Chapter V: Part 5

On one occasion there was a discussion in his presence as to the meaning of those terrible words in the Gospel: _Many are called, but few chosen_.[1] Some one said that the chosen were called a little flock, whereas the unwise or reprobates were spoken of as many in number, and so on. He replied that, in his opinion, there would be very few Christians (meaning, of course, those who are in the true Church, outside which there is no salvation) who would be lost, "because," he said, "having the root of the true faith, the tree that springs from it would sooner or later bear its fruit, which is salvation, and awakening, as it were, from death to life, they would become, through charity, active and rich in good works."

When asked what, then, was the meaning of the statement in the Gospel as to the small number of the elect, he replied that in comparison with the rest of the world, and with infidel nations, the number of Christians was very small, but that of that small number very few would be lost, in conformity to that striking text, _There is no condemnation for those that are in Christ Jesus_.[2] Which really means that justifying grace is always being offered them, and this grace is inseparable from a lively faith and a burning charity. Add to this that He who begins the work in us is He who likewise perfects it. We may believe that the call to christianity, which is the work of God, is always a perfect work, and therefore leads of itself to the end of all perfection, which is heavenly glory.

[Footnote 1: Matt. XX. 16.] [Footnote 2: Rom. viii. 1.]

TO LOVE TO BE HATED, AND TO HATE TO BE LOVED.

This maxim of our Blessed Father's seems strange and altogether contrary to his sweet and affectionate nature.

If, however, we look closely into it, we shall find that it is full of the purest and most subtle love of God.

When he said that we ought to love to be hated, and hate to be loved, he was referring in the one case to the love which is in and for God alone, and in the other to that merely human love, which is full of danger, which robs God of His due, and of which, therefore, we should hate to be the object. He expresses himself thus:

"Those who have nothing naturally attractive about them are very fortunate, for they are well assured that the love which one bears them is excellent, being all for God's sake alone."

UPON OBEDIENCE.

Blessed Francis always said that the excellence of obedience consists not in doing the will of a gentle, courteous superior, who commands rather by entreaty than as one having authority, but in bowing the neck beneath the yoke of one who is harsh, stern, imperious, severe. He was, it is true, desirous that those who had to judge and direct souls should do so as fathers rather than as masters, as, indeed, he did himself, but at the same time he wished those in authority to be somewhat strict, and those subject to them to be less sensitive and selfish, and consequently less impatient, less refractory, and less given to grumbling than most men are.

He used also to say that a rough file takes off more rust and polishes iron better than a smooth and less biting one, and that very many and very heavy blows of the hammer are needed to temper a keen sword blade.

"But," I said to him, when discussing this subject, "as the most perfect obedience is that which springs from love, ought not the command to be given lovingly, so as to incite the subordinate to a loving obedience?" He answered: "There is a great deal of difference between the excellence of obedience and its perfection.

"The excellence of a virtue has to do with its nature; its perfection with the grace, or charity, in which it is clothed. Now, here I am not speaking of the supernatural perfection of obedience which emanates most assuredly from the love of God; but of its natural excellence, which is better tested by harsh than by gentle commands.

"Excessive indulgence on the part of parents and superiors is only too often the cause of many disorders.

"More than this, even as regards the supernatural perfection of obedience, it is very probable that the harshness of the command given helps its growth, and renders our love of God, which is our motive in obeying, stronger, firmer, and more generous. When a superior commands with over-much gentleness and circumspection, besides the fact that he compromises his authority and causes it to be slighted, he so attracts and attaches his inferior to himself that often unconsciously he robs God of the devotedness which is His due. The result is that the inferior obeys the man whom he loves, and because he loves him, rather than God in the man, and for the love of God alone.

"On the other hand, harshness tests far better the fidelity of a heart which loves God sincerely. For, finding nothing pleasing in the command except the sweetness of divine love, to which alone it yields obedience, the perfection of that obedience becomes the greater, since the intention is purer, more direct, and more immediately turned to God. It was in this spirit that David said that, _for the sake of the words_ of God--that is, of His law--he had _kept hard ways_."[1] Our Blessed Father added this simile to explain his meaning further:

"Obeying a harsh, irritating, and vexatious superior is like drawing clear water from a spring which flows through the jaws of a lion of bronze. It is like the riddle of Samson, _Out of the eater came forth meat_; it is hearing God's voice, and seeing God's will alone in that of a superior, even if the command be, as in the case of St. Peter, _Kill and eat_;[2] it is to say with Job, _Although He should kill me, I will trust in Him._"[3]

[Footnote 1: Psalm xvi. 4.] [Footnote 2: Acts x. 13.] [Footnote 3: Job xiii. 15.]

UPON THE OBEDIENCE THAT MAY BE PRACTISED BY SUPERIORS.

Asking him one day if it was possible for persons in authority, whether in the world or in the cloister, to practise the virtue of obedience, he replied: "Certainly, and they can do so far more perfectly and more heroically than their subjects."

Then, seeing my astonishment at this apparent paradox, he went on to explain it in the following manner: "Those who are obliged, either by precept or by vow, which takes the place of precept, to practise obedience, are, as a rule, subject only to one superior. Those, on the other hand, who are in authority, are free to obey more widely, and to obey even in commanding, because if they consider that it is God Who puts them over the heads of the others, and Who commands them to command those others, who does not see that even their commanding is an act of obedience? This kind of obedience may even be practised by princes who have none but God set over them, and who have to render an account of their actions to Him alone. I may add that there is no power on earth so sublime as not to have, at least in some respects, another set over it. Christian kings render filial obedience to the Roman Pontiff, and the sovereign Pontiff himself submits to his confessor in the Sacrament of Penance. But there is a still higher degree of obedience which even Prelates and the greatest among men may practise. It is that which the Apostle counsels when he says: _Be ye subject to every human creature for God's sake_.[1] Who for love of us not only became subject to the Blessed Virgin and to St. Joseph, but made Himself obedient to death and to the death of the Cross, submitting Himself in His Passion to the most sinful and degraded of the earth, uttering not a cry, even as a lamb under the hand of him who shears it and slays it. It is by this universal obedience to every creature that we become all things to all men in order that we may win all to Jesus Christ. It is by this that we take our neighbour, whoever he may be, for our superior, becoming servants for our Lord's sake."

[Footnote 1: 1 Peter ii. 13.]

AN INSTANCE OF OUR SAINT'S OBEDIENCE.

On one occasion, when the Duke of Savoy, being pressed by many urgent public needs, had obtained from the Pope a Brief empowering him to levy contributions on the Church property in his dominions, Blessed Francis, finding some slackness and unwillingness on the part of the beneficed clergy of the diocese to yield obedience to this order, when he had called them together to settle what was to be done, spoke with just indignation. "What! gentlemen," he cried, "is it for us to question and reason when two sovereigns concur in issuing the same command? Is it for us, I say, to scrutinize their counsels, and ask, Why are you acting thus? Not only to the decrees of sovereign courts, but even to the sentence of the most insignificant judges appointed by God to decide differences in our affairs, we yield deference so far as not to enquire into the motive of their decisions. And here, where two oracles who have only to render account to God of what orders they give, speak, we set to work to enquire into their motives and reasons as if we were charged to investigate their conduct. Assuredly, I will take no part in such doings. Our virtue, indeed, lags sadly behind that of those christians--only lay people too--of whom St. Paul said that being wise themselves they _gladly suffered bondage, stripes, every sort of ill-usage from the foolish_,[1] and of whom, in another place, he says that they _took with joy the being stripped of their own goods_, knowing that they had _a better and a lasting substance_.[2] And the Apostle, as you know, is speaking to men who had been unjustly despoiled of their whole property by robbers and tyrants, whereas you will not give up a small fraction of yours to assist in the public need of our good Prince, to whose zeal we owe the re-establishment of the Catholic religion in the three divisions of the Chablais, and whose enemies are the adversaries of our faith! Is not our Order the first of the three estates in a christian kingdom? Is there anything more just than to contribute of our wealth, together with our prayers, towards the defence of our altars, of our lives, and of our peace? The people are lavishing their substance and the nobility their blood for the same cause. Remember the late wars, and tremble lest your ingratitude and disobedience should plunge you again into similar troubles."

Adding example to precept, he paid so heavy a tax upon a part of his own revenue that none could say he did not practise what he preached, and all those who had ventured to oppose him in the matter were not only effectually silenced, but covered with confusion and put to a just shame.

[Footnote 1: 2 Cor. xi. 19, 20.] [Footnote 2: Heb. x. 34.]

UPON THE LOVE OF HOLY POVERTY.

_Godliness with contentment_, says Holy Scripture, _is great gain_.[1]

So content was the godliness of Blessed Francis that, although deprived of the greater part of his episcopal revenues, he was fully satisfied with the little that was left to him.

After all, he would say, are not twelve hundred crowns a handsome income for a Bishop? The Apostles, who were far better Bishops than we are, had nothing like that sum. It is not for us to fix our own pay for serving God.

His love of poverty was truly striking. At Annecy he lodged in a hired house, which was both handsome and roomy, and in which the apartments assigned to him as Bishop were very elegantly furnished. He, however, took up his abode in an uncomfortable little room, where there was hardly any light at all, so that he could truly say with Job: _I have made my bed in darkness_;[2] or with David: _Night shall be my light in my pleasures_;[3] or again, _I am like a night raven in the house, or as a sparrow all alone on the housetop_.[4]

He called this little room, or, to speak more truly, this sepulchre of a living man, Francis' chamber, while to that in which he received visitors, or gave audience, he gave the name of the Bishop's chamber.

Truly, the lover of holy poverty can always find a means of practising it, even in the midst of riches.

Blessed Francis, indeed, always welcomed poverty with a smiling countenance, though naturally it be apt to cast a gloom and melancholy upon the faces both of those who endure it and of those who only dread it.

Involuntary poverty is surly and discontented, for it is forced and against the will. Voluntary poverty, on the contrary, is joyous, free, and light-hearted. To show you how cheerfully and pleasantly he talked on this subject, I will give you one or two of his remarks.

Once, showing me a coat which had been patched up for him, and which he wore under his cassock, he said: "My people really work little miracles; for out of an old garment they have made me this perfectly new coat. Am I not well-dressed?"

Again, when his steward was complaining of down-right distress, and of there being no money left, he said: "What are you troubling yourself about? We are now more like our Master, Who had not even where to lay His head, though as yet we are not reduced to such extremity as that." "But what are we to do?" persisted the steward. "My son," the Bishop answered, "we must live as we can, on whatever goods we have, that is all." "Truly," replied the other, "it is all very well to talk of living on our goods when there are none left to live upon!" "You do not understand me," returned the Bishop; "we must sell or pledge some of our furniture in order to live. Will not that, my good M.R.,[5] be living on our goods?"

It was in this fashion that the Saint was accustomed to meet cheerfully money troubles, so unbearable to weaker characters.

On one occasion I expressed my admiration at his being able to make so good a show on his small means. "It is God," he said, "Who multiplies the five loaves." On my pressing him to tell me how it was done, "Why, it would not be a miracle," he answered, with a smile, "if we knew that. Are we not most fortunate to live on only by help of miracles? _It is the mercy of God that we are not consumed_." "You go quite beyond me," I said, "by taking that ground. I am not so transcendently wise."

"Listen," he replied. "Riches are truly thorns, as the Gospel teaches us. They prick us with a thousand troubles in acquiring them, with more cares in preserving them, and with yet more anxieties in spending them; and, most of all, with vexations in losing them.

"After all, we are only managers and stewards, especially if it is a question of the riches of the Church, which are the true patrimony of the poor. The important matter is to find faithful dispensers. Having sufficient to feed and clothe ourselves suitably, what more do we want? Assuredly, _that which is over and above these is of evil_.[6]

"Shall I tell you what my own feeling is? Well and good, but I must do so in your ear. I know very well how to spend what I have; but if I had more I should be in difficulty as to what to do with it. Am I not happy to live like a child without care? _Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof_. The more any one has to manage the longer the account he has to render. We must make use of this world as though we were making no use of it at all. We must possess riches as though we had them not, and deal with the things of earth like the dogs on the banks of the Nile, who, for fear of the crocodiles, lap up the water of the river as they run along its banks. If, as the wise man tells us, _he that addeth knowledge addeth also labour_; much more is this the case with the man who heaps up riches. He is like the giants in the fable who piled up mountains, and then buried themselves under them. Remember the miserable man who, as the Gospel tells us, thought that he had many years before him in which to live at his ease, but to whom the heavenly voice said: _Thou fool, this night do they require thy soul of thee; and whose shall those things be which thou hast provided_? In truth happy is he only who lays up imperishable treasures in Heaven."

He would never allow himself to be called _poor_; saying, that any one who had a revenue sufficient to live upon without being obliged to labour with head or hands to support himself should be called _rich_; and such, he said, was the case with us both.

To my objection that our revenues were nevertheless so very small that we must be really considered poor, for little, indeed, must we be working if our labour was not worth what we got from our bishoprics, he replied: "If you take it in this way you are not so far wrong, for who is there who labours in a vineyard and does not live upon its produce? What shepherd feeds his flock and does not drink its milk and clothe himself with its wool? So, too, may he who sows spiritual seed justly reap the small harvest which he needs for his temporal sustenance. If then he is poor who lives by work, and who eats the fruit of his labour, we may very well be reckoned as such; but if we regard the degree of poverty in which our Lord and His Apostles lived, we must perforce consider ourselves rich. After all, possessing honestly all that is necessary for food and clothing, ought we not to be content? Whatever is more than this is only evil, care, superfluity, wanting which we shall have less of an account to render. Happy is poverty, said a stoic, if it is cheerful poverty; and if it is that, it is really not poverty at all, or only poverty of a kind that is far preferable to the riches of the most wealthy, which are amassed with difficulty, preserved with solicitude, and lost with regret."

Our Saint used to say that, as for the cravings of nature, he who is not satisfied with what is really enough will never be satisfied. I wish that I could give any just idea of his extraordinary moderation even in the use of the necessaries of life. He told me once that when the time came for him to lay down the burden of his episcopal duties and to retire into solitude, there to pass the rest of his life in contemplation and study, he should consider five hundred crowns a year great wealth; in fact, he would not reserve more from either his patrimony or his Bishop's revenue, adding these words of St. Paul: _Having food, and wherewith to be covered, let us_ (priests) _be content_.[7] He gave this as his reason. "The Church," he said, "which is the kingdom of Jesus Christ, is established on foundations directly opposed to those of the world, of which our Saviour said His kingdom was not. Now, on what is the kingdom of this world founded? Listen to St. John: All that is in the world is the _concupiscence of the flesh, or of the eyes, and the pride of life_; that is to say, the pleasures of the senses, avarice, and vanity. The Church then will be founded on mortification of the flesh, poverty, and humility. Pleasures and honours follow in the train of wealth; but poverty puts an axe to the roots of pride and sensual enjoyments. Some, says David, blaming them, glory in the multitude of their riches; and St. Paul exhorts the rich of this world not to be high-minded.

"It is a perilous thing for humility and mortification to take up their abode with wealth." This is why he wished for nothing but bare necessaries, fearing that superfluity might lead him into some excess.

When I reminded him that if we had this superfluity we might give alms out of it, as it is written, _Of what remaineth give to the poor_, he replied, that we knew well enough what: we ought to do; but that we did not know what we should do, and that it was always a species of presumption to imagine ourselves able to handle live coals without burning ourselves, seeing that even the Angel in the vision of the Prophet took them up with tongs!

[Footnote 1: 1 Tim. vi. 6.] [Footnote 2: Job. xvii. 13.] [Footnote 3: Ps. cxxxviii. 11.] [Footnote 4: Ps. ci. 8.] [Footnote 5: Georges Roland.] [Footnote 6: Matt. v. 37.] [Footnote 7: Tim. vi. 8.]

UPON THE SAME SUBJECT.

Our Blessed Father was so absolutely indifferent to the goods of this world that I never heard him so much as once complain of the loss of almost all his episcopal revenue, confiscated by the city of Geneva. He used to say that it was very much with the wealth of the Church as with a man's beard, the more closely it was clipped the stronger and the thicker it grew again. When the Apostles had nothing they possessed all things, and when ecclesiastics wish to possess too much, that too much is reduced to nothing.

His one hunger and thirst was for the conversion of souls, living in wilful blindness to the light of truth which shines only in the one true Church. Sometimes, he exclaimed, sighing heavily: "Give me souls, and the rest take to Thyself." Speaking of Geneva, to which city, in spite of its rebellion, he always applied terms of compassion and affection, such as "my dear Geneva," or "my poor Geneva," he said to me more than once: "Would to God that these gentlemen had taken such small remains of my revenue as they have left to me, and that we had only as small a foothold in that deplorable city as the Catholics have in La Rochelle, namely, a little chapel in which to say Mass and perform the functions of our religion! You would then soon see all these apostates come back to their senses, and we should rejoice over the return to the Church of these poor Sunamites, who are so forgetful of their duty."[1] This fond hope he always nourished in his breast.

He used to say that Henry VIII. of England, who at the beginning of his reign was so zealous for the Catholic faith, and wrote so splendidly against the errors of Luther, that he acquired for that reason the glorious title of Defender of the Faith, having, by yielding to his passion, caused so great a schism in his kingdom, even had he desired at the close of his life to return to the bosom of the Church which he had so miserably abandoned, would, on setting to work to attain this most happy end, have found the impossibility of recovering for the clergy and restoring to them the property and wealth which he had divided among his nobles, a serious difficulty.

"Alas!" our Blessed Father exclaimed, commenting upon this fact, "to think that a handful of dust should rob Heaven of so many souls! The business of every christian, and especially of the clergy, is the keeping of God's law. The Lord is the portion of their inheritance and of their cup. He would have made to them an abundant restitution of all that had been theirs, by gentle but effective means. They whose thoughts are fixed upon the Lord will be nourished by Him. The just are never forsaken nor reduced to beg their bread; they have only to lift their eyes and their hopes to God and He will give them meat in due season; for it is He who gives food to all flesh. Moreover, it is much easier to suffer hunger with patience than to preserve virtue in the midst of plenty. It is not every one who can say with the Apostle: _I know how to abound, and I know how to suffer need_.[2] A thousand fall on the left hand of adversity, but ten thousand on the right hand of prosperity; for iniquity is the outcome of luxury, and the sin of the cities of the plain had its origin in a superabundance of bread; that is to say, in their wealth. To be frugal and devout is to possess a great treasure."

[Footnote 1: Cantic. vi. 12.] [Footnote 2: Philipp. iv. 12.]

UPON POVERTY OF SPIRIT.

Three virtues, he said, were necessary to constitute poverty of spirit: simplicity, humility, and christian poverty. Simplicity consists in that singleness of aim which looks only to God, referring to Him alone those innumerable opportunities which come to us from objects other than Himself. Humility is that conviction of our own inferiority and destitution which makes the truly humble man regard himself as always an unprofitable servant. Christian poverty is of three kinds. First, that which is affective, but not effective. This can be practised in the midst of wealth, as in the case of Abraham, David, St. Louis, and many other holy persons, who, though rich in this world's goods, were ready in a moment to accept poverty with cheerfulness and thankfulness if it should please God to send it to them.

Second, effective but not affective poverty, which is a very unhappy condition. Those who are weighed down by it feel all its distressing consequences and are miserable because they cannot possess the many things which they ardently desire.

Third, affective, united with effective poverty, which is recommended in the Gospels, and which may happen to be our lot, either from birth or from some reverse of fortune.

If we are reconciled to our condition in life, however humble, and bless God Who has placed us in it, then we tread in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, of His holy Mother, and of the Apostles, who all lived a life of poverty.

Another way of practising this poverty is to follow the counsels of Jesus Christ, Who bids us _sell all that we have and give it to the poor_, imitating our divine Master in that poverty which He embraced for us, that we, through it, might be made rich. And never is this command more practically and worthily obeyed than when the man who has abandoned all his worldly goods for the sake of Christ, labours, not only in order to sustain his own life, but that he may have the wherewithal to give alms.

Thus did the Apostle glory when he said: _For such things as were needful for me, and them that are with me, these hands have furnished_.[1]

[Footnote 1: Acts xx. 34.]

FRANCIS' LOVE OF THE POOR.

To love our neighbour is not only to wish him well, but also to do him all the good that it is in our power to do. If we fall short of this, we deserve the reproach of St. James, addressed to those who, though they have ample means for giving material aid to the poor, content themselves with bare words of comfort.

The love of Blessed Francis for the poor was so intense that in their case he seemed to become a respecter of persons, preferring them to the rich, both in spiritual and in temporal matters. He was like a good physician who in visiting the sick shows the most tender solicitude for those afflicted with the most terrible diseases and lingers longest by their bedsides.

One day I had to wait my turn to go to confession to him for a very long time, he being engaged in hearing a poor blind beggar woman. When I afterwards expressed my surprise at the length of her confession, he said: "Ah! She sees far more clearly the way to go to God than many whose eyesight is otherwise perfect."

On another occasion, sailing with him on the lake of Geneva, I heard the boatman calling him "Father," and addressing him with corresponding familiarity. "Listen," he said to me, "to those good people. They are calling me their Father; and, indeed, I do believe they love me as such. Oh! how much more real happiness they give me than those who call me 'My Lord.'"

UPON THE CHRISTIAN VIEW OF POVERTY.

On one occasion I quoted that saying of Seneca: "He is truly great who dines off earthenware as contentedly as if it were silver; but he is greater still who dines off silver with as much indifference as if it were earthenware."

"The philosopher," he said, "is right in his judgment; for the first feasts on mere fancy, leading to vanity; but the second shows that he is superior to wealth, since he cares no more for a precious metal than for clay.

"Yet, Oh! how ridiculous; how empty is all mere human philosophy! This same philosopher who speaks so eloquently again and again of the contempt of riches, was all his life immersed in them; and at his death left thousands behind him. Does it not seem to you that, this being his own case, his talking about poverty makes him like a cleric expatiating on the art of war? We had far better listen to St. Paul, who speaks as a past master on the subject of poverty, since he practised it so thoroughly that he chose rather to live on what he could earn by the labour of his hands than on what the preaching of the Gospel might bring in to him, as to the other Apostles. Yes, we must needs listen to and believe St. Paul when he says that he esteems all things as dung in comparison with the service of Jesus Christ, counting as loss what he once held as gain."[1]

[Footnote 1: Philipp. iii, 8.]

UPON PROSPERITY.

Blessed Francis objected strongly to the use of the word _fortune_, considering it unworthy of utterance by christian lips. The expressions "fortunate," "by good fortune," "children of fortune," all common enough, were repugnant to him. "I am astonished," he said once, "that Fortune, the most pagan of idols, should have been left standing, when christianity so completely demolished all the rest! God forbid that any who ought to be the children of God's providence alone become children of fortune! and that those whose only hope should be in Him put their trust in the uncertainty of riches!"

He spoke yet more strongly of such as professing to be nailed with Jesus Christ to the Cross and to glory only in His reproaches and sufferings, yet were eager in heaping up riches, and, when amassed, in clinging fondly to them. "For," he said, "the Gospel makes christian blessedness to consist in poverty, contempt, pain, weeping, and persecutions; and even philosophy teaches us that prosperity is the stepmother of true virtue, adversity its mother!"

I asked him once how it was that we are so ready to have recourse to God when the thorn of affliction pierces us, and so eager in asking for deliverance from sickness, calumny, famine, and such like misfortunes. "It is," he said, "our weakness which thus cries out for help, and it is a proof of the infirmity which encompasses us; for as the best and firmest fish feed in the salt waters of the open sea, those which are caught in fresh water being less pleasing to the taste, so the most generous natures find their element in crosses and afflictions, while meaner spirits are only happy in prosperity.

"Moreover," he continued, "it is much easier to love God perfectly in adversity than in prosperity. For tribulation having nothing in itself that is lovable, save that it is God's gift, it is much easier to go by it straight to the will of God, and to unite ourselves to His good pleasure. Easier, I say, than by prosperity, which has attractions of its own that captivate our senses, and, like Dalila, lull them to sleep, working in us a subtle change, so that we begin insensibly to love for its own sake the prosperity which God sends us, instead of bestowing all our grateful love on God Who sends it, and to Whom all thanks and praise are due!"

UPON CHARITY AND CHASTITY.

Feeling at one time troubled and perplexed in mind as to the bearing of these two virtues upon one another, and as to the right manner of practising each, so that one should never run counter to the other, I carried my difficulties to our Blessed Father, who settled them at once in the following words; "We must," he said, "in this matter draw a careful distinction between persons who occupy positions of dignity and authority, and have the care of others, and those private individuals who have no one to look after but themselves. The former must deliver their chastity into the keeping of their charity; and if that charity is real and true it will not fail them, but will serve as a strong wall of defence, both without and within, to their chastity. On the other hand, private individual's will do better to surrender the guardianship of their charity to their chastity, and to walk with the greatest circumspection and self-restraint. The reason of this is that those in authority are obliged by the very nature of their duties, to expose themselves to the dangers inseparable from occasions: in which, however, they are assisted by grace, seeing they are not tempting God by any rashness.

"Contrariwise, those private individuals who expose themselves to danger without any legitimate excuse run great risk of tempting God and losing His grace; since it is written that _he that loveth danger_ (still more he that seeketh it) _shall perish in it_."[1]

[Footnote 1: Eccles. iii. 27]

UPON PURITY OF HEART.

I can never express to you, or convey a right idea, of the high esteem in which he held purity of heart. He said that chastity of body was common enough even among unbelievers and among persons addicted to other vices; but that very few people could truly say, my heart is pure.

I do not say that by this purity of heart he meant the never being troubled by sinful desires, for that would be making the virtue of chastity to consist in insensibility; and what do those who are not tempted know about the matter?

No; he placed it in never yielding to unlawful affections. To these we should rather give the name of _infections_, since they infect the will, and interfere with the safe custody of the heart, which is the well-spring of the spiritual life.

UPON CHASTITY AND HUMILITY.

Speaking of the humility and chastity of the Blessed Virgin the holy Prelate said: "These two virtues, although they have to be continually practised, should be spoken of so rarely that this rarity of speech may rank as silence. The reason is that it is difficult to mention these virtues or to praise them either in themselves or in any individual who possesses them, without in some way sullying their brightness.

"1. There is, in my opinion, no human tongue which can rightly express their value, and to praise them inadequately is in a way to disparage them.

"2. To praise humility is to cause it to be desired from a secret self-love and to invite people to enter its domain through the wrong door.

"3. To praise humility in any individual is to tempt him to vanity and to flatter him dangerously; for the more he thinks himself humble the less he will really be so; and possibly when he sees that others consider him humble he will think that he must be so.

"4. As regards chastity, to praise it in itself is to leave on the mind a secret and almost imperceptible image of the contrary vice, and therefore to expose the mind to some danger of temptation. There is a sting hidden in the honey of such praise.

"5. To praise it in any individual is in a measure to expose him to the danger of falling. It is to put a stumbling-block In his way. It is to inflate that pride which under a fair disguise may lure him over a precipice.

"6. We must never be content to rely upon our hitherto untarnished purity of life, but must always fear, since innocence is a treasure which we carry in a vessel of glass, easily broken.

"7. In a word, the virtues of humility and chastity always seem to me like those subtle essences which evaporate if they are not kept very tightly corked.

"8. However, although I consider it wise very seldom to speak of these two virtues, it is wise to practise them unceasingly, humility being one of the most excellent virtues of the soul, and purity that fair white adornment of the body which is its honour, and which, like a lily growing among thorns, brings forth a wonderful flower, whose fruit is honour and riches.

"9. Nevertheless, I do not mean that we are to be so scrupulous as _never_ to dare to speak of these virtues; not even to praise them when occasion warrants or demands our doing so. No, indeed. In one sense they can never be sufficiently praised, nor ever sufficiently valued and cultivated. What I mean is that we gain little by praising them. Our words in praise of a virtue are of little account in comparison with the smallest fruit; that is, with the least of the acts of a virtue.

"I add this because I know you attach too much importance to my words, and take them as literally as if they were oracles."

UPON MODESTY.

Our Blessed Father, speaking of the virtue of modesty, and dilating upon one of its chief properties, namely, its extraordinary sensitiveness to the slightest injurious influence, made use of two beautiful comparisons: "However pure, transparent, and polished the surface of a mirror may be, the faintest breath is sufficient to make it so dull and misty that it is unable to reflect any image. So it is with the reputation of the virtuous. However high and well established it may be, according the words of wisdom: _Oh! how beautiful is the chaste generation!_ [1] a thoughtless, unrestrained glance or gesture is quite sufficient to give occasion to a slanderous tongue to infect that reputation with the serpent's venom, and to hide its lustre from the eyes of the world, as clouds hide the brightness of the sun.

"Again, look at this beautiful lily. It is the symbol of purity; it preserves its whiteness and sweetness, amid all the blackness and ruggedness of the encircling thorns. As long as it remains untouched its perfume is delicious and its dazzling beauty of form and colour charms every passer-by; but, as soon as it is culled, the scent is so strong as to be overpowering, and should you touch the petals they lose their satin smoothness as well as all their pure and white loveliness."

[Footnote 1: Wisd. iv. I.]

THE CONTEMPT HE FELT FOR HIS BODY.

Since our Blessed Father was not, like the martyrs, privileged to offer his body, both by living and dying, as a victim for God, he found out, with the ingenuity of love, a method of self-humiliation and self-sacrifice to be carried out after his death.

When quite young and still pursuing his studies at Padua, falling dangerously ill, and his life being despaired of, he begged his tutor to see that when he was dead his body should be given into the hands of the surgeons for dissection. "Having been of so little use to my neighbour in life," he said, "I shall thus at least, after my death, be able to render him some small service."

Happily for us, God in His great mercy spared this precious life, being contented, as in the case of the sacrifice of Isaac, with the offering of His faithful servant's will and with his generous contempt for his own flesh.

A motive which urged Blessed Francis to the above resolution, besides his desire of self-humiliation and immolation, was the hope of putting an end to the scandalous practice then prevailing among the surgical and medical students at Padua of secretly by night going to the cemeteries to disinter newly-buried bodies. This they did when they had failed to obtain those of criminals from the officers of justice. Innumerable evils, quarrels, and even murders resulted from this practice, and the indignation of the relatives and friends of the deceased persons whose corpses were stolen may be imagined. By setting the example of a voluntary surrender of his own body for dissection our Blessed Father hoped to diminish such orders.

UPON OUR SAINT'S HUMILITY.

It was of course impossible for Blessed Francis to be ignorant of the high esteem in which his piety was held, not only by his own people, but by all who knew him. This knowledge was, however, as may well be believed, a source of pain to him, and often covered him with confusion. He seldom spoke on the subject, for true humility rarely speaks, even humbly, of itself. Yet on one occasion, when more than usually worried by hearing himself praised, he allowed these words to fall from his lips: "The truth is that these good people with all their eulogiums, and expressions of esteem, are sowing the seed of a bitter fruit for me to gather in the end. When I am dead, imagining that my poor soul has gone straight to Heaven, they will not pray for it, and will leave me languishing in Purgatory. Of what avail then will this high reputation be to me? They are treating me like those animals which suffocate their young by their close pressure and caresses, or like the ivy which drags down the wall it seems to crown with verdure."

I will now give you some examples of his humility. He was sometimes told that people had spoken ill of him. Instead of excusing or defending himself, he would say cheerfully, "Do they say no more than that? Certainly, they cannot know all, they flatter me, they spare me: I see very well that they rather pity than envy me, and that they wish me to be better than I am. Well! God be praised for this, I must correct my faults, for if I do not deserve reproof in this particular matter, I do in some other. It is really a mercy that the correction is given so kindly." If anyone took up his defence and declared that the whole accusation was false, "Ah! well," he would say, "it is a warning to make me careful not to justify it, for surely they are doing me a kindness by calling my attention to the dangers of this rock ahead."

Then, noticing how indignant we all were with the slanderers, "What," he would exclaim, "have I given you leave to fly into a passion on my account? Let them talk--it is but a storm in a teacup, a tempest of words that will die away and be forgotten. We must be sensitive indeed if we cannot bear the buzzing of a fly! Who has told us that we are blameless? Possibly these people see our faults better than we see them ourselves, and better than those who love us do. When truths displease us, we often call them slanders. What harm do others do us by having a bad opinion of us? We ought to have a bad opinion of ourselves. Such persons are not our adversaries, but rather our allies, since they enlist themselves on our side in the battle against our self-love. Why be angry with those who come to our aid against so powerful an enemy?"

It happened once that a certain simple-minded woman told our saint bluntly that what she had heard of him had caused her to loose all esteem for him. Blessed Francis replied quietly that her straightforward words only increased his fatherly affection for her, as they were an evidence of great candour, a virtue he highly respected.

The woman proceeded to declare that the reason she was so greatly disappointed in him was because she had been told that he had taken her adversary's part in a law-suit instead of acting as the father of all and siding with none. "Nay," rejoined the Saint, "do not fathers interfere in the quarrels of their children, judging between right and wrong? Besides, the verdict of the court should have convinced you that you were in the wrong, since it was given against you; and had I been one of the judges I must have decided as they did."

The woman protested that injustice had been done to her, but the Saint quietly and patiently reasoned with her and assured her that although it was natural that she should feel angry at first, yet, when the bandage of passion had fallen from her eyes, she would thank God for having deprived her of that which in justice she could not have retained.

This person finally admitted that she had been in the wrong, but enquired if Blessed Francis was really not annoyed at her having lost her high opinion of him, having formerly regarded him as a Saint. He assured her she was wrong in having done so, and that, far from being annoyed, his esteem for her was all the greater on account of this, her correct judgment. "Believe me," he went on to say, "I am speaking from a sense of truth, and not out of false humility, when I maintain that my friends over-rate me. The fact is, they try to persuade themselves that I really am what they so ardently desire me to be. They expose me to the danger of losing my soul by pride and presumption. You, on the contrary, are giving me a practical lesson in humility, and are thus leading me in the way of salvation, for it is written, _God will save the humble of heart._"

UPON MERE HUMBLENESS OF SPEECH.

He disliked expressions of humility unless they clearly came from the heart, and said that words of this kind were the flower, the cream, and the quintessence of the most subtle pride, subtle inasmuch as it was hidden even from him who spoke them. He compared such language to a certain sublimated and penetrating poison, which to the eye seems merely a mist.

Those who speak this language of false humility are lifted up on high, whilst in thoughts and motives they remain mean and low. He considered similar fashions of speech to be even more intolerable than the words of vain persons who are the sport of their hearers, and whose empty boasting makes them to be like balloons, the plaything of everybody. A mocking laugh is sufficient to let all the wind which puffs them out escape. Words of humility coming merely from the lips, and not from the heart, lead surely to vanity, though by what seems the wrong road. Those who utter them are like people who take their salary gladly enough, but insist on first making a show of refusing and of saying that they want nothing.

Even excuses proffered in this manner accuse and betray the person who offers them. The truly humble of heart do not wish, to _appear_ humble, but to _be_ humble. Humility is so delicate a virtue that it is afraid of its own shadow, and cannot hear its own name uttered without running the risk of extinction.

UPON VARIOUS DEGREES OF HUMILITY.

Blessed Francis set the highest value upon the virtue of humility, which he called the foundation of all moral virtues, and together with charity, the solid basis of true piety.

He used to say that there was no moral excellence more literally christian than humility, because it was not known even by name to the heathen of old. Even of the most renowned among ancient philosophers, such virtues as they possessed were inflated with pride and self-love.

Not every kind of humility pleased him. He was not willing to accept any as true metal until he had put it to many a test and trial.

1. He required in the first place that there should be genuine self-knowledge. To be truly humble we must recognise the fact that we come from nothing, that we are nothing, that we can do nothing, that we are worth nothing, and in fine that we are idle do-nothings, unprofitable servants, incapable of even forming a single good thought, as of ourselves. Yet self-knowledge, he said, if it stood alone, however praiseworthy in itself, would only render those who possessed it the more guilty if they did not act up to it, in order to become better; because moral virtue being in the will, and mere knowledge only in the understanding, the latter alone cannot in any way pass current as true virtue.

2. He even had some doubt of humility though residing in the will, because it is quite possible to misuse it, and to turn humility itself into vanity. Take for instance those who, having been invited to a banquet, take at once possession of the very lowest place, or of one which they know to be inferior to that due to their rank. They may do this on purpose to be invited to go higher amidst the applause of the company, and with advantage to themselves. He called this a veritable entering into vanity, and through the wrong door: for the truly humble do not wish to appear humble, but only vile and lowly. They love to be considered as of no accounts and, as such, to be despised and rebuffed.

3. Even this did not satisfy him. He was not content with mere natural virtue, but insisted that humility must be Christian, given birth to, and animated by charity. Otherwise he held it in small esteem, refusing to admit that among christians it suffices to practise virtues in pagan fashion. But what is this infused and supernatural humility? It is to love and delight in one's own humiliation, for the reason that by its means we are able to give glory to God, Who accepts the humility of His servants, but puts far away from His heart the proud in spirit.

4. Again, our Saint taught that in striving to please God by bearing humiliations, we should aim at accepting such as are not of our own choice rather than those that are voluntary. He used to say that the crosses fashioned by us for ourselves are always of the lightest and slenderest, and that he valued an ounce of resignation to suffering above pounds' weight of painful toil, good though it might be in itself, undertaken of one's own accord.

5. Quiet endurance of reproaches, contempt, or depreciation, was, in his opinion, the true touch-stone of humility, because it renders us more like to Jesus Christ, the Prototype of all solid virtue, Who humbled and annihilated Himself, making Himself obedient unto death, even the ignominious death of the Cross.

6. He commended voluntary seeking after humiliations, yet he insisted upon great discretion being practised in this search, since it easily happens that self-love may subtly and imperceptibly insinuate itself therein.

7. Next he considered that the highest, or more properly speaking, deepest degree of humility is that of taking pleasure and even delight in humiliations, reputing them to be in truth the greatest of honours, and of being just as much ill-content with honours as vain persons are with contempt and contumely.

In illustration of this he would quote Moses, who preferred the reproach of Israel to the glories of a kingdom offered to him by Pharaoh's daughter; of Esther, who hated the splendid ornaments with which they decked her to make her pleasing in the eyes of Assuerus; of the Apostles, whose greatest joy was to suffer shame and reproach for the name of Jesus; and of David, who danced before the Ark amid a crowd of buffoons and mountebanks, and who exulted in thus making himself appear contemptible in the eyes of Michol, his wife.

8. Blessed Francis called humility a descending charity, and charity an ascending humility. The former he compared to those streams which come down from the heights and flow down into the valleys. The latter to the slender column of smoke spoken of in the Canticle[1] which rises up towards Heaven, and is composed of all the sweet essences of the perfumer.