Volume III, Treatise V, Chapter XVII

An Objection Answered

THE care we think ourselves bound to take of our health being the most ordinary and the most just ground for claiming exemptions, it is plain that by answering this objection, we will answer the principal one which can be made to the preceding doctrine. We shall begin then by stating the doctrine of divines on this subject. It is universally asserted by them, and it is obvious to every one, that for a man to kill himself, or deliberately to drink. poison to procure his death, being a great sin, is quite a different thing from his not taking pains to preserve health and prolong life; for not to take these pains is permitted. A man is not bound to use the most nourishing food and that which agrees best with his constitution, however assured he may be to improve his health and prolong his life thereby; nor is he bound to live in those places where the purest air is, with an equal assurance of better health and longer life. To hold the contrary opinion.would be to condemn holy fast, abstinence, and all other austerities practised in the Church. Moreover, holy and learned men justly blame and disapprove in most persons, and particularly in religious, too great a solicitude for health. Nor is any one obliged in time of sickness to have recourse to the most able physicians, or to be at the expense of procuring extraordinary remedies to preserve life; on the contrary, all this is censurable in a religious who makes profession of poverty and humility. It is sufficient that, amid common and easily obtained remedies, we select the most proper; nor does God exact more, because life and health are only temporal and perishable blessings, and scarce deserve to be taken notice of when compared with the life and welfare of the soul. But it is 20 B not only lawful to abstain from extraordinary and costly remedies, but even to retrench something of the common practice. Hence it is that the servants of God frequently make this retrenchment in their eating, drinking, sleeping, and in everything which regards the body, though they know it may prejudice their health and shorten their days; and we are so far from blaming this their practice as unlawful, that we look upon it as a great perfection and an effect of sanctity in them. Again, as it is lawful to expose our own life to save our neighbours, or procure their salvation, as those really do who serve in time of the plague, so it is equally lawful to endanger our life and health by mortification in order to work out our own salvation. If, to enable ourselves to live comfortably and honourably, it is permitted us to cross the seas, and to make journeys into foreign countries, to the prejudice of our health and even at the risk of our lives, how much more ought we to think it not only lawful, but good and holy, to neglect our health and hazard our life that we may secure our salvation, by keeping our flesh subject to the spirit, by pro-venting its rebellion, and not suffering it to destroy the soul? This is what we call a penitential life; and if this practice be once abandoned we may bid adieu to most of the penances now jn use in holy Church. Divines put the question, whether a servant of God who has a great pain, for example in his liver or stomach, or who has any other disease, can in conscience, as long as there is no danger of death, abstain from the use of all remedies in order to suffer his pains for the love of Christ. And they answer that without doubt he can, being warranted by the authority and example of St. Agatha. This holy virgin and martyr having her breasts cut off by command of the tyrant, and St. Peter appearing to her in the prison in the shape of a venerable old man, and proposing to cure her wounds, she refused, saying, “that she had never made use of any corporal remedies in all her life”. They quote also the example of several other great servants of God, who, to mortify their flesh, to subject it entirely to the spirit, and in some sort to suffer with Christ and share in his dolours, have endured long and painful sickness without applying any remedy, and who by this means made great progress in virtue. To prove still more clearly that we are not to set so high value on health or life, and that we are not obliged to take so much care of both as some imagine, divines put the following case: Let it be supposed that a man

- will certainly die unless one of his legs or arms be cut off. It is asked, is this person obliged to suffer this painful operation? They answer in the negative; and in support of this decision they quote the answer of Marius, who having suffered several incisions, commanded the surgeons to give over, “for he would not buy his cure at so dear a rate”. » They hold likewise that we have no obligation to make use of remedies to prolong life, though we know our days will be shortened by not using them: for instance, should the physicians advise you to purge once a month, or prescribe you some other painful remedy or disgusting potion, you might abstain from taking them, though you were assured that thereby you would hasten your death ten years. They further add, that if a man were certain to shorten his days by — drinking cool wines, yet he would not be obliged under pain of mortal sin to abstain from them. Now, to apply this to our subject: if men, barely to gratify their senses by drinking cool wines, or to please their palates with the richest dishes of meat, neglect their health and prefer these delights to the preservation of life, without being condemned for it, shall a religious, upon fancying this sort of victuals does him harm, or that the other is better for him, prefer the care of his health to the observance of his rule? But admit that it is not a “fancy” of his, but a real truth: let us put in one scale the necessity he has of taking this care of his health, and the advantage he can hope from it, which frequently is very uncertain; and in the other scale the trouble, uneasiness, and difficulty he will bring both upon himself and others, the scandal and other ill effects these particularities cause, and we shall easily see that the latter much outweigh the former. If worldly men, to satisfy their sensuality, do this every day, and perhaps you yourself heretofore have done the like upon the same principle, is it not just you should do it now in religion, thereby to keep your rule, conform to the community, and avoid giving scandal to your brethren by your being singular and nice in your palate? Hence it undeniably follows that at least the consideration of our health does not oblige us to seek after particular conveniencies or extraordinary remedies. So that, though the treatment you receive either in sickness or health were still more painful, and even of prejudice to your health, you may be assured without a scruple, that you will do much better to suffer something to testify your love of God and expiate your sins, than to seek your ease and convenience, or complain that they do not take sufficient care of you, or feel as they ought for you. God - Almighty does not wish to have us thus solicitous for our health, whereas he says, “He that will save his soul shall lose it, and he that shall lose it for my sake shall find it’—Mat., xvi. 25. Hence St. Bernard says very justly, that Hippocrates teaches us how to preserve life, Epicurus how to spend it in pleasure and delight, and Jesus Christ how to lose it, to fly sensual delights, and to account everything in this world as nothing in comparison of our salvation. Choose now, says St. Bernard, which of these three you will have for your master. To this we may add what is known by daily experience, that those who are so exceedingly attentive to their health are commonly infirm, and often ruin their health by those very means they use to preserve it; whereas those who trust in God, who commit themselves to the protection of obedience, and endeavour to live like the rest of the house, are ordinarily fit for anything, and enjoy perfect health.

Cassian makes a very good remark upon this subject, and says, that there are some religious who seek after exemptions ‘and privileges, not because they stand in need of them upon the account of their health, but because they wish to gratify their pride and vanity; or sometimes because they would be looked upon to be more than others; or, in fine, because they deem this distinction as due to their seniority and merit. Such religious, says the same author, never prove great spiritualists or proficients m virtue. For, we see that those ancient fathers who excelled in the observance of regular discipline, and whom we ought to imitate, have always made it their chief care to live up to the practice of their holy rule, and have been enemies to all singularity and distinction.

We do not, however, pretend by this to hinder any one from representing his necessities; for it is certain that all have not health and strength alike; and, therefore, in a considerable number there is always some one or other who stands in need of some particular assistance. Hence, no one is to put a sinister construction on what has been said, or thence take occasion to censure his brother; but, on the contrary, when he sees any one not complying with all the rules of the community, he ought immediately think that necessity obliges him to it, and thereupon charitably compassionate his infirmity. It sometimes happens, as St. Bernard observes, “that on seeing these distinctions we envy him whom we ought to sympathize with; and within ourselves we think that a happiness which he esteems a misery and a most painful necessity’—Serm. i. de altit. & bassi. cord. Now, as you would not envy the man whom severe illness urges to have recourse to extraordinary remedies, but, on the contrary, would pity him, even so, if you knew what pain your brother feels at not being able to conform to the practices of the rest of the religious, perhaps you would pity rather than envy him. You would think yourself obliged to return Almighty God thanks for your being able to live up to your institute, without being under the necessity of being indulged and exempted in point of sleep, diet, er any other particular. The same saint says, that whoever criticises on these little privileges some are forced to make use of, shows very clearly that his own thoughts are not in Heaven, and that he is addicted to softness and sensuality.

St. Bernard concludes his discourse in the following manner, and by the mercy of God I can do the same. I do not, dear brethren, says he, speak this by way of complaint of any one here present, but I thought it necessary to put you in mind of these things, because several of you have a@ tender and delicate constitution, which requires dispensation. I thank God, however, that many of you are so far above any mean-hess of sentiment, and so attentive to your own spiritual advancement, that without taking notice how your sick and infirm brethren are treated, you attend only to yourselves, continually complaining as if hitherto you had done nothing, and, according to St. Paul’s commands, “esteeming every one your superior” (Philippians 2:3)

However, I must needs set down the excellent advice which 8t. Bernard subjoins in these words: Do not take notice of those who stand in need of dispensations, but have your eyes always-upon such as are the most zealous and exact observers of religious discipline, and strive to imitate them. And he relates a passage which is adapted to this subject, and was much to his satisfaction, concerning one of his own religious, who came one morning very early to him, and, prostrating himself at his feet, said: “O father, I am altogether unworthy and wretched! Last night at matins I was thinking on the holiness of one of my brethren, and I find that he is master of at least thirty virtues to which I am a stranger”, Such a thought as this is very pro-. fitable; and I desire, says the saint, that the fruit you reap from my sermon be to observe always what is good and excellent in others, and not their defects; but in yourselves, on the contrary, to look on some matter of humiliation and vileness, but never to cast your eyes on what might be an occasion of pride and vanity. For what avails it to you that you take more pains and suffer more rigid fasts than your brother, if he, at the same time be more patient, pious, humble, and more charitable than you are? “‘Observe rather what he has, and what you want, than what you have, and what he wants”; or, to express it better, “make it your chief study to know what is wanting to yourself in order to attain perfection”. For by this means you will maintain humility and charity in your soul, and make great progress in the duties of religion.

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