Volume III, Treatise I, Chapter XIV

Another Means of Succeeding in Our Ministry Is, to Regard Only What Belongs to the Soul, Without Letting Ourselves be Influenced by Outward Appearances.;

OnE of the chief instructions which the saints and masters of a spiritual life give to those who are employed in the salvation of their neighbour, is, to attend only to the soul. There are some, says’ St. Bernard, who attend to the exterior advantages either of nature or of fortune, and who wish to be concerned only with such as possess these. But the truly clear-sighted look to the interior alone, which is not more beautiful in a handsome than in an ugly person, except when he is more holy, but which is exceedingly beautiful in both when they are not defiled with sin, and which, in fine, is more or less beautiful, the more or less it is exempt and free from sin, or the more or less it is enriched with — graces and virtues. The visible beauty of the body is to be esteemed as nothing, if it be not joined with the invisible beauty of the soul. The one is common to us with beasts and inanimate things, but the other belongs peculiarly to the angels and ourselves. Now, as St. Bernard says, it is to the interior alone we are to direct our attention; it is to that soul which God has created after his own image; it is this we are to consider as the living temple of. the Holy Ghost, as a member of Jesus Christ, as all bathed in the blood of the Son of God, and as redeemed by his death; and if we perceive that sin has deformed it, and that the infinite price which it has cost our Saviour is lost, we ought to be sensibly afflicted, and conceive a lively sorrow for it. As to what regards the body, we ought, on the contrary, to withdraw our eyes from it as much as we can, and make no more account of it than of a sack of dirt, than of a dunghill covered with snow, or of a painted sepulchre, because in effect it is”

nothing else. ‘He who labours for the salvation of souls”, as ’ Gerson says, “ought not to attend to the difference of face; no, nor even to the difference of sex”. He is to have eyes, not to see the beauty or deformity of his penitents, or even to discover whether they are men or women, but purely to see their soul and their interior necessities. He is to abstract from all things else, to feel no concern about them, for in souls there are no differences of this kind.

This advertisement is of very great importance, first, because when we shall act in this manner, our love for our neighbour will be truly the love of charity, it will be entirely founded in God, and will have no other motive or end but God himself, and so we shall be secure from the dangerous illusions of carnal love; secondly, because those who are employed in the functions of charity may learn hereby to acquit themselves of them as they ought, exercising them as willingly no less towards one than towards another, and as well towards the poor as towards the rich, because the soul of one that is poor and in want of all things, costs God no less than the soul of the richest and the most powerful person in the world. St. Ambrose alleges on our subject the example of our Saviour, who refused to enter into the house of a great prince that came to beg of him to go there to cure his son, for fear, says this father, that in the person of the son of a great prince he might seem to have any respect or deference for riches; but he went to the house of the centurion to heal his servant that was sick, though the centurion came not himself to ask it, but only sent one to him to beg his cure, because he would not have them believe he neglected to go thither by reason the sick person was a man of mean rank, and because he would teach us at the same time that in the offices of charity we ought to look to souls only, and not to the quality or condition of persons. Our eyes and our hearts ought to be so fixed on souls, that we be as willing to. take care of the salvation of a peasant as of @ prince, because, as the apostle says, “the servant and the master, the slave and he who is free, are all equal in God’s sight” (Galatians 2:28)

But if the love-of our neighbour be truly such as it ought to © be, we shall rather choose to exercise our functions of charity towards the poor than towards the rich, and towards the people of mean extraction than to persons of rank and quality, and this for divers reasons: first, to follow the example Jesus Christ has given us; and secondly, because the poor do better represent the person of our Saviour, “who, being infinitely rich, would become poor for love of us, that we might become rich by his poverty” —. II. Cor., viii. 9. Thirdly, because we are hereby more assured that it is God alone whom we seek in our functions, and that it is purely for him we labour. For when our functions call us to the great ones of the world, we often act from human respect,— we seek ourselves, and act for our own satisfaction and reputation in the world; in fine, there is no traffic or commerce that is so pure and free from dust and straw, as that which we have with poor and simple people; for many times what appears to us to be zeal, is nothing else than vanity and self-love. Fourthly, because by this means it will be more easy to keep ourselves in humility;. and lastly, because experience teaches us that ordinarily more fruit is produced in the souls of the poor than in those of the rich. Do we not see likewise that the poor are those who are more solicitous to follow Jesus Christ, and who make greater profit by his doctrine? And has not he himself’ told us “that the gospel is announced to the poor’?—Mat., xi. 5. With respect to the rich, he has so few followers among them, that the holy text, speaking of one of the chief amongst the Jews who embraced his doctrine, takes notice that, not daring openly to declare himself, “he came to Jesus by night” (John 3:2) Moreover, we declare the truth boldly to the poor, we reprehend them boldly, and they receive in good part whatsoever is said to them; and, in fine, it is easy for a confessor to manage them. But it is not so with the rich and great persons of the world—we are often puzzled with them; for a confessor dares not take all the liberty he ought, and is afraid to tell them what he thinks, and afterwards he is troubled with scruples and remorses for neglecting to speak his mind freely, and for showing too much condescension to them. Besides, as we must accommodate our-.selves to them, we necessarily lose a great deal of time with them, without producing much, or perhaps any, fruit. Whereas with the poor we advance far in a short time, because with them we may presently come to the matter and to the most essential points. Hence those that are truly disabused of the world, and who wish to make great progress in virtue and to produce abundant fruit.in souls, avoid as much as they can meddling with great persons, and look upon them as a burden too heavy for them, according to the words of the wise man: “He shall take upon him a burden who treats with one more honourable than himself” (Ecclesiasticus 13:2) Do we not also perceive that those amongst us who apply themselves to hear the confessions of servants and poor people, are very much esteemed for it, and with a great deal of reason? For you may be assured that the rich will never want confessors; and if you should judge that there is some one rich man, to take care of whom would be a very important service to God, believe, if you are humble, that another will do it better than yourself, and with less danger to his own conscience. In the mean time take care of this poor man that has several times presented himself to confess to you, and has been obliged to return without confession.

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