Volume I, Treatise VIII, Chapter XXIII

That a View of Our Sins, and a True Repentance, Help Us to Support with All Resignation Both General and Particular Ajjlictions Sent Us Srom God

Wirds all holy men it is a general opinion, wherein they are confirmed by several passages of holy Scripture, that ordinarily speaking, public calamities are sent from God in punishment of our sins. ‘ It is upon account of our sins,” said Azarias, in the flaming furnace, “that you have heaped all these afflictions upon us. For we have sinned, we have done ill, we have separated ourselves from you, we have erred in all points. We have neither heard nor obeyed your commands; nor have we performed what you enjoined us for our happiness. Wherefore we have justly deserved all the miseries you have sent us; and in general, whatever you have done against us, you have done with all justice.” (Daniel 3:28) We see by this, that God chastises his people, and delivers them into the hands of their enemies, because they offend him. We read also in several places, that he freed them when they repented and were sincerely converted. Hence Achoir, general of the Ammonites, having told Holofernes, that God took the children of Israel under his protection, but that he chastised them if they performed not their duty; added, that before he attacked them he should send to know, if at present they had offended God in anything; and in case they had, tuat then he might easily gain the victory over them. But if they had not any way offended God, he should desist from his enterprise, lest it would turn to his disgrace and shame; since God, whom no one can oppose, would infallibly fight in the cause of his people. When our Saviour cured the paralytic who had been sick twenty-eight years: ‘ See,” says he, “you are now cured: sin no more lest a worse thing befall you” (John 5:14): and the holy doctors observe that these words of our Saviour convey this truth most fully. According, then, to this doctrine, one of the means which may enable us to conform ourselves to God’s will in all our adversities, as well general as particular, and to bear them with patience, is presently to enter into ourselves, by a reflection upon our sins, and to think how justly we merit the punishment sent us from God. For thus, whatever misfortune shall befall us, we shall bear it patiently, and shall consider the punishment to be less than it ought to be.

St. Bernard and St. Gregory treat of this matter exceedingly well. ‘ Whosoever has a lively feeling and sense of his faults in the interior,” says’ St. Bernard, “will feel little or no pain in the exterior.” Hence David was not so moved at the curses given him by his subjects, when he saw his own son up in arms against him. ‘ My son,” says he, “who received his being from me, seeks to take my life away: with how much more reason may the son of Jemini revile and curse me?” (2 Kings 16:11) St. Gregory, writing upon these words of Job—‘ that you may know you have received a less punishment from him than your sins have deserved,” makes use of a comparison which clearly explains this doctrine. As, says he, in wounds and impostumes, the greater and more dangerous the sore is, the more patiently we endure the lancet and searing-iron; so as soon as we have a lively feeling of the wound caused in us by sin, we easily and willingly admit of the lancing and searing of mortification, of sufferings, and of humiliations sent by God, to enable us to bear this wound, and cure it effectually. For the pain of our chastisement is less felt when we come to acknowledge our past fault, says the same saint. But if you bear not patiently the afflictjons and evils that befall you, it is a sign you see not the danger of the wound given you by sin; and so, not knowing that an abscess is forming within you, you are not able to bear the requisite operations.

Holy men, and true servants of God, not only receive their. pains and afflictions with willingness, but even desire and beg them earnestly at the hands of God. ‘I wish I may obtain my petition,” says Job, “that he who began would crush me; that he would extend his hand and cut me off; and this be my comfort not to be spared in the sufferings wherewith he afflicts me!” (Job 8) The Royal Prophet had similar sentiments when he said; “Try me, O Lord, and tempt me.” (Psalms 25:2) “For I am prepared to receive all sorts of corrections.” (Psalms 37:18) ‘It is well for me that thou hast humbled me.” (Psalms 118:71) The true servants of God beg ardently, says St. Gregory, of God to chastise and humble them; and they are even afflicted when they consider their faults and defects, and see they are not punished by God. For then they fear that he will reserve them for a more severe correction in the other world; and it is to this end Job adds; “And that I may have the comfort not to be spared in the sufferings, wherewith he afflicts me.” Which is as if he said; there are some whom God spares in this world, to punish them afterwards more severely in the next; but let him not spare me in this manner, that he may spare me for eternity—I desire he would correct me now like a charitable father, that he may not chastise me hereafter like a rigorous judge—I shall not murmur, nor shall I even complain, ‘‘ nor will I oppose myself in the least to his holy decrees” (Job 6:10); but on the contrary, I shall find a subject of comfort in my sufferings. This was St. Austin’s sentiment also, when he cried out, “Burn me, O Lord, cut me, and spare me notin anything belonging to this life, that you may spare me for eternity.” (Aug.),

It is an effect of our stupidity to be so little sensible to the evils of our souls, and be so solicitous as to those of our body. For we ought to be more touched at our sins, than at any other thing whatsoever; and did we but rightly conceive the enormity of our sins, we should look upon the most rigid punishment that could be inflicted as too little, and should say with Job: ‘I have sinned, I have indeed offended; and have not as yet received the punishment my crimes have deserved.” (Job 33:27) We ought to have these words always in our hearts and mouths; for all we can suffer in this world is nothing in comparison of what one mortal sin deserves. ‘ And so you will come to see you have not received less punishment of him, than your crimes deserved.” Whoever serieusly reflects that he has offended God, and that consequently he merits eternal damnation; what affronts, what injuries, what contumelies would he not suffer joyfully in expiation of all the faults committed against the divine majesty? “Permit him,’ said David, to those who would have punished Semei for cursing him, “perhaps our Lord will regard my affliction, and our Lord will render me good for the present curses.” (2 Kings 16:12) Perhaps after his indignation he may be appeased, he may pardon my offences and have compassion on me; and so I shall be happy in being thus affronted. It is with the same disposition we are to embrace whatsoever injuries and affronts are offered to us. Let us beill-treated; what matter! perhaps God, in consideration of our patience, will receive our sufferings as a deduction of those pains due to our sins; and what we esteem as evil, may prove one of the greatest advantages that can be conferred on us. If, instead of wasting our time on complaints and resentments, we spent it in entering into ourselves, we should please God the more, and should feel greater comfort in our afflictions.

The saints made use of this means so frequently on similar occasions, and this practice was so familiar to them, that as we read of some of them, they ascribed all the persecutions and calamities which befell the Church to their own sins; and judging their offences merited a still greater punishment, they cried out—-It is my sins which ate the cause of so many wars; they are my sins which are the cause of so many plagues and other calamities sent from God. What may contribute much to confirm any one in these sentiments is, that in reality God punishes oftentimes his people for the sins of one single person: as we see he did for the sin of David, when he sent upon the Israelites a violent plague, of which died threescore and ten thousand persons in the space of three days. It may be answered, David was king, and God frequently punishes the faults of the prince in the people. But what will be said to the example of Achan, who was only a private man? And yet because he, contrary to orders,. conveyed away secretly some part of the booty taken at Jericho, God revenged this transgression upon all the people, by permitting three thousand of the bravest men in the whole army to fly most shamefully from the enemy, and not to escape without having experienced great loss. It is not then for the sins of commanders only, but also for those of every particular person, that God sometimes extends his punishment upon a whole multitude. It is in this sense the saints explain what is so often repeated in holy Scripture, that “God punished the sins of the parents upon their children to the third and fourth generation.” (Exodus 34:7) For masmuch as appertains to the sin alone, it assures us the sin of the father shall not be imputed to the son, nor the sin of the son be imputed to the father; “He who shall have sinned shall die; the son shall not bear the iniquity of his father, and the father shall not bear the iniquity of his son.”

(Ezechiel 18:29) But as to the pain, God acts in a different manner—he oftentimes chastises one person for another; and so, perhaps for your sins and for mine, God will chastise a whole community, and perhaps the whole society.

Let us have always before our eyes, on the one hand, this consideration, and on the other the will of God; and so we shall conform ourselves with these to all the afflictions it shall please him to send us. ‘“He is the master and Lord, who can

do what seems to him best. As it pleases him in heaven, so let it be done.” (1 Machabees 3:60) “I held my peace; and did not so much as open my mouth; becauseé it was you, O Lord, who - caused whatever I suffer.” (Psalms 38:10) This is what we ought to say—this is what ought to be our comfort in the most difficult occurrences. God wills it; God ordains it; God has caused it; God has sent it; we must receive all things as coming from his hands; nor do we want any other motive to make us bear all things with patience and joy. The holy doctors, explaining these words of the Psalmist: “And my beloved is to me as the young unicorn” (Psalms 28:6); take notice that God compares himself to the unicorn, because this animal having its horn lower than its eyes, sees better how to aim its stroke, whereas the bull having his above the eyes, pushes at random. Moreover, the unicorn cures with the same horn wherewith he gave the wound. And so in the same manner God strikes not but with the same weapons which serve for our cure.

In fine, this conformity and this humble submission to our punishment is so grateful to God, that sometimes it is a means to appease him, and to hinder him from inflicting chastisement. It is related in ecclesiastical history, that Attila, King of the Huns, who overran and destroyed so many provinces, and made himself be called the “the terror of the world, and scourge of God” (Nauclerus, 2 vol.), approaching the city of Troyes, in Champaigne, St. Lupus, who was then bishop of the place, went forth to meet him in his pontifical habit, accompanied by all the clergy; and being come up to him, Who are you, said he, who waste and ruin the whole earth? Attila answered, “I am the scourge of God.” The holy bishop having replied: ‘“The scourge of God is welcome,” commanded the gates of the city to be opened to him. But as the soldiers entered the city, God blinded them so, that they passed through without doing the least injury. For although Attila were indeed the scourge of God, yet, notwithstanding, God employed him not as such against those who with so much submission received him as his scourge.

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