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The soul is often grieved and troubled in the body,
even so far as to desert many of its members, which
remain deprived of motion and feeling, while it never
forsakes the heart, wherein it fully remains till the
very end of life.
So charity is sometimes weakened and depressed in
the affections till it seems to be scarcely in
exercise at all, and yet it remains entire in the
supreme region of the soul. This happens when, under
the multitude of venial sins as under ashes, the fire
of holy love remains covered, and its flame
smothered, though it is not dead or extinguished.
For as the presence of the diamond hinders the
exercise and action of that property which the
adamant has of drawing iron, and yet does not take it
away, as it acts immediately this obstacle is
removed, so the presence of venial sins in no sort
deprives charity of its force and power to work, yet
as it were benumbs it and deprives it of the use of
its activity, so that charity remains without action,
sterile and unfruitful.
It is true that neither venial sin nor even the
affection to it, is contrary to the essential
resolution of charity, which is to prefer God before
all things; because by this sin we love something
outside reason but not against reason, we defer a
little too much, and more than is fit, to creatures,
yet we do not prefer them before the Creator, we
occupy ourselves more than we ought in earthly
things, yet do we not for all that forsake heavenly
things.
In fine, this kind of sin impedes us in the way of
charity, but does not put us out of it, and therefore
venial sin, not being contrary to charity, never
destroys charity either wholly or partially.
God signified to the Bishop of Ephesus that he had
forsaken his first charity,(1) where he does not say
that he was without charity, but only that it was not
such as in the beginning; that is, that it was not
now prompt, fervent, growing in love, or fruitful: as
we are wont to say of him who from being bright,
cheerful and blithe, becomes sad, heavy and sullen,
that he is not now the same man he was; for our
meaning is not that he is not the same in substance,
but only in his actions and exercises.
And thus Our Saviour says that in the latter days
the charity of many shall grow cold,(2) that is, it
shall not be so active and courageous, by reason of
fear and sadness which shall oppress men's hearts.
Certain it is that when concupiscence hath conceived
it bringeth forth sin.(3) The sin however, though sin
indeed, does not always beget the death of the soul,
but then only when it is complete in malice, and when
it is consummate and accomplished, as S. James says.
And he here establishes so clearly the difference
between mortal and venial sin, that it is strange
that some in our age have had the temerity to deny
it.
However, venial sin is sin, and consequently troubles
charity, not as a thing that is contrary to charity
itself, but contrary to its operations and progress,
and even to its intention. For as this intention is
that we should direct all our actions to God, it is
violated by venial sin, which directs the actions by
which we commit it; not indeed against God yet
outside God and his will. And as we say of a tree
rudely visited and stripped by a tempest that nothing
is left, because though the tree be entire yet it is
left without fruit, so when our charity is shaken by
the affection we have to venial sin, we say it is
diminished and weakened; not because the habit of
love is not entire in our hearts, but because it is
without the works which are its fruits.
The affection to great sins did so make truth
prisoner to injustice amongst the pagan philosophers,
that, as the great Apostle says: Knowing God they
honoured him not according to that knowledge;(4) so
that though this affection did not banish natural
light, yet it made it profitless. So the affection to
venial sin does not abolish charity, but it holds it
as a slave, tied hand and foot, hindering its freedom
and action. This affection, attaching us too closely
to the enjoyment of creatures, deprives us of the
spiritual intimacy between God and us, to which
charity, as true friendship, excites us; consequently
this affection makes us lose the interior helps and
assistances which are as it were the vital and
animating spirits of the soul, in default of which
there follows a certain spiritual palsy, which in the
end, if it be not remedied, brings us to death.
For, after all, charity being an active quality
cannot be long without either acting or dying: it is,
say our Ancients, of the nature of Rachel, who also
represented it. Give me, said she to her husband,
children, otherwise I shall die;(5) and charity urges
the heart which she has espoused to make her fertile
of good works; otherwise she will perish.
We are rarely in this mortal life without many
temptations. Now low and slothful hearts, and such as
are given to exterior pleasures, not being accustomed
to fight nor exercised in spiritual warfare, never
preserve charity long, but let themselves ordinarily
be surprised by mortal sin, which happens the more
easily because the soul is more disposed by venial
sin to mortal. For as that man of old, having
continued to carry every day the same calf, bore him
also when he was grown to be a great ox, custom
having by little and little made insensible the
increase of so heavy a burden; so he that accustoms
himself to play for pence will in the end play for
crowns, pistoles and horses, and after his stud all
his estate.(6) He that gives the reins to little
angers becomes in the end furious and unbearable; he
that addicts himself to lying in jest, is in great
peril of lying with calumny.
In fine, Theotimus, we are wont to say that such
as have a very weakly constitution have no life, that
they have not an ounce, or not a handful of it,
because that which is quickly to have an end seems
indeed already not to be. And those good-for-nothing
souls who are addicted to pleasure and set upon
transitory things, may well say that they no longer
have charity, for if they have it they are in the way
soon to lose it.
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