Volume III, Treatise I, Chapter VII

Some Remedies Against Timidity of Those Who Dare not Engage in the Employments of Charity Lest They Should Thereby Lose Their Own Soul

To cure ourselves entirely of the fear we may have of losing our own souls whilst we labour for the salvation of others, and to éncourage herein the most scrupulous and fearful persons, we must in the first place suppose one thing, which is very true. It is that, in what way soever God has been pleased to call and place us, our salvation is much more secure in that, than in all those we imagine to be more secure. Let obedience send us to preach in public places; or send us to the confessional, to confess the most wicked and impure wretches in the world; we shall hereby be in greater security, than if, to avoid these employments and the dangers they expose us to, we should of our own choice embrace retirement. For perhaps in the solitude of retreat we might give way to an hundred bad thoughts, whereas in the employments we exercise by obedience, God, who has placed us in them, takes care of us, “andcovers us with the buckler of his good will” (Psalms 5:18) Do not imagine, says St. Basil, that to become chaste, and to be delivered from temptations of impurity, nothing more is necessary than to live in solitude—solitude contributes nothing hereunto. St. Jerom himself confesses that in the desert, where he lived only upon herbs, and where he practised continual penance, his imagination often carried him into the midst of the dances of the Roman ladies, and that neither his fasts nor his austerities, nor his decline of life, were able to hinder his flesh from rebelling, or to deliver him from its rude combats. Abbot Elias, on the contrary, for forty years together, governed three hundred religious in one monastery, without ever being attacked with so much as one temptation against purity, and, as Palladius relates, without ever feeling his imagination troubled with the least bad thought. The flames did not so much as touch the clothes of the three Hebrews who were cast into the fiery furnace of Babylon, yet in an instant they destroyed those that cast them in and who seemed to be far enough from receiving any hurt. This shows that God can easily free from flames those that expose themselves to them for love of him.’ Nay more, he was not content to free the Hebrew children from the flames, but he caused that the furnace should even become a place of delights to them, where they employed themselves in blessing God and singing forth his praises. The same thing happens to those whom zeal for God’s glory and for the salvation of souls causes to enter into the burning furnace of the Babylon of the world. There they sing the praises of God in the midst of flames, and bless him for having called them to religion, whilst the same flames devour the people of the world; and the commerce with the world, which is the ruin of so many persons, serves only to give them a greater knowledge and a greater contempt of its vanity, and to give them a greater esteem of the advantages they enjoy in religion, ‘To them that love God, all things work together unto good”—Rom., viii, 28. All things succeed well in their ministry. It is the love of God and obedience that engage them therein, and oil and honey run out of the rock to feed them. In a word, when we have a heart touched with a lively desire of serving God,—when we are not called, to the exercise of our functions by ourselves, but are called unto them by God,—we must not lose courage, but, on the contrary, hope that God, who has called us thereunto, will render us useful and profitable for his glory and our own salvation.

But, omitting many other reasons which might persuade us to

c what we now speak of, I will only at present insist upon one that ought entirely to convince us, and to be a subject of confidence and consolation to us, either in our ministry for the salvation of souls, or in other offices belonging to the vocation of our society. It is “that the works of God are perfect” (Deuteronomy 32:4) He makes nothing useless: and as, in the order of nature, he never gives a natural cause the power of producing an effect but he likewise gives it the means to reduce to act the power that is given to it, without which this power would be absolutely vain and useless, in like manner, in the order of grace, which is more perfect than that of nature, he never calls any person to any state or for any end without giving him the means and necessary helps to attain it. This being so, it jis not to be doubted but that when God institutes a religious order for any end, he gives it at the same time such grace as is necessary for those who are called to this order to attain this end. This grace is called the grace of religion, which is common to all orders, that they may arrive to that state of perfection for which they were instituted. But there is a difference in the graces, according to the difference of the particular end for which each order was instituted, and according to the difference of the means which are proper to attain it. The one, for example, receives a particular grace to lead a holy life in solitude, in retirement, and in continual abstinence. Others receive _ another grace to celebrate the divine office, and so of the rest. But our society is a religious order, instituted in the Church by the authority of the pope for the help of souls; and God, who has particularly instituted it for this end, has given it also such means as are proper to attain it, which, as the bull of our institute says, are, to preach, to hear confessions, to teach, to give rules for spiritual exercises, to labour in reconciling enemies, and to visit prisons and hospitals; so that, as it is called by God for the help of souls, it is also called to those functions that regard their help or service; and this deserves to be well taken notice of, and ought to be a great subject of comfort to us, that’ the offices which we exercise towards our neighbour are no less of our institute than the end for which we perform them. In effect, it belongs to our institute to preach, to hear confessions, to teach both divine and human sciences; and not only these kinds of spiritual employments are of our institute, but also all corporal works of charity, viz., to visit prisons and hospitals, and the like, as the bull of our establishment testifies.

But to come now fo the conclusion: it follows from all that I have said, that our society receives a particular grace from God tovattain the end for which it was instituted, which is the help of souls, and to attain it by such means as are proper to our vocation, and which he himself has given us for this effect, and this is that grace which it has pleased God particularly to grant to the society. We ought, then, have a great confidence in God in all those offices of charity which we perform for the help of souls, and assure ourselves that he will particularly concur with us to render them efficacious, as by his infinite mercy we daily experience. For to what, think you, ought we to attribute the

-fruit that a preacher of the society produces, who oftentimes, though he comes fresh from his studies, even fills a whole town with the spirit of true conversion and penance, and causes such reconciliations as no one before was able to compass; who abolishes such public scandals as neither the magistrates nor ecclesiastical superiors were ever able to correct before? Does this proceed from his learning, from his eloquence, from his abilities? Not at all; it comes from the particular grace of the vocation of-the society, which was ‘instituted for this effect, and which God for this reason, out of a particular love, favours with his grace in all the means he has given to compass this end. In proof of this, do we not at other times perceive that some preachers who preached with a great. deal of reputation and fruit whilst they © were in our society, and who believed they should have the same success when they were out of it, yet had none at all as soon as they quitted it? This shows it was the grace of the vocation of our society that gave them wings to raise themselves as they did, and that, being by their desertion deprived of them, they necessarily fell. We read, in the. first chapter of Machabees what is very much to our purpose. Some of the chief men among the Jews, speaking of the wonders the Machabées had wrought, and of the great victories they had obtained against the gentiles, wished to establish a reputation for themselves, saying, “Let us also make ourselves a name”—I. Mach., v.57. For this effect they gathered all their troops together, and went against the enemy, but the success answered not their hopes, for their enemies came upon them, defeated them, and killed above two thousand. And hereupon the Scripture takes notice, “that they were not of the race of those men who had been chosen by God — to save the people of Israel”—I. Mach., v. 62. Now the reason ~ of their defeat was that they presumed too much upon them-

- selves, and that they called themselves to a thing to which God had not called them.. _ Hence, then, none of us ought to attribute to ourselves the glory of the fruit which God produces by our means. It is to God to whom we must entirely render it; it is to the choice that he has been pleased to make of us, ‘to be ministers of the spirit of the New Testament”—lII. Cor., iii. 6; it is to the religion to which he has been pleased to call us. These particular graces which he gives you to gain souls to him, and to work your own salvation by labouring for theirs, he gives you, because you are a member of a religion which ‘he has instituted for this end. This is what we ought to imprint deeply in our mind, because, as it serves, on the one hand, to repress our vanity, so it serves on the other to give us confidence and courage. St. Bernard upon these words of the spouse, ‘“come, arise, make haste, my beloved, my dove, my fair one, come”’— (Canticle of Canticles 2:10): the bridegroom, says he, desiring to have his spouse quit the sweet sleep of contemplation to go to the employments of charity, says not to her, go, but he says, come; and this ought extremely to encourage us, because he makes us hereby to understand that the command he gives us does not separate us farfrom — him, but on the contrary causes us to approach nearer to him, and that it is a means to draw us nearer to himself. It is not, therefore, to separate us from himself, that he employs us in works of charity; it is only to unite us the more to himself. It is by this path we go to him; he guides us in it himself, and always accompanies us. We have no reason to fear anything in order to ourselves; but, on the contrary, we have reason to fill. ourselves with confidence and courage, and to hope by these means that we shall make great progress in our salvation. For this end, let us imagine that God says the same words to us, that Absalom said to his servants: “‘ Fear nothing, it is I that command you, take courage and be men of resolution”—II. Kings, xiii. 28. For, in effect, what subject of apprehension can I have, if thou, — O Lord, commandest me to apply myself to the help of my neighbour, and if thou engagest me hereby to a commerce with the people of the world? How dangerous soever it may be, I am there in greater security, if I be there by thy order, than if, by my own choice, I were shut up between four walls; “and when I shall walk in the midst of the shades of night, I will fear nothing,

because thou art with me” (Psalms 22:4)

By this, we may see how much some religious deceive themselves, who, hearkening only to their own sentiments, are disgusted with their employment, and imagine if they had been given any other, or had been sent to any other house, they should have laboured there more profitably for their own salvation and for the service of God. It is a great abuse to think we should work out our own salvation better in those employments we - choose ourselves, than in those in which the hand of God has placed us; and would to God that experience had not too clearly let us know how dangerous this illusion is. We have seen several religious who were uneasy in the employments that God and: obedience had given them, and who sought others with a great deal of earnestness, imagining they could produce in them more fruit for themselves and for their neighbour, and who at length found means to induce their superiors to accord what they desired; but we have also seen them so unhappy from the change, that they themselves were convinced it was a just punishment from God. Wherefore we ought to take very great care not to desire anything of ourselves, nor to hearken to our own inclination in the choice either of place or employments in which we are to be put. All that we have to do herein is, entirely to renounce our own will, and to abandon ourselves to that of God, and to permit ourselves to be led to him by the way of obedience. For, without doubt, we shall never anywhere be in greater security of our salvation, than where God has been pleased to put us.

About ReligiousBookshelf.com · A Supernerd Media project