection of the dead also
came by a man, who is our Lord Jesus Christ ;
as Adam contained in himself, in the order of
nature, all men, inasmuch as they are all his
posterity, so our Lord contains them all in
himself, as regards the order of grace, because
it is from him alone that they receive grace.
Furthermore, just as in the person of Adam
when he fell, when he died by sin, forfeited
original justice, and was driven from the ter-
restrial paradise, we all fell, died, lost justice,
and were banished in him from that abode of
delights ; just as we all were reduced to those
misfortunes, so we have all risen from the
tomb and returned to life with our Lord in
his resurrection.

As the member dies with the head, the
branch withers with the root, the stream dries
up with its source, and the ray is eclipsed
with the sun, and the same member lives
again with the head, the branch revives with
its root when in the spring-time it receives
from it moisture and sap ; the stream flows
once more when its source is full, and the ray

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 305

reappears when the sun having broken through
the cloud and dissipated the storm is again
visible ; so neither more nor less do we die
wifti our Lord dying, and we rise with him
when he rises, because he is our head and we
are his members, he is our root and we are
his branches, he is our source and our sun and
wre spring from his fountain and emanate from
his rays. St. Leo says : " We have been cru-
cified, we have died, we have been buried with
Jesus Christ, and likewise we have risen with
him the third day." (Serm. 2 de Resurr.)

If you desire to know how we rise with our
Lord, and in what manner his resurrection is
the cause of ours, the Angelical Doctor teaches
it writh much precision, explaining to us two
principles : the first, that the thing which is
the first of each kind or species, is always the
cause and pattern of the things that follow
and descend from it ; as appears in Adam,
the first man, and in the animals which were
the beginning and progenitors of their species.
Now the first who rose to die no rriore is with-
out contradiction our Lord, whence St. Paul
calls him "the first fruits of them that slept,"
(i. Cor. xv. 20,) that is, of the risen dead ; not
that he wras the first who came back from
death to life, since he himself had resuscitated

306 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

Lazarus and others ; but because he was the
first to rise to a glorious and immortal life.
Consequently, his resurrection is the cause
and law of ours.

According to the second principle, experi-
ence teaches us that a cause always produces
its effect upon the object nearest to it, and
then transmits it through this object to others
more remote ; thus fire warms first the air
directly around, then through this air com-
municates warmth to the whole atmosphere ;
and we see how the magnet attracts first the
iron close to it, then through this the more
distant masses. Even so the Divinity, that is
life in very essence, first communicates life to
the dead body of our Lord for the reason that
it is personally united to this body ; then,
through our Lord to all other bodies. (Summa
p. 3, q. 57, a. I.)

From this we should infer that the nearer
we approach our Lord, the more closely we
are attached to him, the more intimately
united with him by faith, hope, charity, and
the other virtues, the more brilliant and glo-
rious will our resurrection be, because his will
act more powerfully and more abundantly
upon ours.

On this our hope is founded ; our Lord's

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 307

resurrection assures us of ours, and strengthens
us in our assurance. Tertullian said : " The
trust, and the sweetest expectation of Chris-
tians, is the resurrection of the dead. (L. de
Resurr. Carnis c. 1.) And St. Augustine:
"This is our hope, the foundation of our faith,
the solace of all our sufferings in this evil
world, and the nerve of our perseverance."
(In. Ps. 65.)

Thus the holy man Job, seated upon his
dunghill, in the midst of his greatest suffer-
ings and the sharpest of his pains, while
scraping with his diamond, his ruby, I mean
his piece of broken pottery, his sores and the
matter that exuded from his infected body,
after having made the act of faith in the future
resurrection which we have already quoted,
concludes : " This my hope is laid up in my
bosom." (Job xix. 27.) I cherish in my
spirit the hope of this happiness, I keep it in
my breast as a thing whose memory I care-
fully preserve^ that I do not wish to forget
but to have ever before my eyes, and as
something most rare, a precious jewel, which
I singularly value and press to my heart to
strengthen me to bear my miseries.

Asfain, while in the same condition, he savs :
'' I expect until my change come." (Job xiv.

308 Practice of Union with Our Lord

14.) I rest in the hope of my change ; I await
the hour when my body subject to so many
infirmities, to so many diseases and to death,
my soul prone to so many vices, my mind so
ignorant and dark, my will so inert, so inclined
to the love of creatures and so little touched
with the love of my God, my passions so
irregular and difficult to govern, and all with-
in rne where sin has left such fatal marks of
its malignity and has produced so much cor-
ruption, will be changed and come to its last
perfection and beatitude.

We ought to make use of these words and
to produce frequently acts of hope of our
resurrection, in order to animate ourselves to
endure our trials patiently ; and to give us
more courage and even joy, it will be well to
represent to ourselves the ravishing beauty,
the admirable light surpassing that of the sun,
the agility, the subtilty, the immortality of
our risen bodies, and the torrents of unspeak-
able delights in which they will be immersed
forever. *

J. Joy-

The hope of all these blessings firmly es-
tablished in our souls is, without doubt, capa-
ble of affording us singular satisfaction, and

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 309

of causing us to pass our life in very great
joy ; because the certain hope of a great
good fills the soul with joy. " Rejoicing in
hope," says St. Paul. (Rom. xii. 12.) Rejoice
in the unfailing hope of being eternally happy
if you live well. As the resurrection of our
Lord gives us this hope, it consequently gives
us a reason for this joy.

" This is the day which the Lord hath made ;
let us be glad and rejoice therein," sings the
Royal Prophet. (Ps. cxvii. 24.) This is the
day the Lord hath made ; let us rejoice and
let us leap for gladness on this day. Some
have thought these words referred to the day
of the Incarnation, when the Son of God
clothed himself with our nature that he might
deliver us from our miseries and enrich us
with his blessings. The Church applies them
to the day of our Lord's circumcision which
is the octave of his birth when he appeared
visibly to the eyes of men, and the first day
which he empurpled with his blood for their
love, and which also is the opening day of the
year. St. Jerome and St. Augustine consider
that the words refer to the whole period of
the New Law, in which we should be always
happy, because we have tokens and infallible
assurances of our beatitude in the future life

310 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

if we keep God's commandments ; and in the
present life that nothing" can injure us except-
ing sin, but all may be very advantageous to
us if we use it well.

This is why it may be said of Christians
with much more truth than an ancient writer
said of the Platonists : "We who are of the
family of Plato and his disciples, banish from
our midst all sadness and discontent, and ad-
mit only what is gay, heavenly, and divine."
(Apuleius.) Thus St. Paul says to all, as
well as to the Philippians : " Rejoice in the
Lord always ; again I say, rejoice." (Philipp.
iv. 4.) Rejoice always in our Lord ; again I
beg you, rejoice, because you have great rea-
son to do so. St. Francis used to tell his
religious that it was the business of the devil
and his followers who were on the road to
hell, to be sad ; but it was for us to rejoice,
and to exclude from our hearts sadness and
grief.

The holy Fathers, however, and the Church
generally, understand the words of David to
apply to the day of our Lord's resurrection ;
therefore the Church frequently repeats them
during the octave of that feast, because we
have all very great reason to rejoice on that
day. There was nothing in the universe that

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 3 1 1

had not in our Lord's resurrection a new mo-
tive of joy, his Father in heaven, his Mother
and his disciples on earth, the saints in limbo,
and all men everywhere. St. Peter Damian,
writing to Pope Nicholas II., even says, as
coming from Archbishop Hubert, that the
damned, in honor of the resurrection of our
Lord and the joy it brought to the world, re-
ceive every Sunday some diminution of their
torments, some alleviation of their pains. This,
if true, must be understood of the pains of the
senses.

But what is true and a great cause of joy
on the feast of the Resurrection, is that
all the faithful, or the greater number, who
were in a state of sin, have, in prepartion for
this feast, purified their consciences by Con-
fession and Communion ; that is, on this
day more than on any other of the whole
year there are more true Christians, more
souls in a state of grace, God has more ser-
vants, the Church more children, Jesus Christ
more living members and more brethren.

For these reasons St. Augustftie said that
Easter-day seemed to him more beautiful than,
other days, that the sun appeared to his eyes
to shine with a different light, that its aspect
was more gladsome than ordinarily; that the

312 Practice of Union with Our Lord

stars showed themselves more adorned, more
richly clothed, and the elements were gayer
and more joyous. (Serm. 136. de temp.) And
to the present time it is the custom in the
Greek Church for the faithful on Easter morn-
ing to joyfully embrace one another, saluting :
"Jesus Christ is risen !" and replying: "Yes,
he is truly risen !" The signification of this is
the argument of St. Paul : We shall rise one
day like him, consequently we should rejoice.

Therefore the proper affection and the espe-
cial sentiment of Easter-day, and of the whole
Paschal season, is a holy joy and a sentiment
of divine gladness. Hence Tertullian said :
" From Easter to Pentecost we should rejoice
and preserve our souls in a holy gaiety." (L.
de Corona mil. c. 3.) For the same reason
the Church during all this season sings so
frequently, and jubilantly echoes her A lleluias.

It is our duty, then, to follow her guidance,
and to adopt her sentiments, endeavoring to
fill our souls with a divine joy, and to partici-
pate in that immense satisfaction our Lord
received in his resurrection, when he beheld -
himself victorious over all his enemies, cov-
ered with sovereign glory, and enjoying a life
eternally blessed. This is why he says to
us : " That my joy may be in you, enter

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 3 1 3

thou into the joy of thy Lord." (Jno. xv. 11,
and Matt. xxv. 21.) And the Church begins
the Mass of the Saturday in the Octave of
Easter, with these words of David : " He
brought forth his people with joy, and his
chosen with gladness." (Ps. civ. 43.) The
Lord has brought his people with jubilation,
and led his elect with pleasure. He has guided
them with songs of gladness and with canti-
cles of joy.

^. Contempt of the Goods and Evils of this
Life.

That great, solid, and divine joy with which
the resurrection of our Lord and the other
mysteries of this season embalm our spirits,
should cause us to scorn the goods and evils,
the joy and the bitterness of this life.

First, the goods and pleasures : Just as a
''great and powerful monarch filled with all.
the contentment of earth, as Solomon was,
makes no account of the puerile pastime
children find in building mud-houses and
walking on stilts, so we should pay no at-
tention to the trifling goods of this world.

Joy, says Aristotle, flows into a soul either
from the possession of a desired good, or from
the certain and sure hope of possessing it.
27

314 Practice of Union with Our Lord

Now we have in the present life a hope as
certain as the existence of God is, that if we
observe his commandments, we shall enjoy
the riches, honors, and great and lasting
pleasures of paradise. Even now every just
man possesses the treasures of grace, sancti-
fying grace, charity, the theological and moral
virtues infused and supernatural, the gifts of
the Holy Ghost, and the glory of being a
child of God, a brother, coheir, and living
member of Jesus Christ, and a companion of
the angels ; goods so great that in compar-
ison with the least of them, all the empires,
all the riches, all the magnificence, and all
the possessions of earth are not worth a
straw, are not so • much as the light of a
candle to the rays of the sun. Therefore
we have a wonderful reason to rejoice, and
to hold in contempt all the goods and all
the joys of this life.

Were the absolute gift of a hundred mil-
lion of dollars in gold to be made to a man
carried away with the love of riches, or if
this gift were not bestowed directly, but a
promise made that in three weeks he would
certainly receive it, who can doubt but that
he would feel inexplicable joy, that he would
be almost beside himself at the prospect of

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 315

attaining a good so great in his estimation,
and so comformable to his desires ? More-
over, would he not have reason to scorn a
trifling sum of money, would he need to worry
about the loss of a farthing ? We have much
greater reason to do the same, since we are far
richer ; and the goods that are promised us
are not distant if we make ourselves worthy
of them, because our life is so short.

But the trouble is Ave do not appreciate our
riches, whence it happens that we make great
account of those of earth although they are
very petty and uncertain. In this we resemble
some very rich and powerful king, but who is
still only a child ; the weakness of his, age
renders him incapable of enjoying his wealth
and of esteeming the greatness of his fortune,
and causes him to weep and cry if he is re-
fused an apple. " O children, how long will
you love childishness, and the unwise hate
knowledge ?" (Prov. i. 22.) Little children,
true children, wTith the affections and desires
of children, how long will you love playthings,
and hold wisdom in aversion ?

Secondly, the joy of the Resurrection should
make us scorn the evils of this life and enable
us to bear them, not only with patience and
meekness, but with a certain insensibility, just

3 1 6 Practice of Union with Our Lord

as a man whose soul is penetrated with ex-
treme pleasure, all dissolved in joy and inun-
dated with delight, does not feel the prick of
a pin.

For this object we should wisely banish all
the dark and melancholy thoughts, all the
discouragement and mistrust, all the trouble
and discontent that may attack us, as so many
malignant vapors, and divert ourselves with
the agreeable thought of the blessings of
grace and glory that we may possess now
and forever, and say with St. Paul : " Know-
ing that he who raised up Jesus will raise us
up also with Jesus." (2 Cor. iv. 14.) We be-
lieve that he who raised up Jesus will raise us
with him, freed from all evils and filled with
every good.

5. Prayers and Requests.

We must earnestly pray to our Lord, beg-
ging him with great affection to be pleased to
rise in us, to accomplish in our interior and
exterior the effects of his holy and glorious
resurrection, and to produce in our soul and
body a light, an agility, a subtilty, and an
immortality of grace, while we await that of
glory. We must pray him to produce in us

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 3 1 7

=
the impressions of virtue and perfection, to

give us the sentiments of piety the faithful
received when he appeared to them during
the forty days he remained on earth after his
resurrection. We must implore him to im-
press on us the particular grace of his ascen-
sion, which consists in an ascension of our
souls and an elvation of our spirits above all
the things of earth, with a true contempt of
all the honors of the world, its riches and
pleasures, as being infinitely below the bless-
ings in store for us, and the greatness of a
true Christian.

We should pray and conjure the Holy Ghost
to effect in us a new Pentecost, to come to us
in the form of a tongue of fire to purify us, to
strengthen us, to illumine us, to warm us, to
burn and change us, and to reform our tongues
in speech and silence. We should supplicate
him with all the earnestness possible that, as
his seven gifts are absolutely necessary to
bring the virtues to perfection, and to enable
us to lead lives truly Christian, spiritual, and
divine, he would have the goodness, he who
is himself essential and personal goodness, to
pour them into our souls with abundant pro-
fusion.

3 1 8 Practice of Union ivith Our Lord

III.— THE VIRTUES.
i. A Heavenly Life.

St. Paul says : "As Christ is risen from the
dead by the glory of the Father, so we also
may walk in newness of life." (Rom. vi. 4.)
As Jesus Christ is risen for the glory of his
Father, and by his resurrection to commence
a new life, suitable to the dignity of the Son
of God, so we, to imitate him, must live a new
life. The word Easter obliges us to it, because
it signifies, according to St. Jerome, a change
and a passage. St. Bernard says, referring to
it: "Our Lord passing to a new life, invites
us to follow him, to change our lives." (Bern.
Serm. 1. de Resurr. Dom.)

Let us no longer live as we have lived, with
thoughts, words, and works that are entirely
for earth ; but let us live for Heaven. St.
Paul says to us, as well as to the Colossians :
44 If you be risen with Christ, seek the things
that are above, where Christ is sitting at the
right hand of God. Mind the things that are
above, not the things that are upon the earth.
For you are dead, and your life is hidden with
Christ in God." (Coloss. iii. 1, 2, 3.) You are
dead in Jesus Christ to sin and to all the

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 319

things of the world, and your life is hidden
with his in God.

Assuredly the members must participate in
the dispositions of the head, and it is not pos-
sible for them to live separated from its life.
This is why, having the honor to be members
of Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ being risen,
and we risen in him, we must now lead, like
him, a heavenly life, conducting ourselves
here below as inhabitants of the other world.

In another place, St. Paul tells us : "Their
glory is in their shame, who mind earthly
things. ' Our conversation is in heaven."
(Philipp. iii. 19, 20.) The glory, riches, plea-
sures, and all the actions of those who boast
of being Christians, and nevertheless are at-
tached to the earth, will turn to their confu-
sion. But our conversation, and that of all
who worthily bear this illustrious name and
are living members of Jesus Christ, our honors,
our riches, our satisfaction, and the whole
tenor of our life, prove us to be persons who
profess a heavenly life, who value and con-
temn, who love and hate, who seek and avoid
things, after the fashion of the dwellers in
heaven.

If one of those blessed souls that rose with
our Lord, and united to their bodies, are now

320 Practice of Union with Our Lord

in heaven, should be permitted by God to
return, to earth to live with us, what would
be his thonghts ? What his affections, his
words, and his works ? How would he not
scorn gold and silver, precious stones and pal-
aces, sceptres and crowns ? He would find
bitter our sweetest delights, and the most
beautiful countenances would appear to him
very ugly. He would say to those who would
be astonished at his contempt and his senti-
ments : I have tasted other delights, I have
seen other beauties, I have known other hon-
ors and other riches ; all that I behold on
earth is only fit to amuse children who have
no knowledge of higher things.

In this sense God says to the Christian soul
by his prophet: " I shod thee with violet-
colored shoes." (Ezech. xvi. 10.) I have shod
thee with the heavenly blue, meaning to tell
that soul that its feet, that is its affections, its
desires and hopes, should continually aspire
to heaven, and that all its steps should lead
to that blessed abode. The belief of the
Church, which the painters have followed in
their pictures, is that our Lady, as an expres-
sion of her sentiments elevated above the
earth, a sign of her heavenly life, was always
clothed in blue.

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 32 1

On the day of the Ascension, which is an-
other mystery of this season, the day when
our Lord ascended in body and soul to heaven,
the Blessed Virgin and the apostles who were
spectators of that admirable triumph, followed
him with their eyes, and still closer with their
hearts which that glorious conqueror carried
with him ; so that thenceforward they led even
more than before a life entirely in heaven.
Certainly the most noble bearing and the
most beautiful posture of the Christian is that
of the apostles, accompanying our Lord in his
triumph, and keeping the eyes of the soul, its
thoughts and affections, inseparably fixed on
heaven as the goal of its desires.

Hence we read of several saints, as St. Fran-
cis and his first disciple, the Blessed Bernard
of Quintavalle, St. Ignatius, our founder, and
others, that they took great pleasure in gaz-
ing at the heavens, and spent much time in
contemplation of that abode of their felicity,
because this gaze and contemplation gave
them courage, strength, joy, and a profound
contempt of the things of earth. St. Ignatius
exclaimed : " Qtcam sordet tellns cum ccehtm
aspicio ! " " How miserable appear to me the
things of earth, and all that is most charming
in it, when I consider the heavens, and what

322 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

is there prepared for us ! " Theodoret relates
that St. Simeon Stylites passed the days and
nights upon his column, standing, with his
eyes and arms raised to heaven, and that he
exhorted the crowds that came to see him,
to gaze only at heaven, and to fix there their
hearts. The greater part of Christians raise
their eyes to heaven only to see what the
weather is, which direction .the wind comes
from ; but they ought to lift their eyes, and
look at itJ frequently and attentively, as the
magnificent palace of their eternal dwelling
furnished with glory and riches, and all sorts
of delights, the palace God has built, wThich
our Lord has purchased for them, and where
their relations and friends await them.

This heavenly life is the. Christian life, the
spiritual and divine life which the Holy Ghost
inspired to the faithful when he descended
upon them on the day of Pentecost, and
which he daily inspires to us ; a life in which
we are dead to sin, according to St. Paul, and
" alive unto God in Christ Jesus" (Rom. vi.
n) ; a life in which we endeavor to make our-
selves, like the dead, insensible to a thousand
things, in which we value no more than the
dead do all that men admire and esteem upon
earth ; a life in which we live with interior

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 323

joy, with peace and tranquillity, amid all the
evils that afflict us, resting upon the hope of
the good things that 'will one day be ours.

O happy life ! foretaste of heaven upon
earth ! Life of* God and in God, upon the
pattern of the life of Jesus Christ, and con-
sequently life of joy, in which the Holy
Ghost on Pentecost established the faithful !
Life of peace, which our Lord also after his
resurrection wished and gave so many times
to his disciples, saying to them: " Pax vo-
bis" Peace be with you ! I leave you peace ;
I give you my peace, not that which the world
gives, and which rests on vain honors, perish-
able riches, and the satisfaction of the senses ;
but peace of the soul and repose of the spirit
amid your afflictions and all the vicissitudes
of your mortal life, which is founded on con-
tempt of the honors, riches, and pleasures of
earth, for it is this contempt which produces
this peace and repose. Thus St. Bernard
said: "Give me a soul to which contempt
of all the things of earth has given peace,
and wThich it has put at rest." (Serm. 74 in
Cant.)

It is thus we must express in our life the
mysteries of the resurrection and ascension of
our Lord, and ardently desire to draw him into

324 Practice of Union zvitli Our Lord

us in these states, so as to imbibe their spirit
and bear their marks. For, as we have already
said, we must represent in ourselves the mys-
teries of our Lord, if we wish to receive their
fruits.

St. Augustine savs : " All that was done on
the cross of our Lord, at his burial, in his
resurrection, and his ascension into heaven,
was intended to be reproduced spiritually, not
only in words but in effects, in the Christian's
life on earth." Then, explaining himself in
detail, he continues :

" For it has been said by St. Paul, speaking
of the cross, that those who make profession
of being disciples of Jesus Christ, have cruci-
fied their flesh with their vices and concu-
piscences. Speaking of the sepulture of our
Lord, he says : We have by baptism been
buried with Jesus Christ to die to sin. Of his
resurrection : As Jesus Christ rising from the
dead with the immortal and glorious life he
received from his Father, lived after his resur-
rection differently from before, in like manner
we, 'after his example, forsake our former life,
despoil ourselves of our old habits, to lead a
new life. Finally, as regards the ascension,
the apostle said : If you be risen with Jesus
Christ, make it appear by seeking and tasting

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 325

the things which are in heaven, where Jesus
Christ is seated at the right hand of God, and
not those of earth." (Euchir. c. 53.)

Thus the Christian should bear the features
and lineaments of our Lord's mysteries en-
graven upon his person ; and should be in his
life, as it were, an image of Jesus Christ dead,
buried, risen, and ascended into heaven.

2. Life of Love tozvard our Lord.

One of the principal and most suitable affec-
tions that should be produced in our hearts
by the mysteries of the Paschal season, is an
ardent love toward our Lord Jesus Christ.
There are two powerful reasons to enkindle
this love, namely : the death he has, as it
were, just suffered for us, with its testimonies
of his infinite love ; and the ravishing beauty
of his risen body, which, without contradic-
tion renders him the most beautiful object,
and therefore the most worthy of love, in all
the world.

These two reasons were indicated by David
in Psalm XCIL, which, according to the in-
terpretation of the Fathers and of the univer-
sal Church, treats of the beauty, glory, and
power our Lord acquired by his death and
resurrection. " Dominus regnavit, decorum
28

326 Practice of Union with Our Lord

indutus est" — The Lord hath reigned, he is
clothed with beauty and glory. " Dominus
regnavit " — the Lord hath reigned — and is be-
come King and absolute Lord ; first, over all
his enemies, whom he has subjugated and con-
quered forever ; and secondly, over men, whom
he has gained to his kingdom by his love and
benefits. But how has he reigned ? "Domi-
nies regnavit a ligno" sings the Church. The
Lord hath reigned by the wood of his cross,
or by dying, and by his death he has made
himself the victor over death in his resurrec-
tion. "Decorum indutus est"— he has been
clothed with sovereign beauty, writh most ra-
diant glory, and wTith every attraction. These
two motives are doubtless very efficacious to
-cause us to love our Lord perfectly, and to
■experience toward him all the sentiments ex-
pressed by the Spouse in the Book of Can-
ticles.

Let us now consider the first of these mo-
tives, the passion and death our Lord was
pleased to endure for our salvation. It obliges
us to love him by every title of justice ; for, in
the first place, he has purchased us at the
price of his blood, so that our bodies, our
souls, our hearts, and our affections no longer
belong to ourselves, but to him. - " You are

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 327

not your own," says St. Paul, " for you are
bought with a great price." (I. Cor. vi. 19, 20.)
You are not your own, but belong to him who
has purchased you so dearly. In the second
place, if we did not of right belong to him,
the excessive love he has borne us, and the
death he has suffered for our sakes, should
force us to love him ; inasmuch as the most
powerful motive for love is love itself, and it
is extremely difficult and almost impossible
not to be won by a person who loves us deep-
ly. For this reason, the same apostle in the
following words excites the Corinthians, and
us with them, to love our Lord : " The charity
of Christ presseth us ; judging this, that Christ,
died for all, that they also who live may not
now live to themselves, but unto him who
died for them." (II. Cor. v. 14, 15.) The love
of Jesus Christ urges us and does us violence,
when we consider how he died for all, so that
they who live, grateful for such an excess of
love, may no longer live for themselves, but
for him who has given his life for them.

St. Bernard expresses the same sentiment
when he writes : V If I owe to our Lord all I
am, and am bound to love him because he has
created me, what do I not owe him, and how
am I not obliged to love him for having crea-

328 Practice of Union with Our Lord

ted me anew, and in such a manner ! " (Tr.
de dilig. Deo.) In another place he says :
4k It is true that the benefit of creation, that
of preservation, and so many others which our
Lord has bestowed, and continues to bestow
upon me, are powerful motives to incite me to
love him ; but there is another that urges me
still more, since it affects me more sensibly
and fires me more intensely than aught, else.
It is, O good Jesus, the chalice of bitterness
thou hast drunk for us and our redemption
that renders thee amiable to our hearts ; for
this sovereign benefit and this incomparable
testimony of thy love, carries away and most
powerfully ravishes ours, most sweetly attracts
our affection, most justly exacts it, most
closely binds it, and most strongly touches
it." (Serm. 20, in Cant.)

Verily, if a wise, virtuous, and valiant prince, *
one endowed with all perfections of body and
mind, had taken up arms in your interest, to
defend your honor that wicked tongues had
sullied, to deliver you from infamy, poverty,
and a cruel prison, and to elevate you to
sovereign honors, exceeding great riches, and
a most happy liberty ; and if, in combating
your enemy who had caused you all these
misfortunes, he had been put to death, and

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 329

not only put to death, but left on the field
pierced with wounds and covered with his
blood : I ask you, in the first place, whether
you wrould not consider yourself obliged during
the remainder of your life to love this prince
most ardently, to love this benefactor, even if
he were not a prince, but merely an humble
peasant? I ask you, in the second place,
whether, in case you did not love him, you
would not deem yourself most ungrateful, bru-
tal, and unworthy of the life, honor, and bless-
ings he had restored to you ? In the third
place, whether you could help loving him,
whether you could help thinking of him ?
Assuredly, no. Now, from this you can
understand your position in regard to our
Lord, how you should act toward him, since
he holds the position of this prince to you,
and has even infinitely greater claims upon
you.

" Mors et vita duello conjlixere mirando ;
Dux vitee vwrtuus, regit at vivus.^

6 ' Together, Death and Life in a strange conflict strove ;
The Prince of Life, who died, now lives and reigns,"

sings the Church in the Prose of Easter ; and
in the Preface of the Mass of Easter-day she
says: "Mortem nostrum moriendo destruxit!'

330 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

By dying- he has destroyed our death, and
fought and defeated all our enemies.

To pass to the second motive for love of
our Lord, namely, his beauty and perfections.
The Royal Prophet says : " He is clothed with
beauty" (Ps. xcii. i) ; and in another place :
li His glory is great in thy salvation ; glory
and great beauty shalt thou lay upon him."
(Ps. xx. 6.) Oh ! how great was his glory
when by thy power thou didst save him from
death and deliver him from the tomb. Thou
didst clothe him with majesty and give him a
wondrous beauty. This is what St. Paul wrote
to the Hebrews : u We see Jesus for the suffer-
ings of death, crowned with glory and honor."
(Hebr. ii. 9.) We know that Jesus as the
recompense of his death, is now crowned with
glory and honor, for in Psalm VIII. we find
these words : " Thou hast crowned him with
glory." (Ps. viii. 6.)

Our Lord being so admirably beautiful, and
radiant, with such great glory and so many-
perfections, is undoubtedly the object most
worthy of love in all the world, and con-
sequently the one we ought to love above
everything and with the whole strength of
our affections. We know and learn from too
many examples the immense power physi-

F?-om Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 331

cal beauty exercises over minds ; what then
should be the effect of our Lord's unsurpass-
ing beauty. on our minds and hearts? If the
least of the blessed, who is united to his body,
should descend here below and become visible
to the eyes of men, his beauty would excite,
such great astonishment and admiration, that
all would be in transports and raptures ; they
would swoon, languish, pine away, and die,
if we may so speak, at his feet. For if a
mortal beauty sometimes produces these ef-
fects, an immortal, compared to which the
mortal is nothing, would doubtless do the
same, and in a much greater degree ; such
unequaled beauty wrould create so violent a
desire to behold it, that people would hasten
from all directions and all co.untries, would
forsake all, leave every occupation, to enjoy
such a spectacle, to gaze upon so ravishing
an object.

Now, if the beauty of the least of the blessed
would be capable of producing such marvel-
ous impressions upon men who would never
have received from it any other good, how
should we not be impressed by the infinitely
surpassing beauty of our Lord, which infinitely
excels theirs, cur Lord who by the innumer-

332 Practice of Union zvith Our Lord

able benefits he has conferred upon us, merits
all the love of our hearts.

Let us remark that the greatest miracle of
beauty that was ever known is our Lord Jesus
Christ, because he possesses the three most
beautiful things. His sacred body is unques-
tionably the most beautiful and most pleasing
of all bodies ; his holy soul the most excellent
of all souls, and endowed with the most per-
fect of minds ; and his divinity is the beauty
of beauties, in comparison with which all cre-
ated beauties are only as the stars before the
sun, nay, even seem like visions of ugliness.

These two reasons ought to kindle in our
hearts ardor and zeal for our Lord, and cause
us to lead a life of love for him, as he has led
a life of.loye for us ; and as a means to this
life we should •frequently think of him, sigh
for him, and produce acts of the love of pre-
ference, of the love of complacency, of good
will, of aspiration, and others, and should seek
only his interests through the motive of love
for him.

The Holy Spirit, whom St, Peter calls the
Spirit of Christ (i Peter i. n), and whom our
Lord calls his Spirit, because he proceeds from
him as well as from the Father (Jno. xv. 26 ; xvi.

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 333

13), and Christ has merited for us his coming ;
the Holy Spirit, who is love in essence and m
person, on the day of Pentecost inflamed the
hearts of the- faithful with love for our Lord,
and engraved in their souls the new law, whicli
is a law of love differing only from the old
law, as St. Augustine said, by these two short
words, Timor et Amor — Fear and Love ; a
saying that St. Thomas repeats : " The dif-
ference between the old and new Testaments
is little — fear and love." (In. c. 13, Jno.) The
old law wras a law of fear ; the new is one of
love, which enjoins as its first and chief com-
mandment, and in a manner much more em-
phatic than in the old law, to love God with
all our strength, and our neighbor as ourselves.
We accomplish this perfectly when we love
our Lord, because he is in the first place God,
and in the second place our neighbor, since he
is man, and the most important of men ; and
he is the first of our neighbors, because he has
approached so near us, has united himself per-
sonally to our nature, and daily unites himself
with us in the adorable Sacrament of his Body
and Blood, and because he comes to us in the
thousands and thousands of blessings which
he constantly lavishes upon us.

334 Practice of Union with Our Lord

J. Firmness and Perseverance in this Heav-
enly Life, and in this Life of Love.

This is what we should learn from our Lord
risen, of whom St. Paul says : " Christ rising
again from the dead, dieth now no more ; death
shall no more have dominion over him." (Rom.
vi. 9.) He is in a state of inviolable stability,
of immortal life. We likewise, having formed
the design of rising with our Lord, and by our
resurrection of leading a heavenly life, a life
of love toward this same Lord, must not give
up and return to creatures, to our affection
for the things of earth.

Let us remember that our Lord's resurrec-
tion is an everlasting resurrection, and that
the Passover is a passage, a transition, not a
return, as St. Bernard explains when he says :
"Jesus Christ, to-day while we celebrate the
Feast of his Resurrection, has not returned to
the tomb, but is still risen ; has not gone
back, but has passed onward ; has not lin-
gered behind, but has hastened forward. The
word Easter declares this by its very mean-
ing, for it signifies passage, not return. The
country of Galilee whither the disciples re-
paired to meet their risen Lord, also ex-
presses by its name, not a drawing back, but

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 335

an advance. What shall we reply to this, save
that we take away from the sacred resurrec-
tion of our Lord its name of Easter, when we
return- to our vices instead of advancing more
in virtue ?" (Serm. 1, de Resurr.)

The difference between the resurrection of
the good and of the bad, of the perfect and
the imperfect, is that the former constantly
progress in the virtuous life already begun,
and the latter readily draw back ; the former
rise to die no more, the latter rise but to fall
anew beneath the power of death. Our Lord
rose to an immortal life, as a sign of which,
and to show that he would have no more
need of it, he left his winding-sheet in the
tomb. When Lazarus rose he was still
wrapped in his because it would again be ne-
cessary to him ; and in fact -he died again ;
which should teach us that when our resur-
rection is made in our burial-clothes, I mean
our passions and bad habits with no effort to
divest ourselves of them, we will easily fall
again and return to our vices. Therefore, en-
deavor to rise as our Lord did.

St. Bernard says : " Virtue and perseverance
in good works is that perseverance to which
alone the crown is promised and given. For
what does it profit to be good, wise, and

336 Practice of Union witJi Our Lord

strong, if we do not continue to be so, if we
do not preserve our goodness, wisdom, and
strength to the end ?" (De Pass. Dom. c. 14.)
What use is it to have well commenced, if we
finish badly? Saul, Solomon, and Judas, all
made good beginnings ; but how did they
end? The first killed himself; the second
fell into idolatry ; and the third, after having
sold the Saviour of the world, hanged himself.
It is not enough to begin well, but it is all to
end well. Thus St. Jerome says: "We do
not regard in a Christian how he commences,
but how he finishes." Of a truth, it helps very
little toward the winning of a prize, to have
begun the race well if we do not press on to
the end of the course.

For this reason our Lord tells us : " He that
shall persevere unto the end, shall be saved "
(Matt. x. 22) ; and he alone shall be saved.
In the Book of Ecclesiasticus we read : " Woe
to them that have lost patience, and that have
forsaken the right ways." (Eccl. ii. 16.) Woe
to them that have retired from the race, that
have lost their constancy, that have given up
their exercises of devotion, that have turned
aside from the right path. This turning aside
and this inconstancy can only be most hurtful
to them. As a traveler advances on his road

s

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 337

only by walking and continuing to walk, so
we make progress in the way of virtue only
by persevering.

But as this perseverance, this continuation
of the same efforts, of the same attention and
application to our exercises of piety, is one of
the most difficult things for our virtue, feeble
and changeful as it is, it easily relaxes and
grows cold. Therefore we must reanimate
and strengthen it with great care and skill,
and when it is in some degree benumbed and
asleep, we must awaken it, spurring and en-
couraging ourselves by some powerful reason,
and especially by insisting on the necessity of
this perseverance in order to pursue again, and
joyfully, our road, and to continue our course.

Let us consider, in order to establish our-
selves in this important truth, what was said
to our Lord as he hung on his cross, and what
he did. Here is what St. Bernard says about
it. The Jews had cried out to our Lord : Let
him come down from the cross and we will
believe in him ! This holy father says : " On
the contrary, he did not come down, but re-
mained and died thereon, so that he might
ascend to heaven. Let us- who follow Jesus
Christ our Head, in like manner hearken to
no one, neither to flesh, nor blood, nor to any

29

338 Practice of Union with Our Lord

spirit that would persuade us to come down
from the cross. Let us remain on the cross,
let lis die on the cross, and let us be taken
down as he was, only by the hands of others,
and not by our own levity and inconstancy."
(Serin, i. de-Resurr.)

But as this unfailing constancy in good and
even unto death, and the grace of final per-
severance upon which our salvation absolutely
depends, are very great gifts of God, which
we are incapable of meriting any more than
the first grace, we must earnestly beg them
of God by all that can move him, especially
by the perseverance and holy death of his
Son.

St. Cyprian and St. Augustine say that be-
cause the gift of perseverance is the most im-
portant of all gifts, our Lord composed the
Lord's Prayer, which we repeat many times
every day, particularly to make us ask God
for perseverance, and to obtain it from his
mercy, and this they prove by the following
details (Cypr. L. de orat. Dom. — Aug. L. de
dono Persev. c. 2) :

The first petition is: " Hallowed be thy
name." Tn this petition we do not ask God,
say these saints, to be sanctified in himself by

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 339

our prayers, since he is already infinite sanc-
tity, but to be sanctified in us ; that we having
been sanctified by the waters of baptism, may
ever continue so. We pray him that this sanc-
tification may remain inviolable in us. We
beg him continually, we supplicate him day
and night to preserve in us without intermis-
sion the life of grace which his goodness has
bestowed upon us.

li Thy kingdom come." It is clear that in
this petition we ask for final perseverance in
virtue and grace, since this is absolutely ne-
cessary to reach God's kingdom.

" Thy will be done on earth as it is in
heaven." St. Cyprian thus explains these
words : by earth he understands our bodies,
and 'by heaven our souls ; and he says that we
pray God to give us grace to accomplish with
both his holy will This will, St. Augustine
adds, must be fulfilled to the end by him who
would attain beatitude.

"Give us this day our daily bread." Upon
this petition St. Cyprian remarks : " We ask
this daily bread to obtain the gift of perse-
verance, for fear lest,, being united by grace
to Jesus Christ, and daily receiving the Eu-
charist as the food of salvation, we should

340 Practice of Union with Onr Lord

commit s'ome mortal sin which would render
us unworthy to partake of that heavenly
bread, and so would separate us from the
body of Jesus Christ."

" Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive
them that trespass against us." These two
saints consider that this petition does not re-
gard final perseverance ; but others think it
has reference to that grace, because as sin is
more than anything else an obstacle to per-
severance, inasmuch as it deprives the soul
of sanctifying grace, diminishes actual graces,
and thus takes from the soul the power of
persevering, so they deem the pardon of it
necessary in order to avoid further sin, to
overcome temptations, to practice good works,
and persevere in them to the end.

"And lead us not into temptation, but
deliver us from evil." St. Augustine says :
What else do we ask by this prayer, but to
persevere and die in holiness ?

As final perseverance is the gift of gifts upon
wrhich depends the security of our eternal hap-
piness, and as the Lord's Prayer was com-
posed principally to ask and obtain it of God,
let us remember to make it one of our chief
intentions when we repeat this prayer.

From Easter to the Blessed Sacrament. 341

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

These should be made on the mysteries of
the season. The author refers to several
meditations in a work called " The Illumina-
tive Life of Jesus in the Desert" as being
Very suitable to enkindle love for our Lord.

V.— READING.
See this heading in Chapter III.

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

"I know that my Redeemer liveth, and in
the last day I shall rise out of the earth ; this
my hope is laid up in my bosom." (Job. xix.
25. 27.) I believe that my Redeemer, after
having passed through the pangs- of death, is
now living, and that I shall rise at the last
day and shall see him with my eyes. I bear
this hope in my breast and in my spirit, and it
strengthens and- consoles me.

" But I will rejoice in the Lord, and I will
joy in God my Jesus. The Lord God is my
strength, and he will make my feet like the
feet of harts ; and he, the conqueror, will lead
me upon my high places singing psalms."
(Hab. iii. 18, 19.) Let others rejoice if they
will in the perishable things of this life ; as

342 Practice of Union with Our Lord.

for me, I will rejoice because our Lord is risen,
and by his resurrection gives me hope of ris-
ing one day with him. It is in Jesus, my Go.d
and my Saviour, that I rest all my content-
ment and all my pleasures. The Lord God
is my strength, and he will give me the feet
of the stag"; having himself conquered death,
he will give me grace to conquer it, and will
raise me up to high things and to my beati-
tude, where I shall sing canticles of praise and
joy.

44 Thou art beautiful above the sons of men."
(Ps. xliv. 3.) The Lord my Saviour is beau-
tiful above the children of men ; he has far
greater attractions and charms than creatures
have.

44 Persevere under discipline." (Heb. xii. 7.)
Persevere constantly in your exercises of
devotion, and be exact to perform them with
care and fruit.

44 Remember Lot's wife." (Luke xvii. 32.)
Remember Lot's wife, who having turned her
head to look back at the city of Sodom, and
not having kept on her way as she ought, was
struck dead on the spot and changed into a
pillar of salt, to teach us perseverance, to
make us wise at her expense.

CHAPTER VII.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD IN
THE MYSTERY OF THE EUCHARIST FROM
TFIE FEAST OF THE BLESSED SACRAMENT
TO THE MONTH OF AUGUST.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

The exercise of this season will be upon the
adorable mystery of the most holy EUCHA-
RIST, considered both as a Sacrament and as
a Sacrifice.

The practice will be to say or hear Mass,
to communicate sacramentally or spiritually,
and to visit the Blessed Sacrament with new
care and increased devotion.

II.— THE AFFECTIONS.

The two principal mysteries of our Lord
Jesus Christ are his Incarnation and his Death,
the beginning and close of his mortal life. By
his Incarnation he united himself to our na-
ture in an individual humanity, and by this
union infinitely ennobled and honored it ; by
his Death he saved it, drew it from the abyss
of its miseries, and loaded it with his bless-

344 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

ings, and rendered it capable of the possession
of God, and of eternal beatitude.

The mystery of the Eucharist includes, ac-
cording to St. Thomas, that of the Incar-
nation, because the Incarnate Word unites
himself to all individual men who receive the
Eucharist, and becomes incarnate in a certain
manner in them. It likewise effectively re-
presents the death of Christ, it transmits the
grace of his death, and communicates its sal-
utary effects. God found out this admirable
invention to renew in us these two mysteries,
and to apply to us their fruits ; like a second
Incarnation it produces in us union with our
Lord, and it is the chief channel through
which flaw to us the merits of the cross and
the gifts of God.

This is why whosoever desires to receive
these abundantly, and to be united intimately
with Jesus Christ, should approach this divine
mystery with great care, and should' do as
far as he can what St. Bonaventure relates
of St. Francis : " He wras transported by the
strength of his affection for the Blessed Sacra-
ment, and experienced toward it ardors and
fires of love that consumed him internally,
leaving him plunged in most profound aston-
ishment at that favor so full of extreme love

Fro7ii Corpus CJiristi to August. 345

and infinite kindness which God deigns to
show to men." (In vita S. Franc, c. 9.)

As the beatitude of heaven in the state of
glory is Jesus Christ, God and man — to see
him, love him, possess him, be united to him,
speak to him, converse with him, and remain
perpetually in his society — even so the hap-
piness and perfection of earth in the state of
grace is Jesus Christ and the same relations
between him and us. And since we have Jesus
Christ, God and man, on earth substantially
and in person only in the Blessed Sacrament,
we ought to do all in our power to bind and
unite ourselves to the Blessed Sacrament, and
lit it to Jesus Christ, by faith in the mystery,
by adoration, hope and love, by sacramental
and spiritual communions, by frequent visits,
and by all the other means that may procure
us that happiness.

Verily, Jesus Christ in the Eucharist is all
our good in this life, our treasure on earth.
St. Theresa after her death appeared, endowed
with admirable beauty and resplendent with
most clear light, to a virtuous person, and ad-
dressed her these remarkable words bearing
on our subject : " We who are in heaven, and
you who are still on earth should be united
in love and purity ; we beholding the Divine

346 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

Essence, and you adoring the Blessed Sacra-
ment, toward which you should do what we
do toward the Divine Essence." Such were
her words.

Let us now consider what is the occupation
of the blessed in regard to the Divine Essence.
They are intimately and inseparably united to
it ; they look upon it and contemplate it in-
cessantly, and this gaze, this contemplation
renders them holy, wise, impeccable, tranquil,
contented, and happy, and causes them to
burn with the love of so amiable an object,
and to scorn in comparison with it all the
most precious and most beautiful things of
earth as so much dirt and mire.

We ought to conduct ourselves as far as we
can in the same manner toward our Lord in
the Blessed Sacrament, and to receive from
him the same effects ; we ought to unite our-
selves continually to it by interior acts of the
virtues, with the eyes of faith to behold him
everywhere in it, to converse with him, and
by this vision and conversation to acquire ho-
liness, and lead a life of perfection in great
contempt of all the things of earth ; and finally,
to find in this mystery all the happiness we are
capable of enjoying in this world, for, as St.

From Corpus Christi to August. 347

Jerome says (Hieron. in c. 3. Eccles.) : "We
have in this life this single good, that we are
nourished with his flesh and refreshed with his
blood."

As the blessed see in the Divine Essence all
that concerns their beatitude, and are therein
enlightened with regard to all that pertains
to them in the state of glory, in the same
manner we should learn from the Holy Eu-
charist all that concerns our salvation, and
find in it instructions for all that regards our
conduct here below in the state of grace.

III.— THE VIRTUES.

Isaiah, in the thirtieth chapter of his pro-
phecy addresses us words of great consolation,
and makes us on the part of God a rich prom-
ise, when he says : u The Lord will give you
spare bread, and will not cause thy teacher to
flee away from thee any more ; and thy eyes
shall see thy teacher, and thy ears shall hear
the word of one admonishing thee behind thy
back :s This is the way, walk ye in it and go
not aside, neither to the right hand nor to the
left." (Is. xxx. 20, 21.) The Lord will give
you bread, and will not permit you to lose
sight of your doctor and your master ; your

348 Union zvith Our Lord in the Eucharist

eyes shall see him, and your ears shall hear
him tell you : This is the road that you must
take ; follow it without turning a single step,
neither to the right nor the left.

The prophet promises us bread and a mas-
ter. It would seem that there could be no
connection nor relation between these two
things ; nevertheless there is, and in a close
degree, because by this bread is meant the
Eucharistic bread, and by this master our
Lord, who under the accidents of this bread
teaches us in an excellent manner the spirit-
ual life, and gives us .lessons of very high per-
fection. Our Lord in his character of master
has had three chairs whence he has taught
men by example : the first was his crib, the
second his cross, and the third is the Euchar-
ist, of which these words of Isaiah are princi-
pally to be understood, especially where they
tell us that God will no more take away our
teacher ; because the first two chairs exist no
longer, but the third remains forever. From
this third chair our Lord in person teaches us
at all times and in all places what we ought
to do to become virtuous, spiritual, and per-
fect. And now hearken to his lessons.

From Corpus Cliristi to August. 349

/. This Divine Master s first lesson from the
Chair of the Eucliarist.

This first lesson is on the very essence of
the spiritual life and the fundamental point of
perfection, which consists not in exterior
things, but in interior ; not in actions of the
body, but in those of the soul ; that is, in mak-
ing in the depths of our souls, acts of the vir-
tues, in uniting ourselves interiorly to God
who is within us by acts of faith, hope, and
charity ; in having in all our actions pure in-
tentions, and in performing all our works in
view and remembrance- of the presence of
God. Because all in the spiritual life is hidden
it is called the spiritual life rather than the
physical or corporal life, the interior life in-
stead of the exterior. The Royal Prophet
expresses this thought when he says: "All
the glory of the king's daughter is within."
(Ps. xliv. 14.) All the glory and beauty of
the king's daughter, the just soul, is within,
not without. The prophet says all, not a
part ; so the spiritual man conceals under a
common and often abject exterior, an interior
quite divine, by which he produces extraor-
dinary and admirable operations.

Isaiah says : " Thy eyes shall see thy teach-
30

350 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

er." (Is. xxx. 20.) Thy eyes shall see thy
Preceptor who from the chair of the Eucha-
rist gives thee this lesson and teaches thee
this important truth ; because under an ordi-
nary exterior, under the accidents of bread
and wine, which are such common things, he
conceals the three greatest and most perfect
beauties of the universe, to wit : his sacred
body, his most holy soul, and his divinity ;
and in addition to these, the hypostatic union
which is the most precious and most noble
union that is possible. Thus St. Thomas tells
us in his beautiful hymn :

1 ' Sub diver sis speciebus
Signis tantum, ei non rebus
Latent res exiniicc" — (Lauda Si on.)

" Here, beneath these signs are hidden
Priceless things, to sense forbidden ;

Signs, not things, are all we see."

Even so all the glory and excellence of the
Blessed Sacrament is within, not without ; and
we may say to our Lord wTith the prophet
Isaiah : " Verily thou art a hidden God." (Is.
xlv. 15.)

Truly spiritual men are the same ; they are,
as David calls them, hidden men ; what is
visible is the least Dart of their possessions ;

From Corpus Christi to August, 351

their glory and riches are concealed under a
common appearance and ordinary ways.

We ought to learn and carefully retain this
first lesson of our divine Master, namely, that
our virtue and perfection do not consist in
exterior things, no matter how good. and holy
they may appear, but in interior ; in regula-
ting, purifying, and sanctifying our thoughts,
affections, desires, and impressions, and in
uniting ourselves to God who is within us by
secret acts of the virtues. This is why St.
Paul tells us : "I say, then, walk in the spirit."
(Gal. v. 16.) I warn you to walk with the
spirit, and to perform all your actions like
spiritual men who are prompted by interior
motions of grace. The first direction for
reaching perfection that Wisdom gave to
Blessed Henry Suso, was, as he himself re-
lates : " My son, study to dwell always in the
depths of thy spirit, and to cultivate and
polish unceasingly thy interior man."

It -is by this striving after the interior life
we must judge of progress in virtue and dis-
tinguish those who are truly spiritual from
those who are so only in appearance, who
apply themselves much more to correcting,
composing, and fashioning their exterior than
their interior ; the really spiritual do quite

352 Union with Our Lord in the EucJiarist

the contrary, imitating the wisdom of nature
which in forming our bodies does not neglect
the skin, the hair, nor the extremities, but
nevertheless labors with more diligent care in
perfecting the noble parts that are internal
and the centres of life. The spuriously spirit-
ual imitate art which occupies itself only with
what is exterior and striking to the eye, and
does not think of giving life and sentiment to
its wrork.

2. The Second Lesson,

Our Lord in working the miracle of the
Eucharist produces admirable changes, be-
cause he destroys the substances of the bread
and wine, and converts them into his body
and blood without touching the visible acci-
dents of the one or the other, the color, the
figure, the taste, or the odor ; just, St. Thomas
says, as' he entered the most pure womb of
his holy Mother, without tarnishing in any
degree her virginity, but rather consecrating,
sanctifying, and deifying it by his entrance.
And truly he is powerful enough to accom-
plish this wonder, since, the same saint adds,
we see mother-birds changing into flesh and
a living bird the yolk of the egg they cover
without breaking the shell ; it is certainly

From Corpus Christi to Aztgust. 353

much easier for our Lord who is God to change
the substances of bread and wine into his body
without injuring the species.

Thus it is only the interior things, tha,t is,
the substances of the bread and wine that are
changed and destroyed in the Eucharist, and
the exterior things, as the color, figure, and
other qualities, are preserved in their integrity;
for there is the same whiteness, the same
round figure before and after the consecration
of the host. Here is a lesson which teaches
us, in the first place, that Jesus Christ in the
Eucharist and received by the faithful, pro-
duces in them marvelous changes for virtue
and perfection. And in the second place,
that these changes are interior and not exte-
rior ; for, in order to make us virtuous and
perfect he does not necessarily alter our con-
dition, our country, or our employment, but
our heart ; the merchant continues a merchant,
the married remain married, the tradesman
does not leave his shop, the exterior and visi-
ble qualities are still the same ; but the infe-
rior— the thoughts, views, affections, desires
and plans — become quite different. In the same
manner as the body of Jesus Christ takes be-
neath the accidents the place of the substance
of the bread which is destroyed, the spirit of

3 54 Union zvitJi Our Lord in tJie Eucliarist

Jesus Christ, which is a spirit of humility,
obedience, patience, and all the virtues, takes
in the faithful who communicate the place of
the spirit of the ofd man, a spirit of ambition,
disobedience, anger, and all the vices, so that
they become that new creature of whom St.
Paul speaks so much, who has new eyes, new
ears, new thoughts and affections, and can
exclaim writh the same apostle: "I live, yet
not I, but Jesus Christ who liveth in me !"

Thus, then, the accidents in this divine
mystery a're preserved in their integrity and
properties ; if they are changed at all, they
are only, by a glorious advantage, made much
more perfect in order that they may work and
act above the scope of their nature ; being
mere accidents, they continue to produce the
effects of their own substance, though they no
longer serve it, but Jesus Christ instead. In
the same manner our Lord, retaining the mer-
chant in his traffic, the artisan at his work,
and the married man in his family, teaches
them to perform their actions which hitherto
had no purposes save those of earth, for God's
glory and their own salvation.

Therefore, as the apostle counsels : " Let
every man- abide in the same calling in which
he was called." (i Cor. vii. 20.) Let each

From Corpus Christi to August. 355

remain in his vocation and in the state to
which he was called ; let him not think of
changing it, but rather of excelling in it and
of performing its duties with an interior spirit.
As it is the same Jesus Christ in all the Hosts,
no matter of what bread they may be made,
provided only it is wheaten bread, and like-
wise in all the wine, and in all alike he glori-
fies God his Father and accomplishes our
salvation; so in all states of life and in all
situations, however different, we may find Jesus
. Christ, and may advance his honor and our
salvation.

j. The Third Lesson.

Our Lord in this mystery also instructs us in
the very important doctrine of intentions, and
makes us understand the power they have to
give our actions great value and high merit.

The species of bread and wine are very
common and mean things, since they are only
accidents and not substances ; yet notwith-
standing they are so vile and abject, in the
Blessed Sacrament they are by their union
with the body of our Lord so elevated and
ennobled as to become venerable and ador-
able, and to exact from those who touch or
even look at them, reverences, genuflections,

356 Union zvith Our Lord in the Eucharist

and the worship of Latria ; whilst without that
union, they are only profane and can be
touched, handled, and eaten by all indiffer-
ently and without respect. Consider the dif-
ference between a consecrated Host and one
that is not consecrated. Could there be a
greater ?

This should teach us that our actions, how-
ever trifling they are, may become very ex-
cellent and very meritorious if we perform
them through a good motive. In Christian-
ity the intention gives its value and impor-
tance to the act. Is there anything less than
a glass of water ? Yet if you give it with a
good intention you will in heaven receive an
eternal reward. St. Isidore, to select this saint
from among many who were of low condition,
was a laborer ; he cultivated the land, sowed,
gathered the harvests, took care of horses, and
performed many other humble actions belong-
ing to his condition ; by means of these, how-
ever, he became a saint, he pleased God ex-
ceedingly, and won a very high degree of
glory in heaven, because he performed them
with most pure and perfect intentions.

Let us do the same with regard to all our
actions, however little they may be ; let. us
seek, by performing them through the motive

From Corpus Christi to August. 357

of love for Jesus Christ, to have our Lord ele-
vate them in all their parts, by a union of
charity, as he elevates by a sacramental union
all the parts of the species, and by that union
ennobles, sanctifies, and deifies them. If there
were a part that he did not unite himself with',
it would not be ennobled nor sanctified, but
would continue to be profane, vile, and value-
less. It is the same with our actions in regard
to our intentions.

Therefore bend all your efforts to obtain
that your thoughts, affections, words, and all
your works may be constantly animated by
good intentions, that our Lord may touch
them, and by his touch elevate, sanctify, and
deify them ; that your thoughts, your affec-
tions, and all your actions may be in some
sort consecrated like the species of the Host,
so as to have our Lord united to them to vivify
them by his spirit. And since he is present
in this adorable mystery for the glory of his
Father, for your salvation, and from the love
he bears you, act in all things for the glory of
God, for that of our Lord, and for his love.

^. The Fourth Lesson.

Our Lord is in the Blessed Sacrament like
a spirit, that is, entire in the whole Host and

3 S 8 Union with Our Lord in the EucJiarist

entire in every one of its parts, so that there
is not a single part however small it may
be, of which, placing the point of a pin upon
it, you may not say : Our Lord is entirely
there ; his head, his arms, and his feet, with-
out separation, without confusion, and without
division, are in the extremities and the circum-
ference of the Host as well as in its centre.

From this we should learn that we ought
to apply ourselves unreservedly to what we
do, not alone to the whole, but to each part
or portion ; that we ought to be as attentive
to the progress and completion of an action
as to its beginning, if we would perform it
well. We often fail in this through a very
prejudicial illusion of the devil, detaching our
thoughts and attention from a present action
to bestow them upon the future ; and in so
far as we yield to this suggestion of our enemy,
and to our own inconstancy, we perform the
present action badly, and the future one no
better, because when its time comes, through
the same artifice and the same inconstancy,
we think only of what is yet to follow. Let
us keep to what we are doing, let us think of
no more than is necessary to accomplish it
well ; each thing should have its time and
proper attention.

From Corpus Christi to August. 359

Moreover, when a Host is broken, our Lord
is not broken nor bruised with the species, but
he always remains in his integrity, and is en-
tire in each part.

' ' Fracto demum Sacramento
Ne z'acilles, sed memento
Tantum esse sub fragmento,

Quantum toto tegitur.

Xulla r el fit sa'ssura,
Signi tantum fit fractura .
Qua nee status nee statura
Signatl ihimdtttr.

!' Xot a single doubt retain,
When they break the Host in twain,
But that in each part remains

What was in the whole before.
Since the simple sign alone
wSuffers change in state or torm,
The Signified remaining one

And the same forevermore,"

sings St. Thomas in his celebrated hymn.
Neither more nor less than one sees his whole
face in each part of a broken mirror, so, if our
condition obliges us to employ ourselves in
several different occupations, and, as it were,
to divide and share ourselves, this division
should be only exterior, and not interior and
in the spirit, which should ever continue recol-
lected, and should invariably act in the pres-

360 Union zuith Our Lord in the Euc/iarist

ence of God and for the single purpose of his
<7lorv\

5. Tlic Fiftli Lesson.

This lesson is one of very high perfection,
because it inculcates our self-annihilation, in
which the height of perfection consists. Thus
the blessed in heaven are perfect because God
is their all in all, and they are nothing in any-
thing to themselves. " All in all," as St. Paul
says. (1 Cor. xv. 28.) In the same manner
we here below are perfect according as we
are no longer our own, but God's.

Our Lord teaches this exalted doctrine in
the Blessed Sacrament, where, as well, as in
the mystery of his Incarnation and in that of
his death, these words of the apostle may
be applied to him]: " He emptied himself."
(Philipp. ii. 7.)

Our Lord empties himself in this adorable
mystery, first, by descending to earth and
uniting himself, glorious as he is, to a most
vile thing, that is to say, to the accidents of
bread and wirre, and not to the substance
which is nobler. Secondly, by hiding his
body his soul, his divinity, and all that he is,
under the species, of a little host, in such a
manner that nothing of him appears. Third-

From Cor pits Christi to August. 561

ly, by putting himself, though he is living and
immortal, in the host in a state of death, for a
representation of the death he suffered on the
cross. Fourthly, although he possesses in the
Blessed Sacrament his body, his eyes, his ears,
and all his senses, he annihilates himself, by
remaining there as though his body were not
a body but a spirit, occupying no space as a
body naturally does ; he has eyes with which
he does not see, he has ears but without hear-
ing, a tongue without speech, a palate that
does not taste, and all his other faculties of
sensation which perform no functions ;. he has
a body that does not lead a bodily life. * Thus,
he is marvelously annihilated.

To all this let us add the prodigious annihi-
lations of humility, obedience, and patience
that our Lord practices in the Blessed Sacra-
ment.

What humility to place his infinite majesty,
to conceal his resplendent glory under a veil
so contemptible as the species ! to despoil his
body, that miracle of corporal beauty, of all
its attractions, and to reduce it to a point!
Thus is the God of glory humbled ; thus is
the Infinite Majesty brought to a state of ex-

* It may be well to remark here that theologians differ ill their
opinions regarding this. — Tratislator.

31

362 Union wiih Our Lord in the EucJiarist

treme and continual abasement, and that in
innumerable places, for love of us, and to
teach us to abase and humble ourselves for
him !

How great is his obedience, he whose sov-
ereignty and absolute power extends over all
the universe, to respond at the moment
named, without delay, to the simple wTords of
a priest who calls him to descend from heaven
and place himself beneath the species of bread
and wine, and keep himself inseparably united
to them in whatever place they may be put,
no matter what indignity may be offered to
;him, until they are decomposed ! And per-
haps it is his mortal enemy who consecrates
for devilish intentions, who makes him come
•so far and as often as he wTills in order to do
him outrage ! What an example of obe-
dience !

His patience in this mystery is inexplicable,
his patience in suffering so many injuries from
men in the very mystery where they owe him
most, in the mystery where, as but a thou-
sandth part of a just gratitude, he should
receive from them only all kinds of venera-
tion, homage, and service. Instead of this, he
receives scorn, insults, and opprobrium from
infidels and heretics who do not believe this

From Corpus Christi to August. 363

mystery, who cast him to the earth, trample
him under foot, and treat him with horrible
and abominable indignities. He suffers from
the faithful who receive him in mortal sin, and
in venial sin committed through want of pre-
paration and the requisite attention and de-
votion, and by hearing Mass irreverently. His
best friends even cause him to suffer because
they do not fully acquit themselves of their
duty in the participation of this divine Sacra-
ment.

He suffers greatly in this Sacrament from
all classes of persons on account of the little
change it produces in them. If he were capa-
ble of experiencing a displeasure, it would be
to him a most sensible one to see this so
powerful a means to our salvation, this Sacra-
ment in which he dwells with so ardent a
desire of sanctifying us and communicating to
us the fruits of his passion and death, effect-
ing so little. The devils of the famous pos-
session of Loudun, after having said of our
Lord in the Blessed Sacrament many very
beautiful and very excellent things, gave him
a name disrespectful for him and shameful for
us, a name signifying that, after all, he gains
by means of the Blessed Sacrament little from
us for his glory and our perfection in compari-

364 Union ivith Our Lord in the Eucharist

son with what he deserves, and what he could
effect if we placed no obstacles in his way.

Is it not also a great exercise of patience
for our Lord to remain entire days and nights
quite alone, to be visited by no one, on this
throne of his love, whither he has descended
in order to visit us and to enrich us with his
gifts ?

Our Lord excercises in like manner all the
other virtues, as may be easily remarked by
whosoever will take a little pains to consider
them. Assuredly, therefore, it is upon our
altars that we must seek the school of per-
fection ; and we must avow that, as the Sacri-
fice thereon offered is the same in essence as
that of the cross, the most excellent examples
of virtue the Son of God has left us, are those
he gave from the cross and daily gives us in
the Eucharist, where he not only places them
before our eyes that we may see them, but
furnishes us the grace and strength necessary
to imitate them.

Behold, then, the lessons of perfection which
our divine Master gives us from the chair of
the Eucharist. It remains for us to study them
and put them in practice. Let us make our-
selves docile hearers and true disciples of this
Master, who, being Incarnate Wisdom, and

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 365

teaching- us from such a chair and in so beau-
tiful a manner, merits our fullest confidence,
and deserves that in obedience to his doctrine
we should undertake the perfectly spiritual life
he sets before us.

This is in fact the life of true Christians. St.
Paul says of himself and of all : "Though we
walk in the flesh, we do not war according to
the flesh." (2 Cor. x. 3.) And again: "We
walk not according to the flesh, but according
to the spirit." (Rom. viii. 4.) Even while we
have bodies and senses we live as though we
had none, because we do not follow their in-
clinations, but we live and perform all our
actions according to the spirit of Jesus Christ
and the motions of grace. Addressing the
Roman Christians, the same apostle says :
"You are not in the flesh, but in the spirit."
(Rom. viii. 9.) You are in the flesh without
being of it, because you are in the spirit act-
ing spiritually.

St. Justin, martyr, in answering Diognetus,
Minister of State under Marcus Aurelius, who
had asked him what sort of people the Chris-
tians were, and in what they differed from
other people, wrote to him that they were a
new species of men differing from others not
in country or condition, but in habits of life ;

366 Union with Our Lord in the Eticharist

for, while other men lived according to the
flesh, the Christians lived according to the
spirit, and had all their conversation in
heaven.

It is true that in order to lead this life of
the spirit we must entirely separate ourselves
from the things to which we are by nature
attached, and must rise high above ourselves,
above the body and its senses, above the
lower part of the soul, to live only according
to the higher part and according to the spirit.

The spirit lives in those three excellent and
divine manners of which Richard of St. Victor
and St. Bonaventure speak, and which they
call " the spirit in the spirit, the spirit above
the spirit, and the spirit without the spirit."
(Richard L. de Trinit. prolog. — L. 3, De con-
tempi, c. 12. — Bonav. De sept. itin. acter. d.
3, prol.) The spirit is in the spirit when,
abandoning the inordinate care of its body
and all exterior things, it retires into itself
to attend to its own needs, and to God who
is within it, and to apply itself to spiritual and
divine things. The spirit is above the spirit
when it contemns and forgets itself, and, by
the force of its love and the ardor of its desires,
leaving itself, it hurries away and takes its
flight toward God, to be employed only in

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 367

thinking of him and in loving him alone.
Finally, the spirit is without the spirit when
it not only leaves itself to rise above itself,
but comes even to fade away and lose in
some sort its being, because it passes into
another and an incomparably nobler and more
perfect state, fulfilling the mystical words of
the prophet Abdias : " They shall drink and
sup up, and they shall be as though they were
not." (Abd. i. 16.)

Water may be thus considered in three man-
ners : either as water in water, that is in its
fountain ; or as water above water, that is
.above its nature when by the action of fire
it is heated, expanded, and converted into
steam ; or as water without wTater when' it is
mingled in a small quantity with a great deal
of wine, and, according to some, preserves its
essence; but loses its name, color, and qual-
ities, to take those of the wine, which are
much superior.

This life of separation, elevation, and anni-
hilation of self cannot be acquired without
great effort. But as our Lord gives us the
example of this life in his person in the
Blessed Sacrament, he also gives us the as-
sistance we need in order to practice it ; and
the special grace of this mystery is to pro-

368 Union zvith Our Lord in the Eucliarist

duce it, and so to render us spiritual in a
hi<jh decree.

The two principal effects of the Eucharist
are, first, to unite us with our Lord as he
unites himself to us, whence it is called com-
munion, as we have already remarked ; and
secondly, to enable us to lead a life perfectly
spiritual, and elevated above the senses and all
material things, a life modeled upon that which
our Lord leads in the Blessed Sacrament.

When you have communicated you are filled
with Jesus Christ entire, because you possess
his body, his soul, his divinity, and all that he
is. Being thus filled -with Jesus Christ, this
divine plenitude should spread over your soul,
your body, and your senses, to impress upon
them a disposition of conformity to him, and to
communicate to them his virtues ; so that you
may be united with him as he is with you, and
that in- your body and in the use of your senses
you may lead a spiritual, an elevated life, upon
the model of his, a life above your body and
your senses, so far as Christian perfection de-
mands it of you in your actual condition.

6. Good use of the Blessed Sacrament.

This point is of infinite importance. As our
Lord's passion and death is the mystery of our

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 369

salvation and happiness, and the most abun-
dant application of its fruits, and the broadest
channel through which its merits flow to us,
is the worthy reception of the Blessed Sacra-
ment, it is evident that we ought to do all in
our power to receive it worthily.

Besides, the sacraments of the New Law act
according to the dispositions of those that re-
ceive them. Science teaches, and experience
confirms, that the better and more useful
things are when they preserve their nature,
the more injurious and hurtful they are when
they lose it. We see this in the human body
which, being the most beautiful and perfect of
all bodies so long as it is alive and healthy, is
the ugliest and most infectious when .after
death it decomposes. There is nothing sweeter
than honey, and also nothing more bitter when
it is corrupted. V Corruptio optimi pessima —
The worst corruption is that of what is best,"
says the proverb. Hence it follows that the
Blessed Sacrament being the best food our
souls can receive, the most efficacious means
of our salvation, the most powerful remedy for
all our ills, the most sovereign balm for all
our wounds, and the bond that binds and
unites us most closely to our Lord, when we
approach it with the requisite dispositions,

370 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

produces in us quite contrary effects if we are
not properly disposed, if we are in a bad state ;
for, instead of drawing us to our Lord and
uniting us with him, it disunites and separates
us from him ; instead of strengthening, it
weakens us ; it is no longer for us a means
of salvation, but a cause of ruin and an instru-
ment of God's vengeance, we no longer find
in it an elixir of health, a spring of life, but a
deadly poison. An ancient Father says : '" We
daily behold a lamentable sight in those who
approach the most sacred banquet of the E*u-
charist ; we see some among them growing
worse, and by their bad use of it hastening*
rapidly to their damnation and to eternals
flames." (Philo. Carpath.) They are like the
unfortunate Aman, who was led from Queen
Esther's banquet to the gibbet.

Therefore we should exert all our efforts to
communicate as perfectly as we are able, as
regards alike the preparation, the reception,
and the thanksgiving ; but, since I have in
another work spoken at length of what is ne-
cessary in order to do this, we will not here
dwell upon it. Nevertheless, to animate us
to new efforts, and to show us still better how
to unite ourselves with our Lord in the Blessed
Eucharist, I will say two things :

From Corpus Christi to August. 371

The first is concerning the exterior and the
interior of the mystery. The exterior con-
sists in the accidents of the bread that strike
the senses, the color, odor, taste, and form,
and also in the presence, though invisible, of
the body of our Lord under these accidents,
vv7here he takes the place of the substance of
the bread which is destroyed.

The interior, according to what we said in
Chapter I., consists in the thoughts our Lord
has in this mystery. We should reflect that
as our Lord is in the Host living and glorious,
and that consequently he has the use of his
mind, he certainly thinks of something. If
you ask me of what, I reply that he thinks of
accomplishing the most adorable mystery and
the greatest sacrament of his Church ; of re-
presenting for the glory of his Father and the
salvation of men his passion and death which
were the acts most glorious to the Divinity,
and most profitable to the human race that
were ever performed.

He thinks of men, since it is for them he is
there ; and he thinks of you in particular, he
is attentive to you, he applies himself to you,
occupies himself with you ; so when you are
before the Blessed Sacrament, and when you
look upon it, you should be persuaded that

3/2 Union with Our Lord in the Eucliarist

our Lord who is hidden behind the species,
looks at you, most surely thinks of you, and
keeps his mind fixed on your person.

But what does he think of me, you ask.
Listen to what he tells you by Jeremiah : " I
know the thoughts that I think toward you,
saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of
affliction, to give you an end and patience.
You shall pray to me and I will hear you ;
you shall seek me, and shall find me when
you shall seek me with all yonr heart." (Jer.
xxix. ii, 12, 13.) The Lord says to you: I
have for you thoughts of peace and not of
affliction, thoughts of love, mercy, and pity.
I think of delivering you from your miseries
and bestowing upon you my blessings ; and
because you must suffer as well as I, I think
of giving you a happy end of your tribulations,
and patience in your trials. I think of grant-
ing you what you ask of me, of allowing you
to find me when you seek me, of breaking
your chains and setting you at liberty.

Moreover our Lord has for you in the
Blessed Sacrament the thoughts of a father,
a mother, a spouse, and a sincere friend ;
thoughts of kindness, liberality, munificence,
and infinite profusion of all he possesses, in
order to enrich you with the treasures of

From Corpus Christi to August. 373

his grace and prepare you for those of his
glory.

He thinks of giving you his flesh and blood,
his body and soul, his humanity and divinity,
to nourish you, strengthen you, justify, sanc-
tify, and deify you.

He thinks of making plainly known to the
whole universe the incomparable love he bears
you, which caused him to invent so wonderful
a means of enabling you to eat his flesh and
drink his blood, and this so frequently and
without apprehension or disgust, in order to
reproduce in you in a certain manner the mys-
tery of his Incarnation and to apply to you
abundantly the fruits of his death, in order to
enter your body and soul really and substan-
tially and to unite himself intimately with
you — that love which prompted him to bring
all this to pass, to work in himself, and in
nature, unheard-of things, to exert the great-
est efforts of his omnipotence.

Thus he thinks of you. On your side, think
of him and address him in these words of
David: " Thou hast multiplied thy wonderful
works, O Lord my God ; and in thy thoughts
there is no one like to thee." (Ps. xxxix. 6.)

Thou, my Lord and my God, hast done for
me many wonderful things, and strange acts
32

374 Union with Our Lord in the Eucliarist

of providence and love ; and the thoughts
thou hast for my salvation are beyond all that
can be expressed.

Again address him in these words of Isaiah :
" 0 Lord, thou art my God, I will exalt thee,
and give glory to thy name ; for thou hast
done wonderful things, thy designs of old
faithful, amen. Thou hast been a strength to
the poor, a strength to the needy in his dis-
tress, a refuge from the whirlwind, a shadow
from the heat." (Is. xxv. I, 4.)

O Lord, thou art my God. I declare aloud
to all the universe that I recognize and hold
thee for my God. I wTill praise thee, I will
honor thee, and I will bless thy holy name
because thou doest wonders for me, and hast
old and faithful thoughts of kindness toward
me, and cares tenderer than those of a father
or a mother. Thou dost render thyself in this
mystery where I behold thee, the strength of
the weak, the riches of the poor, and the
refuge of the needy in their misfortunes. Thou
art a shelter from the tempests, a cover from
the fierce heats of temptation, from persecu-
tion, and from all evil.

Do thus, so that you may say with the
spouse of the Canticle : " My beloved to me,
and I to him. I to my beloved, and his turn-*

From Corpus CJiristi to August. 375

ing is toward me." (Cant. ii. 16 ; vii. 10.) My
beloved is mine and I am his ; he thinks of
me and I think of him ; he is attentive to me
and I am attentive to him.

The next point to consider regarding the
interior of the mystery of the Blessed Eucha-
■ rist, is the affections that therein move our
Lord's will ; these are a burning zeal for the
glory of God, an ardent, tender, caressing
love for you, a love that overcomes all diffi-
culties, works miracles, and is constant and
unchangeable ; an earnest desire to be united
to you and to have you united with him so
that he and you should be but one, thus ac-
complishing his promise that whosoever should
eat his flesh and drink his blood should' have
with him a union so close and intimate that
the one would abide and live in the other, and
that he would enable the creature honored by
such a union to lead a pure, holy, and divine
life like unto his own (Jno. vi. 57) ; and finally,
a strong desire that all Christians should be
united among themselves by the bond of a
most perfect charity.

The third point is our Lord's most pure
intentions for the glory of God, and for our
good, our salvation, sanctification, and deifica-
tion, the ends for which he instituted the

376 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

Blessed Sacrament and for which he dwells
in it.

The fourth point is the virtues which he
there exercises in their highest degree, hu-
mility, obedience, patience, meekness, annihi-
lation of self, freedom of spirit, and several
others.

The fifth is the grace he has merited for us,
and gives us that we may faithfully correspond
to his dispositions in this mystery, imitate the
virtues he teaches us in it, and sanctify our-
selves by making a worthy use of it.

My second remark is that one of the most
astonishing things in the Church is that our
Lord being'truly received in the Blessed Sacra-
ment, and received with all his gifts, all his
merits, and all his treasures, and burning with
the desire of communicating them to us abun-
dantly, of bestowing them upon us in profu-
sion, and received so frequently, nevertheless
produces in us so little effect, and that we
still find ourselves after so many communions
so poor, so destitute of real virtue and so full
of faults.

Is it not like saying that the sun does not
give light, fire does not warm, the abundance
of treasures does not enrich, strength does not

From Corptis Christi to Angus t. 377

strengthen, perfection does not make perfect ?
To say this would appear very strange.

We see the effects of the sun upon the
earth. It is the sun that produces by means
of other secondary causes the plants, the
flowers, animals, stones, metals, and every-
thing in the material world ; we find his heat
so intense in midsummer that we cannot re-
main exposed to his rays without being
scorched ; yet he is so distant that there are
more than ninety millions of miles between
him and us. What, then, would happen to
the earth, how would we not be burned if the
sun should approach but one-half nearer ? If
he should come close to us we would in an in-
stant be in flames, we would be consumed like
straw and reduced to ashes.

Why may we not say the same of our Lord ?
Is he not the Sun of Justice ? Has he not as
much and infinitely more heat and power to
make himself felt in our souls, than the mate-
rial sun has to act upon our bodies ? Whence
is it that being so powerful, and not far dis-
tant from us, but near us, even within us, he
effects so little ? So far from inflaming and
burning us, he does not even warm us.

Our Lord said that his flesh was truly a
food, a meat capable of producing in our souls

3 7 8 Un io n zvitli Our Lord in tJi e EucJi a ris t

the effects that material food has upon our
bodies, namely, nourishment and strength.
Where are these effects ? A morsel of dry
and inanimate bread often strengthens your
body more, and a glass of water refreshes it
more than Jesus Christ, his body, soul, divin-
ity, with all his merits and all his power,
strengthen your soul.

Are you contented to remain always the
same ? Are you not willing to dispose your-
self so that the Blessed Sacrament may do as
much for your soul as a morsel of black bread
does for your body ?

He who enters within you is Jesus Christ,
the omnipotent God, who can, if you desire,
deliver you from your vices and make you vir-
tuous and perfect. It is he who from the be-
ginning of the world has justified all the just,
sanctified all the saints, and perfected all the
perfect. It is he who inspired the martyrs
and gave them their fortitude, who imparted
to the confessors their devotion and to the
virgins their purity.

He is willing, assuredly, to produce in you in
some degree the same effects ; he desires it
ardently, as he proves by the prodigies he has
performed to establish the Eucharist.

A single reception of our Lord, a single

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 379

Communion, would be enough, if you were
excellently disposed, to make you holy, and
to cause you to lead ever after a life altogether
perfect and divine. And you have received
him so many times, yet no such results have
appeared ! So many journeys that he has
made from heaven to earth for you, so many
miracles that he has worked in himself and in
nature, have produced nothing in you !

Do you not think that it pains the Son of
God, if we may so speak, after having given
you, after giving you so frequently, so power-
ful a remedy for your infirmities, so efficacious
a means of acquiring humility, obedience,
patience, detachment from creatures, and
perfection, to gain nothing in you, to see his
journeys lost, to be thus deceived in his ex-
pectations and frustrated in his most ardent
desires ?

Reflect that the devil asks nothing better ;
for as he hates our Lord with a mortal hatred
and is the sworn enemy of his glory, he is
very glad to see that this means of our salva-
tion wherein our Lord abides in person, where
he lavishes the treasures of his wisdom and
goodness, where he displays his power by the
miracles he works, and where he applies
himself with so much affection to the affair of

33o Union zuith Onr Lord in the Eucliarist

our sanctification, does not succeed, effects
nothing in us, but leaves us as imperfect as
it found us. I say nothing here of your own
disadvantage nor of the loss you sustain,
which it is impossible to estimate.

But whence arises this misfortune, why is it
that our Lord accomplishes so little in us by
means of the Blessed Sacrament ? It comes
from our negligence ; it is because we approach
the Holy Table without preparation, through
custom and routine ; because we receive sloth-
fully and with a certain vicious insensibility,
without reflection and without devotion ; be-
cause after having received we leave our Lord
quite alone, and do not ask him to .penetrate
our soul, to purify and sanctify it ; because we
do not take pains to keep him with us and to
employ well the precious moments of his stay
when he is more ready than ever to enrich us
with his gifts and load us with his graces, since
his only purpose in coming to us was to be-
stow them upon us. Even as the material
sun produces its effects only according to the
dispositions or qualities of the objects it shines
upon — we see it at the same time and with the
same ray melting wax and hardening the
earth — so the Sun of Justice acts differently
upon souls according as they are prepared.

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 381

Therefore let us awaken from our slumbers,
and let us chase away the sloth in which our
souls have so long stagnated, let us approach
the Blessed Sacrament with more care and
with a more lively devotion than in the past,
and let us make great efforts to render our-
selves worthy to receive its fruits abundantly.

Let us take our Lord himself as our model
for this great act. How does he prepare on
his part to execute it ? What extraordinary
and unprecedented things does he not do in
order to dispose himself for visiting us in this
august mystery, and in order to apply to us
its fruits ? If we consider what he does out-
side of himself we shall see him working as-
tounding miracles, overthrowing all the laws
of nature, operating greater prodigies in the
destruction of the substances, in the disunion
of the accidents, in the consecration he makes
of them, in the strength he gives them, and
in many other ways, than Moses ever per-
formed in Egypt.

If we consider what he effects in himself, we
shall behold ravishing wonders. He places
his body, his soul, and his divinity, the three
most brilliant and glorious things in all the
universe, under the species of a little host
without brilliancy or glory ; he reduces his

382 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

body to a point, his living and immortal body
to a state-like death* his body visible and sen-
sible in itself to the inability of being seen or
perceived by any sense ; and being absolute
Lord of the universe, and consequently per-
fectly independent of his creatures, he wills
nevertheless, in order to come to us in this
sacrament, to depend on the word of a priest
who may sometimes be his bitterest enemy ;
and he wills to remain in this sacrament in a
state of dependence on the accidents.

See how our Lord disposes himself for this
mystery, and how we also after his example
should dispose ourselves, doing great things
within and without us. We should never ap-
proach it without haying first prepared by
some signal act of virtue, without having pur-
chased our Communion and the possession of
the Son of God with some heroic victory over
ourselves.

When you have received Communion be
very careful to render it effectual and a means
to virtue and perfection, in this also copying
our Lord who, after having instituted the
Blessed Sacrament and communicated him-
self, went to the Garden of Olives to pray,
and thence to his passion and death.

We have already said what is true, that one

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 383

of the most abundant sources of the little ben-
efit we draw from Holy Communion is our
negligence, after having received, in enter-
taining our Lord, and in profiting by the
precious moments of his visit ; for often after
a short prayer carelessly said, or a cold and
formal conversation with our Lord, we leave
him, and immediately divert ourselves with
other things. It is easy for any one willing
to reflect ever so superficially on the nature
of things, to understand that to proceed in
this way will be of no profit ; if the food you
eat does not remain some time in your stom-
ach, and is not there converted into chyle,
and then into blood to be distributed through
your whole body, it is useless to you ; the
same thing is true of the divine food of the
Eucharist.

Therefore apply your whole attention most
diligently to the Blessed Sacrament after you
have received, being persuaded that the pro-
fit you derive will be greater or less according
to your application ; and remembering, to in-
cite you to closer attention, that then is the
time of divine liberality and profusion, that it
is then only we hold our Lord, possess him,
and can unite ourselves in the most perfect
manner to his sacred\humanity ; that it is then

. 384 Union with Onr Lord in the Eucliarist

the soul may drink from the side of our Lord,
that she may draw from that divine fountain
the waters of life, that she may gather abun-
dantly the fruits of his passion and death, that
she may sprinkle herself with his blood, that
she may wash in it and be purified and sancti-
fied, that she may approach that fire which
makes seraphim on earth as well as in heaven,
and the flames of which will enkindle in her
heart a love that will extinguish the love of
creatures, that she may expose herself to the
Sun of Justice, who with his rays will illumine,
vivify, and strengthen her, pouring upon her
his clear light, and rendering her divine ; and
finally, that it is then that opening her ears to
this great and only Master she may hear in
his secret and mystic school the sublime les-
sons of Christian perfection which he does not
teach to the wise of the world.

After your conversation with our Lord, look
to the effects. St. Augustine says : " Let him
who receives Life," that is the Holy Eucharist,
for so the Fathers named it, "determine to
change his life ; for if he does not change his
life, and correct his conduct, he receives Life
to his condemnation, and he will grow worse
rather than better from having received it, and

From Corpus Christi to August. 385

will gain death instead of life." (Aug. opp. t.
v. App. Serm. cxv.)

For this reason the Eucharist is also called
the Passover, which means passage, because it
should cause us to pass from sin to grace,
from vice to virtue, and from faults to perfec-
tion.

Let the faithful soul then who receives,
who eats the Passover, think of accomplishing
these mystical passages, and of producing
these changes of conduct in himself; let him
go with our Lord to the Garden of Olives by
prayer and recollection, and thence to the
passion and death of his ruined nature, by the
exercise of humility, obedience, charity, for-
giveness of injuries, and the other virtues, in
the highest degree of their excellence ; so
that like Elias, a figure of this mystery, who,
strengthened and refreshed by the bread the
angel gave him, walked forty days and forty
nights until he came to the high mountain of
Horeb (3 Kings xix. 8), he, too, supported and
strengthened by the sacred bread of the Eu-
charist, may constantly go onward during the
whole course of his life, by day and night, in
light and darkness, prosperity and adversity,
untii he reaches the mountain of perfection
to which God calls him.
33

386 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

7. Good use of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

To animate ourselves to make a good use
of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we need
only consider its infinite excellence and the
inestimable treasures of blessings it brings us.

The Sacrifice of the Mass is indeed the
grandest, the most august, and the most ven-
erable act of our religion ; it is the sublimest
and most exalted action that is performed in
the universe ; it is the most glorious to God,
the most agreeable to our Lord, to our Lady,
and to the whole Church triumphant ; it is
the most useful to the Church militant, and
affords most aid and solace to the Church
suffering ; and to each one of us individually
it is of the greatest value for our advancement
in virtue, and our salvation.

The Sacrifice of the Mass contains and
unites in itself all the sacrifices of the Old
Law, which were but diminutive pictures and
faint shadows of it. Thus it is a holocaust of
infinite adoration, by which we acknowledge
God as our first principle, the cause of our
bodies and souls, and all that we are ; as our
sovereign Lord who has the right to dispose
of us as he pleases without our resisting in
any manner whatsoever ; and as our Last

From Corpus Chris ti to August. 3S7

End for whom we were created, and in whose
service we should incessantly occupy and con-
sume ourselves. It is a sacrifice of infinite
propitiation, by which we appease the anger
of God irritated against us on* account of our
offences, and obtain pardon of them. It is a
eucharistic sacrifice, capable of rendering him
infinite thanksgivings for all the benefits he
has bestowed upon us, and a sacrifice of im-
petration infinitely powerful to obtain from
him fresh benefits.

The Sacrifice -of the Mass is something so
honorable and glorious to God, that a single
Mass said by a wicked priest for infamous in-
tentions, procures him more honor and glory
than all the blessed will throughout eternity ;
because all the honor they render him and
will render him, has, and will always have,
limits as coming from limited or finite crea-
tures ; but the honor the Mass procures him
is absolutely infinite, because it is Jesus Christ,
his Son and the first priest, who offers it to
him in person by the effective sacrifice of him-
self, a sacrifice which is not different in essence,
but only in some accidental formalities, from
that of his cross and death.

All these reasons clearly show us the great
care we should take to make a good use of

388 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

this adorable Sacrifice for the glory of God
and our own salvation, offering it ourselves
and saying Mass if we are priests, or hearing
it, or very frequently during the day present-
ing it in spirit to God, for the intentions for
which it was instituted.

We will not explain here how this should
be done, because we have treated of the sub-
ject in another work, to which we refer our
present readers. (See " The Knozvledge and
Love of our Lord Jesus Christ" B. III. c. x.
p. 14.)

I will only add in this place that the Mass
being the same act which our Lord performed
in the Institution of the Blessed Sacrament
on the evening of his Last Supper, an act
which contained in itself an infinity of won-
ders, and was identical with the one he per-
formed on the cross when he sacrificed himself
and died for the honor of his Father and the
salvation of men, we should unite ourselves to
it with sentiments of extraordinary devotion.

To say Mass wherein is contained both the
sacrament and the sacrifice, js to do what our
Lord did at the Last Supper and on the cross.
To hear Mass is to do what our Lady did at
the foot of the cross, where she shared the
dispositions of her Son, co-operated in the

From Corpus Christi to August. 389

offering he made of himself to God his Father,
and offered herself likewise to him.

Consider when you go to Mass that you are
going to assist at the grandest and most ad-
mirable action that can be performed in hea-
ven or on earth ; you are going to witness the
execution, the murder, the putting to death
of the Son of God, the Creator of the universe,
and the King of kings, by representation in
his own person ; you are going to see him die
for your salvation and your love. Is not this
enough to dispose you to say or hear Mass in
a most perfect manner ?

Therefore, in conclusion, let us attach our-
selves with the deepest affection to the holy
Eucharist, whether as a Sacrament or a' Sacri-
fice. Let us'breathe our Lord and draw him
into us in this divine mystery ; let us unite
ourselves to him by faith, respect, and adora-
tion, by frequent visits, by worthy sacramental
and spiritual communions, and by all the
means we can devise, so that in this union he
may communicate to us according to his de-
sires and the end for which he instituted the
Eucharist, his divinity, his humanity, his merits,
his graces, and his gifts, which will enable us
to imitate his life.

3QO Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

Consider the excellence of a consecrated
Host, and the perfection acquired by the acci-
dents of the bread and wine from their being
united to Jesus Christ in this sacrament. So
long as they are united to bread and wine
they are vile and abject ; their natural union
with their own substance constitutes their
vileness and meanness ; but by being sepa-
rated from it and united to our Lord, they are
ennobled, sanctified, and raised to an inesti-
mable dignity, and to a power of producing
marvelous effects which without this union
they could never possess. Even such is the
difference between a man consecrated by the
presence of and union with Jesus Christ in
the Blessed Sacrament, and the same man
when he is not so consecrated.

Finally, let us make the Blessed Sacrament
our school, our asylum, our altar of refuge, our
arsenal, our medicine, our banquet, our de-
light, our happiness, our paradise, and our
heaven on earth, that we may draw from it
our instruction, our light, our defence, our
strength, our health, our nourishment, and all
that we need, inasmuch as our Lord is there
to confer upon us all these blessings.

From Corpus CJiristi to August. 391

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

What has been said may serve as subjects
for meditation ; if it is not sufficient, there are
several books from which you may select your
subjects.

V.— READING.
Again see this heading in Chapter III.

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

M My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is
drink indeed." (Jno. vi. 56.)

{i He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my
blood, abideth in me, and I in him." (Jno. vi.
57.) He that eateth my flesh and drinketh
mv blood dwells in me, and I in him. Is this
so ? Can I testify this of myself with truth ?
Do I dwell in Jesus Christ by thoughts, de-
sires, love, and preference of him to all the
things of earth ? And he, does he dwell in
me, in my body to purify it, in my soul to
sanctify it, in my understanding to enlighten
it, in my will to quicken it, in my passions to
rule them, in my eyes, in my ears, in my
tongue, and in all my senses to govern their
movements ? If I do not experience this, but
on the contrary am sure that the case is quite

y.

)2 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist

different, what is the cause ? Is Jesus Christ
a liar, to promise a thing that is impossible ?
Or rather do I make it impossible by the ob-
stacles I interpose ?

"As the living Father hath sent me, and I
live by the Father, so he that eateth me, the
same also shall live by me." (Jno. vi. 58.)
As my Father has sent me and willed me to
lead his divine life, I communicate that life to
him that eateth me. Oh ! incomparable effect
of the Blessed Sacrament ! He who receives
it must lead the life of the Son of God, if the
Son of God speaks truly. Where is that di-
vine life I lead ? Is my life always even a
reasonable life ? It is not often a passionate
life, an animal life ? What then have so many
Communions during so many years accom-
plished in me, a single one of which, if it had
been excellently made, might have raised me
to the highest sanctity ? Henceforth let us
endeavor to bring to order so great an irreg-
ularity, and find an efficacious remedy for so
dangerous a disease.

"As often as you shall eat this bread, and
drink the chalice, you shall show the death
of the Lord until he come." (i Cor. xi. 26.)
As often as you shall communicate you shall
show forth the Lord's death. That is, accord-

From Corpus Christi to August. 393

ing to St. Thomas, you shall represent in your
interior and exterior Jesus Christ crucified, and
shall express in yourself by imitation the vir-
tues he exercised in his passion and death.

Observe that each Communion should ac-
complish these effects in you ; and every time
that you have communicated remember to
say to yourself frequently during the day :
I must to-day represent in myself the death
of our Lord, and express in my actions his
humility, his obedience, his patience, his meek-
ness, his charity, and the other virtues he prac-
ticed on the cross.

"But let a man prove himself, and so let
him eat of the bread and drink of the chalice ;
for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily,
eateth and drinketh judgment to himself."
(1 Cor. xi. 28, 29.) Let him that desires to
approach this divine table, enter into himself,
and examine and see if he is worthy ; if he is,
let him eat this bread and drink this chalice ;
if he is not, let him beware of touching it,
otherwise he may be certain that he eats and
drinks his judgment and condemnation, that
instead of receiving life he will find death.

" The Lord wakeneth me in the morning, in
the morning he wakeneth my ear that I may
hear him as a master ; I do not resist." (Ex.

394 Union with Our Lord in the Eucharist.

Is. 1. 4, 5.) Our Lord residing in the Blessed
Sacrament awakens me early in the morning
and seizes my ear, so that I may listen to him
as to my master who gives me excellent les-
sons in the practice of the virtues and in per-
fection. I do not contradict him, I do not
resist him, I do not refuse to believe what he
tells me, nor to do what he teaches me.

In conclusion, owing, as you do, a singular
devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, be careful
to practice it especially during the entire
octave of Corpus Christi, a season wThen we
should keep as much as possible in our Lord's
company, and for long periods expose our-
selves to the Sun of Justice to be illumined,
and to the Divine Fire to be warmed and con-
sumed. We should gaze in astonishment at
a God burning with love for us upon our altars,
wTe should thereon regard with eyes of ven-
eration this great mystery of our faith, this
powerful motive of our hope, this sharp sting
of our love, this excellent pattern of all vir-
tues, and this perfect model of all the actions
of our lives. We should likewise do the same
in due proportion during the other seasons of
the year.

CHAPTER VIII.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST FOR THE MONTH OF AUGUST, BY
THE VIRTUE OF FAITH.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

Since the Holy Ghost descended upon the
disciples on the day of Pentecost to impress
on their hearts, and on the hearts of all men
who should come after them, the New Law,
the law of grace and perfection, and to make
them true Christians ; and since faith, hope,
and charity are the three virtues by which
true Christians are especially made and formed,
and which they exercise more carefully than
all the others as being the most excellent and
most perfect ; we have judged it useful and
proper to adopt these virtues as the subject of
our exercises for the remainder of the year, re-
ferring them chiefly to the holy Eucharist in
order not to divert ourselves from that con-
sideration, but to ground us more and more in
the worship of our Lord, and to unite us more
and more closely with him in that adorable
mystery. We will begin with Faith.

396 Union with Our Lord for August,

EXERCISE ON FAITH.

Faith is the first of the three Theological
Virtues. It enables us to believe firmly and
with an unalterable persuasion, all the truths
that God has revealed to us, either directly,
or through his organs, that is, the patriarchs,
the prophets, and the apostles of the Church.

Faith is the foundation and the commence-
ment, the gate-way of our salvation, the
source of our happiness, the principle, rule,
and measure of all our virtues ; for we will
have as much hope, as much charity, as much
humility, and as much patience as we shall
have lively faith.

Faith is the greatest ornament of our souls,
the one that purifies and ennobles them more
than all human sciences. It has wondrous
eyes that do not rest on the exterior appear-
ance of things, but penetrate their interior
even to their depths ; that do not look upon
the present, but the future ; that do not con-
sider nature, but grace and glory — not time,
but eternity. Gazing at the Eucharist they do
not notice the color, the figure, the odor, nor
the taste, as the senses do, but pass beyond
and discover beneath these accidents the Son
of God who there hides himself for us. Neither

By the Virtue of Faith. 397

the world and its noise, nor walls, nor doors,
nor tabernacles, nor veils, nor ciboriums, nor
the species, nor any other obstacle or parti-
tion, prevent them from behglding our Lord
in the Blessed- Sacrament ; they see him there
as clearly and distinctly a hundred leagues off
as at only two steps distance ; the distance of
places does not deprive them of their vision,
for, far more than the eyes of the lynx, they
pierce everywhere.

Still more, Faith has powerful arms with
which it performs signal and heroic deeds.
It was with these arms that the saints attacked
and overthrew their vices, that they acquired
virtues and exercised good works, that they
combated and gained the victory over the
world, the flesh, and all the enemies of their
salvation, and that they conquered to them-
selves the eternal kingdom. "By faith," says
St. Paul, "they conquered kingdoms and
wrought justice." (Hebr. xi. 33.)

Pure, naked, and blind faith is the faith of
great souls, which in its whole and in each of
its parts is faith and nothing else, which seeks
and desires no other support or reason for be-
lieving, and believing everything no matter
how elevated above our senses and our minds,
than God's word alone, to which it submits
34

39S Union zuith Our Lord for August,

with closed eyes. This faith is the principle,
rule, and measure of all the other virtues, and
its absence is the source whence flow all our
miseries. " They believed not for his won-
drous works, and their days were consumed
in vanity," David said of the Israelites. (Ps.
Ixxvii. 32.) The same may be said of Chris-
tians, because they have not firmly believed
the wonders he has worked in their favor, nor
given credence to his truths ; they have spent
their days in vanities, and have consumed
their lives in follies and in all sorts of vices.

The exercise, then, of this month will be to
make earnest acts of this virtue in reference
to the principal doctrines of our religion, and
particularly in reference to the doctrine of the
Eucharist.

These principal doctrines are contained in
'the Apostles' Creed, and to them must be
added the doctrine of the presence of God
everywhere, both without us and within us,
i:his doctrine being the broadest and most
universal principle of the spiritual life, serving
as a foundation for all the actions of the pur-
gative, the illuminative, and the unitive states ;
that of the existence of God and of our
nothingness, which is the root of Christian
humility ; that of God's providence over us,

By the Virtue of Faith. 399

which is the source of all the true joy we can
possess in this life ; and others that we have
indicated in those places where we have
spoken of this virtue.

But the chief object of these acts will be the
most holy sacrament of the altar, which among
all our mysteries is pre-eminently called mys-
terium jidei,— the mystery of faith, because it
exacts of us a very great submission of intel-
lect and demands that we renounce in the
most absolute manner all our natural, as wTell
as all our acquired knowledge, and all our ex-
perience, and that wre close the eyes and ears
of our senses so as neither to see nor hear the
judgments they would form if left to them-
selves.

The truths of our religion are all equally
certain, but they are not all equally easy to be
understood. There are some that are clear,
the comprehension of which is not beyond the
capacity of our minds ; for example, the exis-
tence of a God who created the universe, that
there is but one God, and that he is good, wise,
powerful, and just. There are other truths
that have been made visible, palpable, that
have fallen under the senses of men ; such are
the mystery of our Lord's humanity, his birth,
his circumcision, his miracles, his preaching,

400 Union zvith Our Lord for August y

his life, death, ascension, and the descent of
the Holy Ghost. Others, again, are obscure
and elevated far above and beyond the power
of our understanding and of our senses ; such
as the unity of one God in three equal persons,
and the incarnation of the Word ; still, these
are not directly opposed to our understanding,
and the Doctors of the Church teach that
among natural phenomena there are things
analagous to these truths which by certain
traits of resemblance facilitate our belief in
them.

But of all our mysteries the most obscure,
the one that is shrouded in the thickest dark-
ness, is the mystery of the Eucharist ; for it is
not only above our minds and senses, but is
seemingly, against them, inasmuch as it pro-
poses to us a transubstantiation, the change
of one entire composite body into another ; a
body existing in several places at the same
time ; a body deprived of exterior extension,
but preserving each member in its natural
place ; a body reduced to a point ; a body en-
tire in the whole and entire in each part of the
host, after the manner of spirits ; a body sen-
sible and palpable in itself, yet present insen-
sibly and impalpably ; a body having eyes

By the Virtue of Faith. 401

without sight," ears without hearing, a tongue
without speech, and accidents without, their
substance yet producing the effects of it.

These are wonders that astonish us, over-
throw all our scientific theories, and set at
naught all the evidences of our senses. If we
consult our sciences, if we ask our senses, their
judgment of a consecrated Host, whether they
consider that an entire man is contained in it.
they will reply that it is folly to think of such
a thing, that the body of a man is not so
formed and cannot be enclosed in such narrow
limits ; that certainly and evidently it is only
bread, and that the color, odor, and taste
show this beyond a doubt.

It is, then, chiefly in this adorable mystery
that faith wins her greatest victories over our
judgment and our senses ; it is here she tri-
umphs with most glory and erects her most
magnificent trophies.

The beloved disciple tells us : "This is the
victory which overcometh the world, our
faith." (1 Jno. v. 4.) Faith is the glorious
conqueror of the world and of the human
intellect.

The pious and learned William, Bishop of
Paris, supposes Faith to say in this connection :.
* This is an opiuion. — Vide Franzelin de Euch.

402 Union with Our Lord for August 9

14 Whose eloquence will be adequate to praise
me according to my merit ? Who can repeat
the signal victories I gain, especially in the
Holy Sacrament of the altar ? There I sur-
mount so powerfully, and with a single blow,
the five senses, and with so great authority
keep them beneath me that they dare not
even breathe against the truth of this mys-
tery ; there I reduce so low the loftiest human
intelligence, and trample so deep in the earth
all the science and reasoning of nature, that
they know not where they are, and I hold
them for my enemies as declared and ready
to do me evil as Satan is, if they be not con-
quered and ranged under my obedience."
(William of Paris, L. de morib. c. I.)

The ancient representation of Faith was
very appropriate. It was pictured as a virgin
beautiful as the day, holding in her hand a
chalice with a Host, having at her feet
prostrate and loaded with chains a great
captain who bore upon his brow, pride and
insolence — that is, the human mind ; around
her lay soldiers stiff in death — that is, the
senses ; below was the motto : Mystcrimn
fidei — the mystery of faith.

Verily, when we enter the presence of the
Blessed Sacrament, when we gaze at it, and

By the Virtue of Faith. 403

when we offer it our homage, we should recall
this picture ; we should see at one side Faith
in this guise and with these marks of her
power, and on the other behold her disdain-
fully trampling under foot the presumption of
our intellect and the rashness of our senses ;
then, with closed eyes, with most profound
respect, with deep humility, with perfect sub-
mission, and pure faith, we should adore the
Mystery on the altar ; and afterward, in the
same sentiments, proceed to the following
practice.

II.— PRACTICE OF FAITH.

This practice contains five points :

1. To believe all the truths of the Christian
religion, and particularly those we have in-
dicated.

2. To believe them with incomparably more
firmness than we do the evident truths of
nature.

3. To protest that we wil} die in a pure,
naked, and blind faith in these truths.

4. And this even were the whole world to
deny or doubt them.

5. So to believe in spite of whatever may
befall us in consequence of our faith.

Thus : I believe all the truths of our holy

404 Union with Our Lord for August,

religion ; I believe in the Trinity, the Incar-
nation, the omnipresence of God, his provi-
dence in my regard ; and especially in the
most holy and most adorable mystery of the
Eucharist, and I believe in it most firmly with-
out a doubt, and most simply without an ex-
amination, and with a pure, naked, and blind
faith, precisely because God has declared it.

Yes, I believe, and I hold for truth this
mystery, with greater firmness of mind and
more perfect repose of soul than I believe and
hold for truth what I see with my eyes, what
I touch with my hands, than I believe that the
sun shines at midday, or that I am alive ; I
believe it above all natural reasons, above all
evident demonstrations, all the infallible ex-
periences of the senses, all supernatural visions,
and all the other knowledge we can possess
in this life, the revelation of God alone taking
for me the place, and performing the office of
reason, demonstration, experience, vision, and
every such thing, being without comparison
more than these.

I desire to live and die in this pure, naked,
and blind faith in the truth of this mystery ;
and I declare now, for the present, and for all
the future, before God, before the angels, be-
fore men, and before all creatures, my above

By the Virtue of Faith. 405

said will and desire. I renounce all contrary
thoughts I may have, I disavow all contrary
words I may say, at whatever time, in what-
ever place, and upon whatever occasion, pro-
testing that they are not in accordance with
my belief and my intention.

And when all men, and even all angels, if so
might be, shall deny this truth, or doubt it ;
when they shall deny and doubt it as much as
they wish, as for me, I am irrevocably resolved
to live and die in its profession, and I desire
no other eucharist, no other sacrifice, no other
salvation than what I believe to be in it.

And when, in consequence of my so believ-
ing this truth, there shall arise some peril for
my honor, or my goods, or my life, or my
eternal salvation, I am determined to submit
to it willingly.

If necessary, I desire to be lost in this belief;
but I know it cannot be my loss ; that on the
contrary it will save me.

Let us apply these five points to the other
mysteries, and thus establish ourselves firmly
in faith in their truth ; let us accustom our-
selves to see things, not with the eyes of the
flesh, nor of the natural reason, but with the
eyes of faith, and to perform our actions under
its motives and principles.

405 Union with Our Lord for August,

Take care that your faith be not an animal
faith, as Tertullian calls it (L. de jejun. c. i. 3),
that leans greatly upon the senses, and is a
very mixed faith, but seek to have it a pure
and naked faith ; let it be not only habitual,
as in the greater part of Christians, but actual
and practical ; not sterile, but efficacious and
operative to produce good works, according
to the manner in which they should be wrought
so as to prove useful for our salvation.

III.— MEDITATIONS.

The author recommends two meditations on
Faith, which are to be found in the work en-
titled " The Illuminative Life of Jesus in the
Desert!'

IV.— READING.

See this heading in Chapter III.

V.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

" My just man liveth by faith." (Heb. x. 38.)
God says : He who is just before me lives and
is nourished by faith.

"I am the resurrection and the life. Be-
lievest thou this?" (Jno. xi. 25.) Our Lord
said to St. Martha : I am the resurrection and

By the Virtue of Faith. 407

the life. Believest thou this ? And she re-
plied : " Yea, Lord, I have believed that thou
art Christ, the Son of the living God." (lb.
xi. 27.) Yes, Lord, I believe that thou art the
Messiah and the Son of the living God.

We ought to represent to ourselves that
our Lord addresses us the same question re-
garding the same mystery, also regarding the
mystery of the Eucharist, and the other mys-
teries, and that we make the same reply:
"Yes, Lord, I believe."

"Lord, increase our faith." (Luke xvii. 5.)
Lord, increase faith within us, grant that we
may have a firm, simple, pure and naked faith,
that we may look at things with its eyes, and
perform our works with its hands. Amen.

CHAPTER IX.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST FOR THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER,
BY THE VIRTUE OF HOPE.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

Hope is the Second Theological Virtue. It
causes us to hope to receive from God all
temporal and eternal blessings, all corporal
and spiritual blessings, the blessings of nature,
grace, and glory. It causes us to hope for
them, because he being omnipotent is able to
give them to us ; because being perfectly good
and goodness itself, he has an extreme incli-
nation to give them to us ; because he is
infinitely liberal and munificent ; and finally,
by reason of the deference he renders to the
life and death of his Son, our Lord Jesus
Christ, and because he has promised to give
them to us for the sake of his Son.

Hope is our balm, our cordial, and our con-
solation in all the sufferings of this life ; it is
a virtue that has powerful attractions and
ravishing charms to win us to its love, and
to inspire us with an ardent desire to exercise
its acts.

By the Virtue of Hope. 409

Pure, naked, and blind hope is the hope of
great souls, the hope that remains unshaken
amid difficulties like a rock in the ocean amid
storms ; it hopes in the midst of despair and
the absence of all human aid, and it rises up
to God in proportion as it sees itself cast down
among creatures ; by a wise and fortunate
blindness it shuts its eyes to men, so as not to
see their weaknesses nor the strength of its
adversaries, and opens them only to look at
the power, goodness, and faithfulness of God,
and the merit of the blood of his Son ; finally,
in its whole, and in each of its parts, it is hope
only in God, and in no other.

We should exert all our efforts to rise to
this pure and perfect hope.

Truly, the sight of what God does for the
insects and the worms of the earth, the care he
takes to preserve them and provide for their
necessities should strongly move us to believe,
if we have not lost our reason, that he will
provide for our wants, and wrill watch over us
who are his images and the master-pieces of
his hand. Considering how he has made for
our use the sun, the moon and the stars, the
elements, the animals, and all visible things ;
how he has given us his angels to guide, as-
sist, and defend us ; how he has given us his
35

410 Union with Our Lord for September,

own Son to take our nature, to assume our
miseries, to teach us by his example and
words, to wash away our sins with his blood,
to gain life for us by his death, and to make
us eternally happy, considering all this that
God has done for us, we ought to confide and
trust in him.

But, added to all this, what takes place in
the most holy Eucharist is a lively incentive
to our perfect and entire confidence, because
our Lord there gives us assurances and tokens
of all the blessings he can impart to us, of all
that we can ask him, and of all we can need.

1. Our Lord gives himself to us in this ador-
able mystery under the species of bread and
wine.

2. He comes to us destroying substances,
strengthening the feebleness of accidents, dis-
uniting things naturally united, and over-
throwing the laws of nature.

3. He comes exercising humility, patience,
obedience, charity, and other virtues in a high
and eminent degree.

4. He comes to unite himself to us in the
manner of food which is the most intimate
union to be found in nature.

5. He comes, not passible and mortal, but
in a state far removed from the attacks of suf-

By the Virtue of Hope. 411

fering and the power of death, and with a
a blessed soul and a glorious body.

We need physical and spiritual blessings,
temporal and eternal blessings, the blessings
of nature, grace and glory. Our Lord gives
them to us in the Blessed Sacrament, and
consequently gives us reason to ask them of
him, and a certain hope of obtaining them
from him in this adorable mystery.

First, physical blessings the most neces-
sary of which are food and drink ; he furnishes
us these by putting himself under the species
of bread and wine, which are the principal ali-
ments of our bodies.

Secondly, as to spiritual blessings, the state
of grace and perfection consists in three things:
The first is the reformation of our nature
spoiled by sin, the eradication of our vicious
inclinations and our bad habits, which is the
labor of the purgative life ; the second is the
practice of virtues, which is the employment
of the illuminative life ; and the third is our
union with our Lord, and through him with
God, which is the occupation of the unitive
life.

Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament does
these things in an admirable manner most
worthy of our meditation.

412 Union with Our Lord for September,

First : he destroys the substances of the
bread and wine ; he separates and disunites
things naturally united, that is, the substance
and the accidents ; he strengthens the weak-
ness of the accidents so that they exist with-
out support ; he overthrows the laws of
nature.

Secondly: he exercises in a most high and
eminent manner humility, obedience, patience,
and the other virtues, in order to give us ex-
amples, and at the same time communicate to
us grace to imitate them. Besides, he raises
the accidents above themselves so that they
produce the effects of their substances and
thus far surpass their own power.

Thirdly : he unites himself for love of us to
the accidents of the bread and wine, which are
very mean things ; he unites himself to us, to
our bodies and souls, whence the Blessed
Sacrament is called Communion ; and he
unites himself to us in the quality of food,
which forms with the one who receives it the
most intimate and perfect of all natural
unions, because after a very little time it
passes from union to unity.

Finally, with regard to the state of glory"
and eternal recompense, the Eucharist is
called by the Fathers the seed of immortality

By the Virtue of Hope, 413

and a blessed resurrection ; our Lord comes
to us in it, not passible and mortal, but m a
state incapable of suffering" and death, and
with his divinity and his blessed humanity
which are to constitute the beatitude of our
souls and bodies.

The Son of God. then, coming to us in such
a manner in the most holy Eucharist, invites
and even forces us to ask him with unshaken
confidence for all these blessings, and to hope
for them from his bounty ; to hope that he
will give us bread and wine, that is, nourish-
ment for our bodies and all that is necessary
for our life ; that he will give us courage to
destroy our vicious inclinations, to conquer
our passions, to detach and disunite ourselves
from creatures that captivate us, to rise above
our nature in order to practice virtues excel-
lently, to unite ourselves with him, and at last
to see him and possess him eternally in the
state of glory.

Therefore, if the holy Eucharist is called
the mystery of our faith, it deserves most
justly to be also called the mystery of our
hope, and the sacrament of our sweetest ex-
pectations. Truly, when we see our Lord
coming to us from heaven to earth with such
a disposition to give, we ought to go to him

4 H Union with Our Lord for September,

to ask with hope, and to confess that if after
this we are still needy and miserable, it is not
his fault, but ours.

Consider again with what liberality and
profusion he gives himself to us. He gives
himself entirely ; he gives us his divinity, his
soul, his body. Does not oiiq who gives an
object of an absolutely infinite value as
security for a promise of a few cents, furnish
great reason to hope, and an infallible cer-
tainty of obtaining from him the few cents ?
We, relying upon the token our Lord gives
us, have much greater reason U> hope to re-
ceive from him all that is necessary for our
bodies and souls.

St. Thomas admiring God's liberality in this
mystery, says : " God gave man heaven and
earth, and this was the first degree of his
bounty ; he destined his angels to instruct
and defend us, this was the second degree ;
and the third is that he has given us himself,
and in several manners ; for he has given him-
self to accompany us in our pilgrimage, to
assist us in our necessities, and to make of his
blood the price of our ransom. But the high-
est degree of his liberality and magnificence
is that he has given himself to us to be our
food. The other gifts are somewhat apart

By the Virtue of Hope. 415

from himself; this one is not, but produces an
intimate and inseparable union between him
and the receiver ; whence our Lord says :
41 He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood
dwells in me, and I dwell in him." (Opusc.
58, c. 5 ) Having before us, by day and night
and in so many churches, so great and ad-
mirable a reason for perfect hope in our Lord
in all our necessities, " let us hold fast the
confession of our hope without wavering," as
St. Paul says. (Heb. x. 23.) Let us strengthen
ourselves in an unshaken hope. " And hope
confoundeth not," says the same apostle.
(Rom. v. 5.) A hope so well founded, estab-
lished upon such strong reasons, and supported
by such excellent pledges of our Lord's exces-
sive love for us, cannot deceive us.

This is why St. Paul also says : " Let us go
therefore with confidence to the throne of
grace, that we may obtain mercy and find
grace in seasonable aid." (Heb. iv. 16.) Let
us go with great confidence to our Lord in the
Blessed Sacrament where he is as on the
throne of his grace and liberality, to obtain
mercy and a remedy for all our evils.

When you are afflicted, discomforted, or
pained (this is a very good counsel), go for
your consolation, not to creatures who fre-

41 6 Union with Our Lord for September,

quently instead of curing your disease will
make it worse, and in place of pouring, like
the pious Samaritan (Luke x. 34), oil and wine
upon your wound to heal it, will touch it with
fire to inflame it, but go straight, and with faith
and confidence, to the Blessed Sacrament, as
to your asylum and your altar of refuge.

Expose your affliction and pain to our Lord,
and supplicate him to help you ; and be cer-
tain that you will never come away from this
visit without fruit, and that you will always
find in some way in the Blessed Sacraroent
light for your doubts, strength for your weak-
nesses, consolation for your sorrows, and assist-
ance for all your needs, inasmuch as our Lord
is there on purpose to help you, and to pro-
duce in you these effects. The prophet Isaiah,
speaking figuratively, says : "There shall be
a tabernacle for a shade in the day-time from
the heat, and for a security and covert from
the whirlwind, and from rain." (Is. iv. 6.) The
tabernacle where our Lord dwells shall serve
you as a shade from the fierceness of the sun,
and as a shelter from the whirlwind and the
rain, and from all sorts of storms. I

Let us then hope strongly in God, and let us
put all our confidence in him. " Hope in the
Lord God mighty forever," the same prophet

By the Virtue of Hope. 417

bids us. (Is. xxvi. 4.) Hope steadfastly in
the Lord, who is strong and all-powerful.

Let us not hope in creatures, but in our
Lord. " I have learned in the Catholic Church,
before all things," says St. Augustine, "not to
put my hope in any man ; for I hear God tell-
ing us by Jeremiah : ' Cursed be the man that
trusteth in man.'" (Jer. xvii. 5.) William of
Paris says : " He who leans upon man, leans
upon a reed which, incapable of supporting
him, breaks beneath his weight and wounds
his hand." (William of Paris, L. de morib. c. 3.)
The pious bishop borrowed this simile from
the prophet Ezechiel, who says of Egypt :
i4 Behold thou hast been a staff of a reed to
the house of Israel. When they took hold of
thee with the hand thou didst break and rend
all their shoulder." (Ezech. xxix. 6, 7.) Isa-
iah, also speaking, of Egypt, had already ex-
pressed the same thought : " Lo ! thou trustest
upon this broken staff of a reed, upon Egypt,
upon which if a man lean it will go into his hand
and pierce it ; so is Pharao, king of Egypt, to
all that trust in him." (Is. xxxvi. 6.)

God tells us and repeats it many times, he
invites and solicits us with most pressing
words, to lean upon him and to establish in
him our hope. Do we believe that he speaks

41 8 Union with Our Lord for September \

thus for nothing ? St. Augustine asks wisely,
and after him William of Paris, if we can en-
tertain the wicked thought that if, encouraged
by God's words, we should lean upon him, he
would be so cruel and deceitful, he who is
goodness and truth itself, as to withdraw and
let us fall ? (Will, of Paris, lee. cit)

Therefore, convinced and persuaded by these
reasons, let us lean boldly upon him, and let
us fearlessly place in him our hope for the re-
lief of all our necessities, and let us proceed to
the practice.

II.— THE PRACTICE.

Like the Practice of Faith, it should con-
sist in the following five points :

I hope my God and my Saviour, from thy
goodness, thy liberality, thy mercy, thy in-
violable fidelity to thy promises, from thy
power, and especially from seeing thee as I
do in the adorable mystery of the Eucharist,
that thou wilt deliver me from all evils, and
wilt load me with blessings. I hope that thou
wilt give me my food, and as many temporal
blessings as I need for my salvation. I hope
that thou wilt assist me with thy grace to
avoid sin, to withstand temptations, to con-
quer my passions, to correct my bad inclina-

By the Virtue of Hope, 419

tions, and to. destroy my corrupt nature. I
hope that thou wilt strengthen my weakness,
and enable me 'to exercise the virtues to per-
fection and unite myself to thee ; and that at
last thou wilt open to me the gates of heaven,
and permit me to enjoy the eternal beatitude
of my body and soul.

Beholding thee in that Host, upon that
throne of goodness, liberality, and love, I hope
all these blessings from thee above all the
hope that can be placed in kings, in rich and
generous men, in kindred, in most intimate
friends, even for the least things.

I desire to live and die in this lofty confi-
dence, and in this unshaken hope for which in
the Blessed Sacrament thou dost give me so
much reason.

And when all men shall distrust thee, and
esteem that thou wilt not, or that thou canst
not assist and defend them, the sight of what
thou art, and of what thou dost for me m the
Blessed Sacrament, shall always constantly
strengthen me in this hope.

And though even this hope should delay to
be fulfilled by my deliverance from my evils,
and I should be left to stagnate in my afflic-
tions and to be miserable in this world and in
the next, thou, nevertheless, wouldst always

420 Union with Our Lord for September.

be through all, and in spite of all opposition,
my refuge and my support.

III.— MEDITATIONS.

Father Saint-Jure under this heading again
recommends, in addition to the matter of this
chapter, the work entitled "The Illuminative
Life of Jesus in the Desert."

IV.— READING.
See this heading in Chapter III.

V.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

" Offer up the sacrifice of justice, and trust
in the Lord."* (Ps. iv. 6.) Offer to God the
sacrifice of justice and hope in the Lord ; sup-
ported by the sacrifice and sacrament of his
body and blood, trust in him.

" Thou, O Lord, art my hope.1' (Ps. xc. 9.)
Beholding, my Lord, how thou abidest for me
in this divine mystery, and what thou doest
in it for my salvation, thou art my hope.

"Yes, thou art truly all my hope and all
my confidence.1' (St. August. Manual, cap. 12.)

"Thou hast prepared a table before me,
against them that afflict me." (Is. xxii. 5.)
Thou hast placed before me a table spread
with an admirable and divine food, to strength-
en me against all that afflict me.

CHAPTER X.

PRACTICE OF UNION WITH OUR LORD JESUS
CHRIST FOR THE MONTHS OF OCTOBER
AND NOVEMBER UNTIL ADVENT, BY THE
VIRTUE OF CHARITY.

I.— THE SUBJECT.

We will conclude the exercises of the year
by one on Charity, which is likewise the con-
clusion of the commandments of God, and as
St. Paul says, the queen of virtues, in the
practice and perfection of which consists the
height of the perfection we can acquire in this
life.

This most noble and divine virtue, the third
and the most perfect of the theological vir-
tues, has for its object and effect to love God,
and to love ourselves, our neighbor, and all
that is outside of God, solely for the love of
God.

William of Paris says that this most excel-
lent virtue is called Charity because it renders
God very dear to us, and that without it he
is very vile to us since we account him less
than a miserable creature, a vain honor, the
gain of a few pennies, or a beastly pleasure.
36

422 Union ivitJi Our Lord until Advent,

It is pure and bears this name of charity
when it is unmixed with any other love ; it is
naked when it is not covered with any strange
affection ; it is simple when it is not divided
between two objects and does not make pre-
tence of loving" God while it really loves
another; finally, it is blind when it shuts its'
eyes to all difficulties, when it considers no
trouble and has regard to nothing whatsoever
when there is question of loving God and
giving him proofs of love.

It is contained in the first commandment
of the Old and the New Law : Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart,
and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole
mind, and with all thy strength ; that is, with
all thy will, with all thy affections, with all
thy mind and all thy thoughts, with all thy
soul and all thy passions, and with all thy
interior and exterior faculties ; and thou shalt
love him in this manner because he is thy God
who merits it of himself alone, and because
he is thy Lord who is most worthy of it on
account of what he is to thee. These are
the motives of this love.

Truly it is a fearful thing for us to love God
so little when we have so much reason to love
him.

By the Virtue of Cliarity. 423

He merits our love because as God he is
infinitely perfect and consequently infinitely
amiable; and as man, the Incarnate Word,
he is sovereignly worthy of it on account of
the sovereign perfections of his sacred body
and his most holy soul which are incompara-
bly beyond all that is, or ever will be, beautiful
and attractive among creatures.

He has made the heavens, the earth, and
the whole visible universe for us.

He clothed himself with our nature, he lived
thirty-three years amid all kinds of poverty
and misery, and then died in an excess of
suffering and opprobrium on a cross for our
salvation.

He has heaped upon us the riches of grace,
and he is preparing for us those of glory.

He has created us, he preserves us, he
nourishes us, and keeps us in the wTorld only
to love him. The commandment he has given
us to love him with all our heart and all our
strength is the first, the most important, and
the most imperative of all his commandments.
He promises us a thousand blessings if we ob-
serve it, and he threatens us with a thousand
evils, both in this life and in the next, if we
disobey it.

In addition, we cannot live without loving

424 Union zvith Our Lord until Advent,

something ; and what do we desire, or what
can we love more amiable than he ? Whose
love will procure us more honor, more profit,
and more satisfaction than his ?

All these reasons show us the extreme and
indispensable obligations we are under to love
God with all our heart, and therefore are very
capable of kindling in us the fire of charity.
But, besides these, I find that the holy Eu-
charist possesses a most particular and most
powerful virtue to produce this effect.

St. Ambrose, speaking of the Theological
Virtues, says that our Lord is our faith in
baptism, our hope in the resurrection, and our
charity in the Blessed Sacrament. (L. 3. de
Virgin.) The angelical Doctor, St. Thomas,
relates that this sacrament is sometimes called
Sacr amentum charitatis — the sacrament of
love (Opuse. 58 ; c. 3) ; and before him, St.
Bernard all dazzled by its light and burning
with its flames, said : " Think you that you
are able to esteem worthily enough, what,
and how great is this Holy of holies, this
Sacrament of sacraments, this Love of loves,
and this Sweetness that contains all sweets ?"
(Serm. id. caena. Dom.)

And St. Ephrem earlier than either calls it
fire, which has always been considered the

By the Virtue of Charity. 425

symbol of love ; this is how he speaks :
41 Truly, what God's only Son, our Saviour,
has done for us, is above all our admiration, all
our thoughts, and all our words. He has
given us for food and drink, fire and a spirit,
that is to say, his body and his blood." (De
Nat. Dei non curiose scrut.) He calls this
sacrament fire and a spirit because it is not a
material, but a spiritual fire. St. Chrysostom
also gives it the same name (Horn. 6 in Matth.) ;
and several other writers explain in this sense
these words of Leviticus : " The fire on the
altar shall always burn." (Levit. vi. 12. cf.
Lorin. Ibid.) Fire, that is the Blessed Sacra-
ment, shall always burn upon my altar.

' The Council of Trent utters these beautiful
and remarkable words in reference to our sub-
ject : 4t Our Saviour being about to depart
and return to his Father, instituted this sacra-
ment, wrherein he has manifested to men the
extreme affection he bears them, and has, as
it were, poured upon them the treasures of his
love, making this mystery the abridgment of
his wonders." (Sess. xiii. c. 2.)

Likewise St. John, speaking of its'institution,
says : i4 Jesus knowing that his hour was come
that he should pass out of this world to the
Father, having loved his own who were in the

426 Union with Onr Lord until Advent,

world, he loved them unto the end " (Jno.
xiii. 1), giving them his body and his blood
for their food. Now let us see how this love
has been manifested.

Love has this characteristic, namely, to
seek and procure by all possible means the
union of the lover with the beloved ; it has a
uniting power, says St. Denis (L. de divin.
nomin. c. 3); it causes the lover to give gene-
rously and profusely all he can to the beloved ;
it surmounts all obstacles that maybe opposed
to its designs, and it desires with unspeakable
earnestness their execution and spares nothing
to accomplish it. Our Lord has done all this
in the Blessed Sacrament in an admirable
manner that delights the angels and ought to
delight men.

Our Lord, urged by his infinite love for man,
united himself to him in the two most inti-
mate and perfect of all ways : First, by uniting
his person with an individual humanity in the
mystery of the Incarnation, wherein human
nature was elevated in that humanity, and
consequently all of us in a certain manner, to
the divine nature and to all its infinite perfec-
tions ; Secondly, as only that single humanity
could be united to him in that mystery, and
nevertheless he desired to unite himself with

By the Virtue of Charity. 427

all men individually, he found out an expedient
truly admirable, an invention that surprises
and astonishes all minds, that is, the Blessed
Sacrament.

He unites himself intimately with all men
as far as is possible ; he unites himself as food,
which forms with the one who receives it, as
we have said, the closest, most inseparable,
and most perfect of all natural unions ; he
unites himself daily, and in some manner as
many times as there are atoms in the host to
contain him entire, because he is, like our
souls in our bodies, entire in the whole host,
and in each of its parts ; by this union he
gives himself to us, he gives us his body, his
soul, his divinity, his virtues, the labors of his
life, the fruits of his death, and all his posses-
sions ; l and by means of that multitude of
presences in the host, as we have remarked,
he unites and gives himself with all his pos-
sessions to us as many times as he is present
in the host. So great is his desire to unite
himself to us, to apply to us his merits, to
communicate to us his virtues, to bestow
upon us his blessings, and to render us hence-
forth as happy as he is able to do ! Our Lord
knows that our happiness in this life and in
the next consists in our union with God, and

428 Union ivith Our Lord until Advent,

in our possessing him, and that it is certain
that, no matter what God gives us, even
though he should give us millions of worlds,
we will not be happy unless he gives us him-
self, because he is our end and consequently
our beatitude ; so the extreme love he bears
us, infinitely ingenious, prompted him to in-
vent this wonderful means by which he unites
us to his humanity, and through his humanity
to his divinity ; and thus he makes us happy,
and gives us possession of the paradise we
may enjoy on earth, and prepares us for that
which awaits us in heaven.

Although our Lord is now impassible and
immortal, he nevertheless places himself in
the host as though he still suffered, and he is
there as if dead, since, by the power of the
words of consecration, his blood would be, if
it were possible, separated from his body to
teach us the excess of his love. It is as though
he said to us : I have for thy sake endured
the agonies of my passion, and have suffered
the most ignominious death that ever was ;
I desire to apply to thee unceasingly the value
of my blood and the merit of my death ; and
if it w7ere necessary for thy salvation that I
should die again, thou mayest judge by the
state in which thou seest me, and by the love

By the Virtue of Charity. 429

I testify toward thee, that 1 am ready to die
again once, and a thousand times, and that I
would do it."

What appears most admirable in this mys-
tery, is our Lord's burning desire to institute
this divine sacrament, in order to be able to
unite himself to us, to give himself to us, and
to enrich us with his blessings.

Urged by this desire he said, before estab-
lishing it : " With desire I have desired to eat
this pasch with you before I suffer." (Luke "
xxii. 15.) I have ardently desired to eat this
pasch with you before I suffer death. Our de-
sire of a thing is an evident and positive sign
of our affection for it ; we do not desire things
that are indifferent to us, but those we hold
dear. Our Lord says that he burned with the
desire to eat this pasch, because he was ex-
tremely anxious to unite and give himself to
us.

All that we have said above proves clearly
the vehemence of this desire. But in addition
to all that, is it not to desire with incredible
ardor, to come whence he comes, and in the
manner he comes, and to do what he does
that he may come and unite himself to us ?

He comes from the highest heaven, which is
almost infinitely remote from the earth.

430 Union ivith 0?cr Lord until Advent,

He comes in an instant, so anxious is he to
come to us, and to come immediately.

If we should see some great personage, some
very wise man, some one filling the most ex-
alted position, a powerful, prudent, and aged
monarch, running with all his might through
the streets, what would we think ? What would
we say ? We would say that he had either
lost his senses, or was possessed writh an inex-
plicable desire for the thing after which he
wras running. It is a far greater wonder to see
the Son of God coming so quickly.

But the prodigies he performs in himself and
outside of himself, in order that he may come
and be united with us, make clearer than the
day his violent desire of this union. He puts
himself at the same time in heaven and on
earth ; he puts himself in two places and in
an innumerable number of places, since he is
in as many places as there are consecrated
hosts in the whole Church ; he contracts him-
self and makes himself so little that he is
reduced to a point ; he deprives himself of
the use of his senses ; he abases his majesty,
he covers his glory with a vile exterior ; he
unites himself to the accidents ; he disguises
himself, and in such a manner that neither the
most ingenious poets, nor the most impas-

By the Vii'tue of Charir 431

sioned hearts have ever invented any artifice,
subtlety, any transformation or rcifcta-
morphose that resembles it. In addition, he
exposes himself to a thousand insults, and he
resolves to endure them for the gratification
of his desire ; and for the same purpose he
subjects himself to the word of a priest, who
may sometimes be his mortal enemy.

Outside of himself he overthrows the laws
of nature, destroying the substances, sustain-
ing the accidents without their natural sup-
port, and giving them strength to do the work
of their substance.

Behold whence our Lord comes, how he
comes, and what he does, in order to unite
himself to us ! And behold how he puts him-
self in the host, and how he remains in the
tabernacles often for whole days and nights
quite alone, waiting with invincible patience
for persons to come to visit him, to come to
speak to him, and to prepare themselves so
that he may unite himself with them, may :
himself to them, and do them good ; for this
hat he desires ardently, since he does nor
come so iar, nor so quickly, nor with so many
wonders, not to continue the ardor of his
desire ! Oh ! what a desire ! Oh ! what

: !

432 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

II.— THE AFFECTIONS.

If our Lord so ardently desires to come to
us, it is certainly most just that we should
desire to go to him. If he says to us : ik I
have earnestly desired to eat this pasch with
you ; " we, in view of the infinite inequality
of dignity and perfections between him and
us, have far greater reason to say to him :
''With desire I have desired to eat it with
thee." For what does he gain by it ? What
advantage does light receive from communi-
cating itself to darkness ? Wealth from giv-
ing itself to poverty? Beauty from uniting
itself to ugliness ? Purity to corruption ? Wis-
dom to folly ? — which means, our Lord to us.
Are not all the gain and glory ours ?

If, then, being what he is, he desires and
seeks with such burning affection to come to
us, with what affection and what transports
ought not we, being what we are, to desire to
go to him ? St. Chrysostom says, speaking of
this : " Do you not see how eagerly babes
bound into their mothers' arms and take the
breast ? We should do the same with re-
gard to the Holy Eucharist. For this reason
the early Christians called it Desiderata — the
things desired ; and when they baptized the

By the VirUie of Charity. 435

catechumens who received directly after their
baptism, they were accustomed to sing Psal'm
XLI. : ' As the heart pa-nteth after the foun-
tains of water, so my soul panteth after thee,.
O my God.' As the hart runneth from the
pack, and parched with thirst seeks the foun-
tains of water, so my soul, O my God, desires
thee, longs for thee, and sighs after thee."

The saints, for instance Catherine of Sienna
and Catherine of Genoa, languished and pined
with the desire of Communion ; St. Catherine
of Genoa, as soon as she saw the host in the
hands of the priest, cried out with admirable
fervor : " Make haste, make haste ; send it
to the depths of my heart, for it is my
strength." Cardinal James de Vitry says
of Blessed St. Mary d'Ognie : " It was her
life to receive the body of Jesus Christ, and
to be deprived of it for any length of time was
her death ; for she experienced in herself the
truth of these words of our Lord : ' Except
you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink
his blood, you shall not have life in you.' "
(Jno. vi. 54.)

Therefore, we ought to ardently desire to
communicate ; but remark, concerning this
desire, two important things :

The first is, that however great is our Lord's
37

434 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

desire of coming to us, it is always regulated
and governed by obedience, for he is present
in the host only at the word of the priest. • In
the same way, however strong your affection
and desire for Holy Communion is, it should
always be subject to your spiritual superiors
to grant or refuse it, according as they judge
to be most useful to your soul.

Frequently the refusal well accepted and
borne, will be more glorious to God, and
more meritorious to you than the permission,
because your desire will be annihilated, and
your self-will destroyed by your submission to
God. St. Luke relates that the disciples of
Emmaus knew our Lord only in the breaking
of bread : " Their eyes were opened and they
knew him " in the breaking of bread. (Luke
xxiv. 31.) Upon which St. Bernard wisely
remarks : " If you would know our Lord, you
must break yourself as he is broken, you must
break your will, renounce your desires, and
annihilate your sentiments ; after that you
shall know and enjoy our Lord." (Horn, de
discip. eunt. in Emmaus.)

The second thing is that this desire ought
to strongly animate us to prepare in an ex-
cellent manner to receive the Blessed Sacra-
ment, and to make our thanksgiving afterward

By the Virtue of Charity. 435

with great perfection ; more especially because
the better we do these things, the more our
Lord will be disposed to unite himself inti-
mately with us and enrich us, which is all he
desires. For we may well believe that he has
not so wonderful and burning a desire to come
to us only to do nothing for us, or to do us
harm, which however will be the case if we
do not receive him as we should ; rather his
purpose in coming is to communicate to us
abundantly the fruits of his life and death, and
to bestow upon us his treasures, and he exe-
cutes this purpose always according as our
Communions are good.

Our desire then should lead us to prepare
most carefully for Communion, and to ap-
proach with most firm and simple faith, with
singular humility and profound reverence, with
a lively sorrow for our sins, with a strong con-
fidence in our Lord, whose burning desire to
come to us and to do us good is a powerful
motive of this confidence ; with an ardent love
deriving it from his love for us and kindling
our fire from his, and with all the other dispo-
sitions we have indicated in their order.

As our Lord works prodigies in himself and
in nature in order to come to unite himself
with us, overturning the obstacles that oppose

456 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

his coming and his union, so we likewise
should do great things, destroying our vicious
nature and surmounting all difficulties in order
to be fit to go to unite ourselves to him.

It is also just as important to employ the
time after Communion in conversing with our
Lord, in thanking him for his visit, and espe-
cially for the extreme love he manifests
toward you, for the ardent desire he had to
come to you, to unite himself with you, and
to do you good, begging and conjuring him
by the excess of that love and the ardor of
that desire to truly unite himself to you and
you to him, to purify you, sanctify you, illu-
mine you, warm you, strengthen you, animate
you with his spirit, and apply to you the
fruits of his passion and death.

Say to him : Effect in me, my dear Saviour,
that for which thou hast come. Wouldst thou
have come so far, and in such haste, to do
nothing, and to return just as thou earnest ?
Hast thou produced such wonderful and pro-
digious changes in thyself and in all nature,
to change nothing in me and to leave me as
thou findest me ? I know not how to persuade
myself that thou hadst so great a desire to
come and unite thyself to me, and to give me
thy divinity, thy humanity, the fruits of thy

f Charity. 43 _

rs, the treasures of thy b^lood, and some
share in :ues, if in reality thou dost not

them to me, but si : me to ever re-

main in my imperfections anc

thus fervently approach H$ly Com-
munion and receive our Lord, as much for his
interest as for ours. For his interest let us
him pleasure and to afford him
a gratification he desires so much ; for on the
one hand it is clear that the more one de
a thing the greater is the joy the possession
: affords ; and on the other, that our Lord
edible affection to come to us,
to unite himself to us, to apply to us the
: his blood and enable us to- enjoy the
fruit of his labors, and consequently that we
cannot do anything more agreeable to
than to assist him to come to us and enrich
us, and thus satisfy his desire and accomplish
For our interest, let us receive on
account of the inestimable blessings we will
derive from our Communion.

From ail this it must be inferred that for
most just reasons a faithful soul should n
be prevented or deterred from communicating ;
because otherwi- ingular displeasure will

be given our Lord by depriving him of some-
thing he desires soardentlv, and a great wrongs

43 S Union with Our Lord until Advent,

will be done the soul by keeping from it so
great a blessing.

You will tell me : A soul should be very
pure to communicate. I reply : It is true ;
but if we regard the infinite purity of the God
who is received, our purity, though we should
take a hundred years and an eternity to purify
ourselves, and even the purity of the Seraphim
and Cherubim, will never be sufficiently great,
because, according to the maxim of philoso-
phy, there can be no proportion nor measure
between that which has limits and that which
has none. But we should learn to what one
is absolutely obliged in order to communicate
worthily. It is to be pure from all mortal sin,
and not from venial sin ; otherwise, who could
communicate, since those that are most just,
as the wise man says, fall seven times ? (Prov.
xxiv. 16.) And an apostle, St. John the be-
loved disciple, renders this testimony with
respect to himself, and to all men : "If we
say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves
and the truth is not in us." (i. Jno. i. 8.)

Most certainly we should endeavor to bring
the most exact purity possible to the recep-
tion of this adorable mystery, and should pre-
pare ourselves for it, as we have already said,
with very great diligence, in order to receive

By the Virtue of Charity. 439

fully its fruits according to our Lord's desire
and plan ; but we must not require of our-
selves or of others, angelical purity, nor im-
possible dispositions.

Two reasons drawn from the Blessed Sacra-
ment itself, show this to us plainly: the first,
the one St. Theresa used to excuse the faults
that the misery, frailty, and ignorance of men
commit toward our Lord in the Blessed Sacra-
ment, is that he is there hidden and unknown ;
for although he is truly there in body and
soul, we see nothing of him any more than if
he were not there. On account, therefore, of
his being there thus disguised and invisible ;
of his being really there and yet apparently
not there, the faults committed against him
in that state are less than if he were visible
in his majesty and glory.

The second reason is derived from the ex-
treme desire our Lord has of coming to us,
which does not at all harmonize with a pre-
paration so pure and perfect, and consequently
so difficult ; because when we greatly desire a
thing we render the acquisition of it as easy
as possible ; for example, if you anxiously
desire a friend to visit you and that his coming
should afford you singular joy, you do not tell
him that you do not want him to come ex-

44-0 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

cepting when it rains in torrents, or when it
freezes hard, or at a very inconvenient time,
or when you know he cannot come, for this
would be to declare plainly, in the opinion of
everybody, that you do not care much about
his coming at all, since you appoint his visit so
he cannot make it, or' only with so much
trouble as to render it very difficult and
almost impossible.

Therefore our Lord, not considering what
is due to himself, but what it is in our power
to offer him, and his own desire to see us, does
not require of us as a condition of visiting or
receiving the Blessed Sacrament a disposition
so extremely difficult, but such a one as may
be easy to all according to their capacities.

This is clearly shown in the parable the
Church uses as the Gospel of the Mass of the
Sunday in the octave of Corpus Christi. In
this parable our Lord relates that those who
were invited to the feast, a figure of the Eu-
charist, having excused themselves most un-
civilly and rudely, the master commanded his
steward to go quickly through the streets and
lanes of the city, and to bring in the poor and
the feeble and the blind and the lame ; and it
was done. And because there was yet room
the master again commanded the steward to

By the Virtue of Charity. 441

go out of the city and search the highways
and hedges and invite the poor that he would
find lying by the roadside, and urge them to
come, and even compel them ; seeming by
this to wish to force them. (Luke xiv. 16.)

What can be clearer and stronger than the
words of this parable ? Go out quickly — cxi
cito ; search everywhere, in the streets and
public places, in the fields, even among the
hedges — in plate as et vicos civitatis, in vias et
sepes. And for whom ? For the poor, the
infirm, the weak, the blind, the lame — pau-
per es, ae debiies, et cezeos, et claudos ; bring
them, push them, compel them to come — in-
iroditc hue, compelle intrare.

In conclusion, I wish to place before the
eyes of all my readers an excellent picture of
many of the things we have said above, par-
ticularly of the desire of Communion, the pre-
paration for it, the benefit of receiving it, and
the thanksgiving after receiving ; this picture
is found in the history of Tobias. (Tob. iv.)
It is related that Tobias the father having
sent his son to the city of Rages in the coun-
try of the Medes, to obtain from a man named
Gabelus a sum of money he had lent him sev-
eral years before, the young Tobias had no
sooner started than Anna his mother besran

442 Union with Onr Lor^d until Advent \

to weep and to say to her husband: "Thou
hast taken the staff of our old age and sent
him away from us. I wish the money for
which thou hast sent him had never been.
For our poverty was sufficient for us, that we
might account it as riches that we saw our
son." (Tob. v. 23, 24, 25.) And when the sen
did not return on the day appointed, but was
absent much longer than the period assigned
for his journey, the mother redoubled her
lamentations and tears, and her husband even
shared her apprehensions, and, as the history
relates, "they began both to weep together."
(Tob. x. 3.) But the mother whose tenderness
was greatest, could no longer endure the ab-
sence of this dear son, and overcome by her
grief, cried out: "Wo, wo is me, my son!
why did we send thee to go to a strange
country, the light of our eyes, the staff of our
old age, the comfort of our life, the hope of
our posterity I We having all things together
in thee alone, ought not to have let thee go
from us." (lb. x. 4, 5.)

Her husband endeavored to console her and
dry her tears, "but she could by no means be
consoled." (lb. x. 7.) She would receive no
consolation and was desolate in her sorrow.
What grief, what regret for the absence of

By the Virtue of CJiarity. 443

this dear son ! How violent a desire for his
return !

Have we not certainly as much, and vastly
more reason to mourn the absence of our
Lord, and to desire his return in the Blessed
Sacrament ? Every word that this mother,
transported by her affection, says of her son,
may with much greater appropriateness be
applied to our Lord. This is the first object
in our picture.

The second is Anna's violent desire of her
son's return, a desire which prompted her to
leave her house every day to look all about to
see if he were not coming, and to go out of
the city into all the roads by which he might
return to behold him afar off if she could.
"Running out every day, she looked round
about, and went into all the wTays by which
there seemed any hope her son might return,
that she might if possible see him coming afar
off." (lb. x. 7.) More than this, she ascended
to the summit of a neighboring mountain
whence she could discern at a great distance
travelers that approached, and here she sat
alone and motionless for whole hours and
days, with her eyes fixed in the direction from
which she believed Tobias would come. "Anna
sat beside the way daily, on the top of a hill,

444 Union ivith Onr Lord until Advent,

from whence she might see afar off." (Tob.

xi. 50

Consider this second object in the picture.
The desire that inflames the soul for the re-
turn of our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament,
and for the possession of him, should incite it
to discover all the ways, and employ all the
means of preparing well to receive him, should
prompt it to retire from creatures and enter
into itself for recollection, and should move it
to ascend the mountains, that is to make ex-
cellent'and exalted acts of faith, adoration,
humility, contrition, hope, love, and the other
virtues of which we have treated.

While this affectionate mother was on the
mountain watching for the arrival of her son,
"she saw him afar off, and presently per-
ceived it was her son coming ; and returning
she told her husband." (Tob. xi. 6.) She saw
him afar off, and as the eyes of love are very
quick, she recognized him immediately and
hastened to tell her husband. When at last
this beloved son so bitterly wept, so earnestly
desired, and so long awaited, arrived and en-
tered the house, who could describe the joy
and delight of the father'and mother ? " The
father receiving him, kissed him, as did also
his wife, and they began to weep for joy."

By the Virtue of Charity. 445

(lb. xi. 11.) They both wept, not now for
sadness, but for joy.

This third part of our picture reveals to us
the divine and exceeding satisfaction that well
prepared souls receive from the coming of our
Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, a satisfaction
which, as St. Bernard says, far surpasses all
the pleasures derived from creatures, and
which is only marred by its short duration.

The joy of Tobias and Anna was greatly
increased when they saw their son returning
with more goods than they had hoped for.
But what proportion did these goods bear to
the treasures of immense value, which our
Lord brings to rejoice the soul that receives
them ?

Finally, as a model of thanksgiving after
Communion, the angel Raphael, who, by a
special favor of God, had visibly accompanied,
protected, and instructed the young Tobias
during his entire journey, said to him : " As
soon as thou shalt come into thy house, forth-
with adore the Lord thy God, and giving
thanks to him, go to thy father and kiss him."
(Tob. xi. 7.) We should do the same after
having received our Lord.

The angel continuing to instruct Tobias,
told him to put the gall of the fish he had
38

446 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

directed him to keep, upon the eyes of his
blind father, assuring him that their sight
would be restored ; which truly happened
after he had annointed them for about half
an hour. u He stayed about half an hour."
(Tob. xi. 14.)

What is signified by this fish's gall that must
be applied to blind eyes ? Assuredly the merits
of the bitter passion and painful death of our
Saviour Jesus Christ, who is that mysterious
fish so beautiful spoken of by the sibyls, and
which we must by prayer and by all other
means after Communion, apply to our under-
standing to enlighten it, and to our diseased
faculties to heal them.

The half-hour of application of the remedy
indicates the time we should continue our
thanksgiving ; during this time we should do
all we can to thank our Saviour, and should
employ every invention to testify our grati-
tude. For if, as the Scripture relates, the
two Tobiases desired to give as a recompense
to the charitable traveling companion, whom
they as yet knew not, the half of all the goods
the young Tobias had brought back, and if,
after having learned from himself that he was
not a man, but one of the highest archangels,
they were so astonished and surprised that

By the Virtue of Charity. 447

trembling they fell to the ground on their
faces ; and if, even when reassured by the an-
gel, they remained prostrate for three hours,
blessing God and thanking him for such a
favor (Tob. xii. 15 and 22) ; what should not
our sentiments be, what posture should we
not assume to thank our Lord for the benefit
so greatly exceeding, for the favor so infinitely
surpassing the one he conferred upon Tobias,
with which he honors us in each Communion?

III.— THE PRACTICE.

It should be similiar to that of the preced-
ing virtues, Faith and Hope :

Yes, O my Lord and my God, I desire and
and I wish most ardently to love thee with
all my heart and all my strength, because thou
art worthy of being infinitely loved on account
of thy infinite perfections, and on account of
the innumerable benefits thou hast bestowed
upon me, thou dost daily bestow upon me, and
thou dost design to bestow upon me ; and es-
pecially on account of what thou dost do for
my salvation, and of what thou dost give me
in the Holy Eucharist.

I desire and resolve to love thee more than
all else that is lovable in the whole universe.

I declare that I will live and die in this love

44 3 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

which I owe thee, and which I am resolved to
give to thee.

And this even were none else to love thee.

And notwithstanding whatsoever may be-
fall me in consequence of it.

The love of our neighbor should follow and
flow from the love of God as from its true
source.

Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament teaches
it to us in the most excellent manner, and
obliges us to it most effectively, because by
testifying so much love toward our neighbor
and doing for him such wonderful things, he
undoubtedly renders him most worthy of be-
ing loved ; and because he has instituted this
sacrament under the species of bread and wine,
symbols of fraternal charity and union, inas-
much as the bread is made of several grains
of wheat, and the wine of several fruits of the
vine united together. We ought thus to be
united in charity. St. Paul says : "We being
many, are one bread, one body, all that par-
take of one bread." (i Cor. x. 17.) Partici-
pating in one same bread which is the Blessed
Sacrament, we ought all to form one bread
and one body although we are many.

As when two things are united to a third,

By the Virtue of Charity. 449

they are also united between themselves, ac-
cording to the maxim of philosophers, the
faithful being all united in heart and spirit to
our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament, must of
necessity be united among themselves.

Moreover, as all the consecrated hosts that
are in France, Italy, Spain, and elsewhere, are
very different in figure, taste, and the other
exterior accidents, but all nevertheless are one
same living and vivifying Bread, because the
same Jesus Christ is in all ; so while all the
faithful that communicate worthily may differ
in nation, condition, complexion, and other
natural qualities, they all agree in Jesus
Christ, whom they receive, and by whom
they are animated.

And neither more nor less than all the hosts
lose by the consecration their own substance
to receive one common to all, that is our
Lord ; so those wrho communicate as they
should, humble their own spirit, their own
will, and their individual sentiments, which
are the ordinary sources of discussions and
quarrels, to follow the will and judgment of
others, and adopt sentiments common and
uniform in the spirit of Jesus Christ.

This is something that cannot be done with-
out difficulty, because in order to do it, it is

450 Union zvitJi Our Lord ?cntil Advent,

necessary to break and bruise ourselves ; we
are just like the grains of wheat and the grapes,
which cannot be united to form one same bread
and one same wine without being previously
broken and crushed. And as, if there is rup-
ture and division of this bread and wine after
the consecration, it is only in the species, and
not in Jesus Christ, who always remains invi-
olable and indivisible in his integrity ; so, if
sometimes there is some difference and dis-
union among the faithful, it must not affect
charity nor penetrate to the heart, but be
only in exterior matters that constrain them.
In order to practice worthily and constantly
charity toward our neighbor, it is absolutely
necessary to establish well in our memories
the presence of God, to know how to make a
good use of everything, and to acquire a great
depth of humility, patience, and annihilation
of our own caprices.

IV.— MEDITATIONS.

As before, Father Saint-Jure recommends
that these be taken from the work, " The Il-
luminative Life of Jesus in the Desert."

V.— READINGS.
See Chapter III.

By the Virtue of Charity. 451

VI.— ASPIRATORY VERSES.

Charity toward God.

"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with

thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and

with thy whole mind. This is the greatest

and the first commandment." (Matt. xxii. 37,

38)

" With desire I have desired to eat this pasch
with you." (Ex. Luke xxii. 15.) I desire with
incredible ardor to eat this passover with you.

"Who will give us of his flesh that we may
be filled ?" (Job. xxxi. 31.) Ah ! who will
give me of that virginal and divine flesh, the
flesh of my Saviour, that I may be fed ?

" O Desire of the everlasting hills ! " (Gen.
xlix. 26.) O Desire of the eternal hills, Desire
of noble and sublime souls, and object of all
aspirations !

" Thou art the only desirable, the only de-
sired." (Cant. v. 16 juxto text, hebr.) Thou
art the only desirable, and the one to whom
all our affections should tend as to their
centre.

"My soul hath desired thee in the night;
yea, and with my spirit within me in the
morning early I will watch to thee." (Is.
xxvi. 9.) My soul hath earnestly desired thee

45 2 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

during the night ; and in the pain of thy ab-
sence, my spirit, from a holy impatience for
thy return, is agitated and moved within me ;
my eyes shall always be open and my heart
turned toward thee, until thou dost return.

Charity toward our Neighbor.

"A new commandment I give unto you:
That you love one another as I have loved
you." (Jno. xiii. 34.)

M This is my commandment : That you love
one another as I have loved you." (Jno. xv.
12.) I give you a new commandment which
is mine that I prefer to all the others : It is
that you should love one another as I have
loved you.

" By this shall all men know that you are
my disciples, if you have love one for another."
(Jno. xiii. 35.) By this mark they will know-
that you are my disciples.

" I pray that they all may be one, as thou,
Father, in me, and I in thee ; that they also
may be one in us. That they may be one, as
we also are one. I in them, and thou in me,
that they may be made perfect in one." (Jno.
xvii. 21, 22, 23.) I pray thee, Father, that all
those who believe in me may be united to us,
and among themselves, as we are united ; that

By the Virtue of Charity. 453

I may be in them by grace and love ; by na-
tural and adoptive fraternity founded upon my
incarnation ; by imitation and resemblance as
a master in his disciples ; by the mystical
union of the head with its members, which is
that of my Church with me ; and by a real and
intimate penetration as their food and their
life in the Sacrament of my Body and Blood.
As thou art in me by nature and by grace,
may they also contract with us and among
themselves, the holiest, the most divine, and
the most perfect union possible on earth.

" My little children, let us not love in word,
nor in tongue, but in deed, and in truth." (1.
Jno. iii. 18.) My children, let us not love God
nor our neighbor, with only words and tongue,
but let us love them effectually and truly.

VII.— CONCLUSION.

In conclusion of all that relates to the three
Theological Virtues, I desire to add a point of
great consequence concerning their practice
in order to still further encourage to it those
who shall read this book.

I suppose, in the first place, that a thing is
never perfect nor complete until it has reached
its first principle ; for, as it is from it that it
derives its being, it is also in it that it must

454 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

find the perfection of it ; from which follows
that, according as it approaches its first prin-
ciple it becomes perfect, and according- as it
departs from it, it becomes imperfect and
vicious. Thus we see that heat is always
diminished in proportion as it leaves the fire
and is increased according as it approaches it,
and in the fire it is perfected and consummated.
The same holds true of light with regard to
the sun ; and of man in respect to God, since
his union with God constitutes his excellency
and all his happiness, and on the contrary his
separation from God is the source of his faults
and his ruin. This is conformable to these
words of the Prophet-king: "Behold, they
that go far from thee shall perish ; it is good
for me to adhere to my God." (Ps. Ixxii. 27,

28.)

In the second place, I suppose that, accord-
ing to this truth, as God is our first principle
who has produced us, and as our understand-
ing is a participation in his understanding, our
memory in his memory, and our will in his
will, in order to procure for these faculties of
our soul the glory and perfection of which
they are capable, we must of necessity unite
them to God, we must unite our understand-

By the Virtue of Charity. 455

ing to his understanding", our memory to his
memory, and our will to his will.

This being granted, I say that this union
is effected by the three Theological Virtues ;
that our understanding is united to God's un-
derstanding by faith, our memory to his mem-
ory by hope, and our will to his will by
charity.

But I say further that, in order to bring
about this union, these faculties of our soul
must be prepared for it by the annihilation of
their natural modes of action, so that God
finding them void of their own acts, and con-
sequently fit for him and his operations, may
unite himself to them and render them perfect
and divine.

Now, the natural modes of action of these
three faculties are as follows : The under-
standing has naturally a great inclination for
knowledge which causes it to constantly seek
for something that it does not know ; and
Having found this, it regards it, considers and
studies it, reasons upon it, draws conclusions
and passes judgment, and makes experiments
of it; it desires to know things from the ex-
perience of the senses, is not willing to trust
to others, but would know for itself and by its
own light.

456 Union with Our Lord until Advent,

The memory preserves images of all the
things upon which we rely, which are our-
selves and creatures. For we naturally cher-
ish, if we do not watch ourselves very closely,
a certain secret confidence in ourselves, in our
mind, our knowledge, our industry, our riches,
and the other advantages we may possess.
We also trust much in our relatives, our
friends, in remedies for our diseases, and in
other creatures for all our wants.

Our will is naturally inclined to love itself
and us exceedingly, and to love nothing else
save for love of us.

All these modes of action are to these facul-
ties hindrances to their union wTith God, and
consequently must be utterly destroyed. This
is done perfectly by the three Theological
Virtues. Faith chases from the understanding
all natural methods of knowledge, and ban-
ishes from it even all the other means of
learning ; it extinguishes all its lights, and
produces in it a night of profound darkness
and a great void, which puts it in a state cap-
able of fully receiving God and fundamental
truth. God communicating himself to the
understanding thus denuded of its own know-
ledge, and uniting himself to it by faith, ele-
vates and ennobles it in an admirable manner,

By the Virtue of Charity. 457

and renders it perfect and divine in the highest
degree possible on earth. To speak truly, the
real effect of faith is to elevate the mind to
First Truth to receive its instructions, and to
believe is nothing else than to unite our under-
standing to God's by means of submission, ac-
quiescence, and respect.

Hope divests the soul of all reliance upon
itself and upon creatures, and produces in the
memory a forgetfulness of all created supports,
and by this means renders it capable of being
united to the omnipotence of God, and of re-
ceiving his assistance and strength.

Finally, charity deprives the will of all its
natural fashions of willing and loving, and
disposes it to union with God, who by this
union enables it to will as he wills, and im-
parts to it a portion of the love with which he
ioves himself and ail things.

When, therefore, you would practice faith,
you must raise your understanding above itself
and all its own modes of action, and must
renounce your knowledge, your experience,
and all other methods of learning, and in this
elevation and blindness must produce, first, in
general, the five acts of which we have spo-
ken in the chapter on Faith, and then refer
them to some particular truths, such as the

458 Union until Our Lord until Advent.

existence of God and your own nothingness,
his presence everywhere, his providence, or
others that you wTill find in the same place.

You must employ the same method to
practice hope and charity, rendering your
memory and your will, by separating them
from the obstacles and disinclinations they
have to union with God, fit for this union, and
consequently for their perfection, as we have
just explained ; and you must then make acts
of these two virtues according to the models
we have given in the chapters which treat of
them.

The End.

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