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There are certain inspirations which tend only to an
extraordinary perfection of the ordinary exercises of
the Christian life.
Charity towards the sick poor is an ordinary
exercise of true Christians; but an ordinary exercise
which was practised by S. Francis and S. Catharine
with an extraordinary perfection, when they licked
and sucked the ulcers of the leprous and the
cancerous; and by the glorious S. Louis, when
bare-head and upon his knees he served the sick; - at
which a Cistercian abbot was lost in admiration,
seeing him in this posture handle and dress the
horrible and cancerous sores of a poor wretch.
And it was also a very extraordinary exercise of
this holy monarch to serve the most abject and vile
of the poor at his table, and to eat their leavings.
S. Jerome entertaining in his hospital at Bethlehem
the pilgrims of Europe who fled from the persecution
of the Goths, did not only wash their feet, but
descended even so low as to wash and rub the legs of
their camels, imitating Rebecca whom we just
mentioned, who not only drew water for Eliezer, but
for his camels also.
S. Francis was not only extreme in the practice of
poverty, as is known to all, but was equally so in
the practice of simplicity. He redeemed a lamb which
he feared was going to be slaughtered, because it
represented our Saviour. He showed respect to almost
all creatures, contemplating in them their Creator,
by an unusual yet most wise simplicity. Sometimes he
would busy himself with removing worms from the road,
lest passers by should trample them under their feet,
remembering that our Saviour had compared himself to
the worm. He called creatures his brothers and
sisters, by a certain admirable consideration which
love suggested unto him.
S. Alexius, a gentle man of very noble descent,
practised in an excellent manner the abjection of
himself, living unknown for the space of seventeen
years in his father's house at Rome as a poor
pilgrim.
All these inspirations were for ordinary
exercises, practised, however, with extraordinary
perfection. Now, in this kind of inspiration we are
to observe the rules which we gave for desires in our
Introduction.(1) We must not strive to practise many
exercises at once, and upon a sudden, for the enemy
often tries to make us undertake and begin many
designs, to the end that overwhelmed with the
multiplicity of business we may accomplish nothing,
but leave all unfinished: yea, sometimes he suggests
the desire of undertaking some excellent work which
he foresees we shall not accomplish, in order to turn
us from prosecuting a work less excellent which we
should have performed; for he cares not how many
purposes, plans and beginnings be made, so long as
nothing is done.
He will not hinder the bringing forth of male
children, any more than Pharao did, provided that
before they grow they are slain. On the contrary,
says the great S. Jerome, amongst Christians it is
not so much the beginning as the end that is
regarded. We must not swallow so much food as to be
unable to digest what we take. The deceiving spirit
makes us stay in beginnings, and content ourselves
with the flowery spring-time, but the Divine Spirit
makes us regard beginnings only in order to attain
the end, and only makes us rejoice in the flowers of
spring in the expectation of enjoying the ripe fruits
of summer and autumn.
The great S. Thomas is of opinion that it is not
expedient to consult and deliberate much concerning
an inclination to enter a good and well-regulated
religious Order; for the religious life being
counselled by our Saviour in the Gospel, what need is
there of many consultations?
It is sufficient to make one good one, with a few
persons who are thoroughly prudent and capable in
such an affair, and who can assist us to make a
speedy and solid resolution; but as soon as we have
once deliberated and resolved, whether in this matter
or in any other that appertains to God's service, we
must be constant and immovable, not permitting
ourselves to be shaken by any appearances of a
greater good: for very often, says the glorious S.
Bernard, the devil deludes us, and to draw us from
the effecting of one good he proposes unto us some
other good, that seems better; and after we have
started this, he, in order to divert us from
effecting it, presents a third, ready to let us make
plenty of beginnings if only we do not make an end.
We should not even go from one Order to another
without very weighty motives, says S. Thomas,
following the Abbot Nestorius cited by Cassian.
I borrow from the great S. Anselm (writing to
Lanzo) a beautiful similitude. As a plant often
transplanted can never take root, nor, consequently,
come to perfection and return the expected fruit; so
the soul that transplants her heart from design to
design cannot do well, nor come to the true growth of
her perfection, since perfection does not consist in
beginnings but in accomplishments. The sacred living
creatures of Ezechiel went whither the impulse of the
spirit was to go, and they turned not when they went,
and every one of them went straight forward:(2) we
are to go whither the inspiration moves us, not
turning about, nor returning back, but tending
thither, whither God has turned our face, without
changing our gaze. He that is in a good way, let him
step out and get on.
It happens sometimes that we forsake the good to
seek the better, and that having forsaken the one we
find not the other: better is the possession of a
small treasure found, than the expectation of a
greater which is to find. The inspiration which moves
us to quit a real good which we enjoy in order to
gain a better in the future, is to be suspected.
A young Portuguese, called Francis Bassus, was
admirable, not only in divine eloquence but also in
the practice of virtue, under the discipline of the
Blessed (S.) Philip Neri in the Congregation of the
Oratory at Rome. Now he persuaded himself that he was
inspired to leave this holy society, to place himself
in an Order, strictly so called, and at last he
resolved to do so. But the B. Philip, assisting at
his reception into the Order of S. Dominic, wept
bitterly; whereupon being asked by Francis Marie
Tauruse, afterwards Archbishop of Siena and Cardinal,
why he shed tears: I deplore, said he, the loss of so
many virtues. And in fact this young man, who was so
excellently good and devout in the Congregation,
after he became a religious was so inconstant and
fickle, that agitated with various desires of
novelties and changes, he gave afterwards great and
grievous scandal.
If the fowler go straight to the partridge's nest,
she will show herself, and counterfeit weakness and
lameness, and, raising herself up as though she would
take a great flight, will immediately tumble down, as
if she were able to do no more, in order that the
fowler being busied in looking after her, and
expecting easily to take her, may not light on her
little ones in the nest; but when he has pursued her
a while, and fancies he has her, she rises into the
air and escapes.
So our enemy, seeing a man by God's inspiration
undertake a profession and manner of life fitted for
his advancement in heavenly love, persuades him to
enter into some other way, more perfect in
appearance; but having put him out of his first way,
he makes him by little and little apprehend the
second way impossible, proposing a third; that so
keeping him occupied in the continual inquiry for
various and new means of perfecting himself, he may
hinder him from making use of any, and consequently
from attaining the end he seeks, which is perfection.
Young hounds leave the pack at every new scent,
and make after the fresh quarry; the old and
wellscented hounds never change, but keep the scent
they are on. Let every one then, having once found
out God's holy will touching his vocation, keep to it
holily and lovingly, practising therein its proper
exercises, according to the order of discretion and
with the zeal of perfection.
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