Class Book . GopyrigM? COFWHGHT DEPOSIT. THE VALUES EVERLASTING BOOKS BY FATHER GARESCHE Published by Benziger Brothers In Same Uniform Series Each, Net, $1.25; Postage, 10 Cents LIFE'S LESSONS. Some Useful Teachings Of Every Day. Will be read and should be read by people who want to turn to best accounts their talents. — Ecclesiastical Review. THE PATHS OF GOODNESS. Some Helpful Thoughts on 'Spiritual Progress. It is a most readable book. — Catholic Bulletin, YOUR OWN HEART. Some Helps to understand it. The Author knows how to talk of men's faults so as to inspire them to do better. — The Fort- nightly Review. YOUR SOUL'S 'SALVATION. Instructions on Personal Holiness. We know of no spiritual book which deserves to have a larger vogue amongst Catholics. — ■ Ros'ary Magazine. THE THINGS IMMORTAL. Spiritual thoughts for everyday reading. The subjects are most important, the treatment simple, practical and persuasive. — Catholic World. YOUR INTERESTS ETERNAL. Our service to Our Heavenly Father. He presents immortal truths in a direct way that enlists attention and arouses zeal. — : Catholic School Journal. THE MOST BELOVED WOMAN. The Preroga- tives and Glories of the Blessed Mother of God. It is enjoyable, very interesting, edifying and highly instructive. — Dominicana. YOUR NEIGHBOR AND YOU. Our dealings with those about us. ' Should be in every Catholic library and every busy Catholic should read it. — St. Xavier's Calendar* SOCIAL ORGANIZATION IN PARISHES. Net, $2.75. Postage 15 Cents. Brimful of ideas, it will be of practical aidto Reverend Pastors in their varied Parish Activities. MADONNA Sassoferrato L The Values Everlasting Some Aids to Lift Our Hearts on High BY ... •,v REV. EDWARD F. GARESCHE, S. J. New York, Cincinnati, Chicago BENZIGER BROTHERS PRINTERS TO THE PUBLISHERS OF HOLT APOSTOLIC SEE I BENZIGER'S MAGAZINE 1922 tSJmprttm jjjJniBsL vV* Francis X. McMenamy, S.J. Praep. Prov. Missourianitz, Arthur J. Scanlan, S.T.D. Censor Librorum. ,3Iinprtjrratur~ ►J« Patrick J. Hayes, D.D. Archbishop of New York, New York. May 25, 1922 0»* Copyright. 1922. by Benziger Brothers CI.A683140 2)eMcation TO THE MOST BLESSED VIRGIN MARY TOWER OF IVORY CONTENTS PAGE Dedication 5 Preface 9 The Greatness of the Little . 11 It Might Have Been .... 25 On Being Made Clean .... 36 The Cheering Thought of Heaven 48 Conformity 62 God's Condescension .... 76 The Richness of Our Heritage . 87 Confidence in Mary . . . . 10 1 The Precious Half Hour . . . 115 Our Devotions 126 Turning Life to Prayer . . . 137 A Strange Delusion 147 Things as They Are . . . . 158 Courage 167 Celestial Company . . . . 177 PREFACE A FLOOD of worldly thoughts, worldly ideas and estimates invade the mind nowadays on the wings of the ephem- eral print which is so insistently circulated by powerful agencies everywhere. We must read, and so much of the reading matter that is forced upon our attention, teaches insidi- ously the low values and sordid outlook of the worldling, forever intent on the things of time and quite forgetful of the great issues of eternity. To protect ourselves from the contagion of this pervading worldliness, we should, in justice to our own soul, turn deliberately aside now and then to dwell upon the values everlasting. As men of old used, when pass- ing through contagious plague spots, to hold to their nostrils a sweet smelling flower, to guard themselves from the infection, so we should hold to the nostrils of our soul the sweet flower of some heavenly thoughts, to guard against the poisonous exhalations of the world. io Preface The papers in the present volume are meant to aid us in lifting up our thoughts toward the eternal things. They are brief and various, so as to interest and occupy a leisure hour. The writer sends them forth with a prayer for all who may read, and he asks in turn from those who may read these lines a prayer for the writer thereof. Feast of the Apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes. THE VALUES EVERLASTING THE GREATNESS OF THE LITTLE For our judgments of men we are so dependent on what we see, that it is usually great and striking deeds that stir us to admiration. The uncommon and the spectacular attract us. Great exploits, sudden shows of courage, feats of intellectual prowess, deeds of physical daring, excite our wonder and compel our praise. But the silent heroism of the many humble and hid- den folk among us, scarcely moves us to any admiration at all. With God, of course, it is quite otherwise. He looks beyond the outward show of things and searches the hidden heart. The glitter and glory of outward deeds cannot deceive His eyes, as they deceive our own. So He loves the heroism that has, to urge and spur it on, no stir of outward pomp and glory, but only the calm, firm, steadfast sense of ii 12 The Greatness of the Little duty, the love of God and man. God loves the heroism of little things! This world, which God has made to carry out His great designs, is admirably well suited to give opportunity and scope for this heroism of little things. The chances to perform great exploits come but seldom in the way of any man. To some of us they never come at all. But all about every one's pathway, offering themselves at every hour, sometimes coming in crowds, besieging our every step — throng opportunities for heroic courage and fidelity in the faithful doing of little things. The course of every one's life, if we take it by moments, is, after all, only a long pro- cession of little things. One may be a king, or he may be a pope, and seem to the world at large a person whose concerns are all majestic and impressive. But he himself sees wearily that the daily cycle of his life is only a tedious round of little duties, coming with the tireless moments of the tireless days, and each one making some new demand upon mind or heart for heroic and exhausting fidelity in little things. We hear of men whose physical strength gives way under the strain of such high affairs as the government The Greatness of the Little 13 of a nation or the ruling of an important portion of the Church. Do you suppose that it was any great function of State which wearied them and drained the vigor of their lives? Great functions of State come sel- dom, and are usually well prepared for; and there is cordial excitement and sympathy and applause to hearten and to cheer. No ; what wore them out was the constant, ceaseless round of exacting duties which made up the little things of daily life. To do a great and startling deed now and again is a tonic and a stimulant. But, oh, — the countless little acts of hidden duty — where is the cordial or the tonic in these ? This is the reason why one sometimes finds persons who are deplorably deficient in the performance of little duties belonging to their state of life and who yet surprise their neighbors and all who know them best, by some heroism of devotion, some surprising act of renunciation, or some startling stroke of self-sacrifice. Their courage was not great enough, it may be, to bear the strain of every-day and petty faithfulness. They winced and yielded at the pain of heroic fidelity in little things. But when a sudden opportunity of doing a single striking deed 14 The Greatness of the Little of self-renunciation came upon them, they found heart of grace for that moment of sublime accomplishment. They had strength enough to be heroes, but not enough to be heroic in little things! Fiction abounds in such characters, and e very-day life has its share of them. Occa- sionally, when a great catastrophe occurs, some obscure man or woman, of whom no one has heard before, comes into sudden and glorious prominence by doing a heroic action. Of course this heroism of a moment is sometimes only the flowering out of long- continued and hidden faithfulness of virtue in the trifling things of the day's routine. The staunch spirit of self-sacrifice, grown into a sturdy habit by constant exercise in the little things of life, shows itself gloriously in moments of supreme need or danger. But not always. Sometimes Tom or Mary blos- soms suddenly out into a heroic action, with no preceding practice of great faithfulness or constancy to prepare them for the noble deed. A sudden occasion, a strong and mov- ing impulse to do something unselfish and great, and Tom leaps out from the crowd and amazes all who knew him — and none more than himself — by playing the The Greatness of the Little 15 impromptu hero, and covering himself with momentary glory. It is the affair of an instant. There was no time for his fiery enthusiasm to cool away. The very heat of bold resolve which moved him to attempt the deed, carries him through and brings him safely out of it, without space to falter or repent. It is a great help to be committed to a noble line of action with no way out and every one watching us go through with it. Given the proper incentives, most of us could be heroes for one occasion. But contrast this heroism of an hour, this showy and public doing of a striking deed, with the slow, dull, hidden heroism which one must practice if he will be greatly faithful in all the little duties of life. There is no question then of a swift, exalted instant of spectacular self-sacrifice, with the applause of other men to cheer us, and our own hearts beating high with enthusiasm, and the stress of a great occasion keying us up to heroic courage and sublime achievement. No, there is question rather of the long, weary stretches of dull days with wearing duties, of long hours when we might be doing our own sweet will and taking our own good pleasure, of long moments when the weight 1 6 The Greatness of the Little and pressure of monotonous toil grows intol- erable from the thought of so many similar moments, which reach behind us and stretch before. To keep steady and cheerful through the lights and shadows of our life's long travels, to keep strong and true to the great ideals which Faith holds up before us in spite of all alluring byways of pleasure and ease, to be good when goodness is common- place and wearisome beyond expression, and when wickedness, in the false light of this world, is attractive and alluring — this is the every-day heroism, which life requires of the common man. Who that has any deep experience thereof, will ever say sincerely that a momentary feat of glorious self-for- getfulness and courage can ever be truly called harder than those years of painful, dull fidelity and sacrifice? Most men shrink from such heights of constant faithfulness and honor as this hero- ism of every day demands. They allow themselves little exemptions from the stern ways of consistent fidelity in little things. They take the edge off unpleasant obligations by small concessions to their own small weak- nesses. Where the harness of duty rubs, they ease the hurt by compromises. Perhaps The Greatness of the Little 17 this is the reason why they find it hard to see how hidden and every-day lives can ever be heroic. Their life is not, because they have no heart for the endless sacrifice which can make dull lives sublime. But only let us try to do all the trivial tasks of every day supremely well, and we shall see what hero- ism lies in little things. We have said that it is God's will to offer us all great opportunities of being heroic in these small occasions. The material for noble fidelity and courage lies ready to hand in all the trials and duties of the day. Possibly it has never occurred to you to view your commonplace life as the theatre of glorious and lofty deeds. You feel obscure and little, in the midst of this great w r orld of men and women — so many of them far above you in all that demands attention and wins esteem. But you may become conspicuous and noble at any moment of your days — noble at least and conspicuous in the sight of God and of His angels — by being great and heroic in little things. The duties which harass and oppress you with a weariness that no man on earth, it seems to you, can lighten or comprehend, are only so many doors to greatness. The little slurs and slights you 1 8 The Greatness of the Little meet with from other men and women, are matter for grand forbearance and forgive- ness. The opportunities for self-sacrifice and self-denial which line your way, are but material for conquests and victories which might almost make the angels envious! Look over your days in the light of these reflections, and see how God has meant your whole life to be a glorious battlefield, with chances at every step for hand-to-hand encounters and mighty feats of arms ! Discouragement, in one form or another, is one of the great causes of our sloth and small accomplishment. Well, here is a cure and a charm against low spirits and discour- agement — to think of the heroic possibilities of our dull and common lives. How can any one pine and fret at his lack of oppor- tunity, when there lie ready at hand occasions for unselfish devotion and glorious self-sacri- fice which can please the hosts of heaven! The same all-wise Creator, who has planned His world to give all men this chance to practice the heroism of little things, has been at great pains too, if one can speak so of Him, to make it clear to us all, that it is His will, that we should practice this commonplace heroism. His command- The Greatness of the Little 19 ments and His counsels all point us on to steadfast fidelity in little things and great. The command He gave to our first parents in the beginning, may have seemed to them but a little thing, yet it was most momentous in its consequences. Many of their descend- ants find it hard to see why God still gives us, through His Church, onerous precepts, concerning seemingly little things. The abstaining from meat, the keeping of holy- days and fast-days, the marriage laws of the Church, the regulations of dioceses and par- ishes — they sometimes seem, to the unwise, nothing but fussing over trifles. Yet, these seeming trifles are in reality momentous things, for they measure our love and fidelity and obedience toward the One Eternal God, the Lord of all. The most solemn and striking lesson of the importance of little things, of little duties and little cares, was given us by the Word Made Flesh. The pagan nations of old in their longing for some nearer knowledge of God had woven together many curious and fanciful legends of gods who came to seek adventure among the sons of men. But all their notions of what a god would do, if he were to come on earth, ran upon splendid 20 The Greatness of the Little feats and startling wonders, showy exploits and stupendous deeds, done in the face of an astounded world. Nothing but the magnifi- cent, the striking and the heroic was worthy, so they judged, of the gods who walked with men. When the true God of Heaven did vouch- safe to come on earth to show mankind the godlike way of living, how singular and unthought of were His deeds! He did indeed live a life which was most magnifi- cently heroic, but His heroism for thirty long years, was the heroism of little things. His days went by in simple obedience, in painful labor, in the thousand small acts of service, kindness and forbearance which make up the plain man's gray and uneventful days. All that the Gospels find to say of Him, during this time, is contained in one small sentence of St. Luke, "He went down with His par- ents into Galilee and was subject to them." For thirty years, with Mary and with Joseph, He practiced the arduous and hidden heroism of an inconspicuous and laborious life. Yet no one but God Himself can ever comprehend the full and glorious heroism of every act and thought and word of all those The Greatness of the Little 21 thirty years. Not a moment but bore its due and utter weight of glory to God, of good to men, of wonder and joy to all the watching hosts of heaven. Not an act of the God-Man, but was in perfect and just accord with the will of His Heavenly Father — in heroic and complete self-immolation of His human will to the plans of God. This accord is, after all, what makes up the true and splendid heroism of little things — the perfect harmony between the details of our lives and the designs of God's holy will. He does not disdain — that infinitely great and glorious Lord — to have a care even of the littlest things. Seen from the heights of His Infinity, nothing is great or little, save in the sense that all things are great which give Him glory, and all are unspeakably vile which contravene His Will. So that not the least of our daily actions can escape His eyes and nothing can fail to please Him which is done in full concord with His Law. This is one of the lessons we have all of us most need to learn, and it was to teach us this that the Saviour of men spent thirty years in the obscure cottage in hidden Nazareth. He and Mary and Joseph were 22 The Greatness of the Little seeking in every little thing the great and perfect will of God. All the men and women who have most gloriously followed the example of Christ's perfect life have done so by heroic faithful- ness in little things. Read the lives of the saints, and you will find their hidden faith- fulness in the small details of their laborious perfection, more wonderful than their mira- cles, and more moving than their great, pub- lic exploits of charity and zeal. The slow martyrdom of a life of absolute self-sacrifice and fidelity, is a greater proof of love and holiness than the power to move mountains or to bid the sun stand still. Those holy souls, in every state of life, who practice this hidden heroism of little things, are the salt of the earth, and the light of the world. Think of the patient, and devoted fathers and mothers who pray and toil in a willing slavery from dawn to dusk, keeping their little flock. Think of the priests, who work in God's vineyard, in the loneliness of little parishes, living their daily round of solitude and poverty that they may feed the little ones of Christ. Think of the men and women, vowed to the threefold heroism of the religious life, whose labors The Greatness of the Little 23 He in every land throughout the civilized and savage regions of the earth, who live hidden and self-immolating lives in strictest imita- tion of that perfect life at Nazareth ! These men and women are heroic indeed. The bravest soldier who ever led a forlorn hope upon a battlefield, would shrink from taking up their faithful round of daily toil and prayer. Their silent and unselfish devotion puts all show and pretentiousness to shame. The reverence in which their lives are held by those who know them best, is one of the greatest of all encomiums upon the heroism of little things ! We ourselves should draw some cheerful inspiration from the thought of the greatness which lies in doing our little duties well. There they are, forever with us, forever appealing, forever pressing with unceasing urgency — that host of daily tasks. They are our supreme opportunity, if only we will choose to do them perfectly. They hold out to us, with a thousand eager hands, a thou- sand chances of winning heavenly fame. Our little duties to God, our little duties to our neighbor, and to ourselves, are, each one in its distinctive way, new opportunities for admirable fidelity and self-denial. Let us 24 The Greatness of the Little greet them with a hearty welcome when they come upon us hereafter, little ways of being generous, little ways of being unselfish, help- ful and kind. If we will have courage to practice these little heroisms of hidden fidel- ity to principle, these little martyrdoms to duty, what peace and calm and happiness of soul will come to us here on earth, and what surpassing glory hereafter! It is little things that lead us to perfection, and true perfection is the heroism of little things. IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN There is an inexpressible pathos about lost opportunities. One sees it in many instances of life. "The sad- dest words of tongue or pen," as we are reminded in an antique and ill-rhymed dis- tich, "are those sad words, 'It might have been.' " To have had an opportunity and squandered it, to have had a chance and lost it, awakens regret in the heart, which is no less keen because so unavailing. What a strange thing is time! We are carried on past the hours and the days, and at each moment opportunities, like lovely vistas, open to either side. But the current of time is swift and we can never return. The past opportunities are irrevocably behind us, and no effort of ours can bring us back to them again. "If you do not ask me what time is," says St. Augustine, "I know; but if you ask me what it is, I find I do not know." What we know of time is its outward reality, its irre- 25 12,6 It Might Have Been vocable movement, its unvarying current, the speed with which it carries us on and never releases us to wander back again to the things that were, except by the unavailing and shadowy paths of memory. And we lose, in the swift rush of time, so many opportunities ! It has been said by some of the saints who were blessed with revelations from Almighty God, that if we could see the graces prepared even for ordinary men and women, would they but accept their daily opportunities, we should think that such favors were reserved for the greatest saints. How many of these high achievements, how exceedingly many of the graces which God has laid up for us, we have lost and left behind us by neglecting our momentary opportunities ! It is a common- place in the spiritual life, that one grace leads to another. When we are offered some chance of doing a good act and accept it, it is not merely the merit of that act that we gain, but we take in our hands one link of a golden chain of such graces; and if we accept each one as it comes, this chain of the favors of God will lead us slowly onward and upward toward 'the heights of perfect virtue. But if we loose from our hand that 77 Might Have Been 27 one golden link of present opportunity, then we lose the whole chain, for one link is caught up with another, and quitting our grasp on one, we drop them all. One sees impressive illustrations of this in the lives of some of the saints. An opportunity which seemingly was of little moment, to practice an act of virtue or to show their love for God was eagerly seized by them, leading them on to greater effort. It was the instant opening and clos- ing of a door to great vistas of sanctity, as they passed by on the road of life. With love and desire they leapt in, before the door of the moment's opportunity was closed to them, and thereafter their feet walked in new paths and they aspired after heavenly things. The story of St. Camillus de Lellis offers an instance of such a prompt grasping of a moment's grace. He was a broken- down soldier, discharged, disabled from the wars. At the age of nineteen he was already an inveterate gambler, a brawler and an out- cast even from the rough circles of the camp. To gain his daily bread he took some menial work in the building of a monastery, and one day a compassionate monk came out to speak a few words of admonition and exhor- tation to the broken soldier. At that 28 It Might Have Been moment the grace of God touched the young man's heart. He felt contrition for what he had done, resolved to change his ways, and gave the rest of his days to the practice of heroic sanctity. How many such impulses have come to us I Yet Camillus, brawler, gambler as he was, listened to the Heavenly Invitation. His heart leapt up to meet the grace of God. He seized the opportunity, was moved to contrition, became desirous of amendment. He confessed his sins and began the way of a new life. From that moment's taking of the opportunity of God's grace and pardon, Camillus the sinner went forth to be Camillus the saint. It was so, too, with St. John of God. A sermon so touched his heart (as how many times sermons have touched our own), that he resolved at once to be quit of the world and to live for God alone. He rushed from the church in such fervor of contrition and love of God that men thought him, for a while, a fool. But from the moment when he rose to that heavenly opportunity, he was a changed man and an heroic servant of God. It was so also with St. Francis of Assisi. He stripped himself of all things, put on a It Might Have Been 29 sackcloth marked with the sign of the cross and went forth to fulfill with rigorous observance the counsel of poverty. It was so with all the saints, so with Ignatius when on his bed of pain he perceived the difference between the delights of the world and the delights of God's service, and made the great renunciation. The heights of prayer and sacrifice to which the saints arose, depended on their seizing of momentary opportunities. It is the same with all souls who are sin- cerely zealous in serving God. All goodness is the result of using good opportunities. No amount of dreamy wishing, no abstract speculation, will make any one holy. Holi- ness comes from the taking of the oppor- tunities of every day for self-sacrifice, good deeds, faith, hope and charity in action, and all the exercises of virtue that make up a holy life. God's graces descend on us at instants; they offer themselves to us for the moment; the moment passes; the grace passes away; the opportunity is either taken or has been refused, and we are richer or poorer for all eternity. It is a tremendous thought, that our opportunities run forward and impress them- selves, for our weal or loss, upon eternity. 30 It Might Have Been Eternity is the logical and irrevocable conse- quence of our use of passing opportunities. We shall be glorious for all eternity in just the proportion that we use the opportunities of time. A thousand crowding chances, met with day after day in the ordinary course of our lives, offer us occasions for acts of faith, of hope and of love both toward God and our neighbor. Little words of charity, the opportunity for small deeds of goodness, small services to our neighbor and the Church which lie in our path, the myriad interweavings of good deeds which make up an ordinary Christian life — these things are seemingly slight and infinitesimal in them- selves, a mere web of passing opportunities, yet they are the stuff of which is woven the cloth of gold of our eternal glory. Every time we neglect and pass over the chance of a good deed offered us, we lose, so to say, one strand in the bright robe which we shall wear before the eyes of the Almighty. Every least opportunity seized upon and made use of; every good action which we perform for the love of God, is another golden thread to help to clothe us before God and His saints in the days to be. Throughout our years we have been using or refusing our momen- It Might Have Been 3 r tary opportunities, and there is ready for us now, through God's mercy and kindness, a garment of heavenly glory more or less beautiful, more or less richly adorned with the gold that does not tarnish and the jewels that will not perish, according as we have made use of or neglected them. Viewed in this light, how immensely important even the small chances of life become! Consider the many moments in which we can pause and make an act of love of God. To love God for His own sake is the most profitable of all actions. One such act clears the soul of mortal sin, adorns it with greater graces, and gains merit for eter- nity in the eyes of God. Granted a little thoughtfulness, a little care, and our life is full of opportunities for making an act of God's love. Both misfortune and joy, full- ness, and need, happiness and distress are continually reminding us of our dependence on God, our need of His infinite goodness and love. The shadows of earth point us toward God, just as the brightness of Heaven reminds us of Him. In pain or sorrow our thoughts turn to the Father who can relieve all our distresses. Fullness and content remind us of Him from whom all blessings 32 It Might Have Been flow. In Him we live and move and have our being, and all things conspire both with- out and within us to remind us continually of the mercy and tenderness of God and to multiply our opportunities for loving and serving Him. It is a little and an easy action to love God, so far as concerns the labor and effort required. It is an endlessly holy and pre- cious, weighty and glorious thing to love Him, so far as concerns the merit and dig- nity of the action. How life multiplies and presses upon us opportunities for that other exercise of Divine Charity which, with the love of God, fulfills the law — to wit: the love and help of our neighbor! Our neighbor is, as it were, the representative of God for us. Since we can neither benefit nor help the Infinite Goodness who is the object of our love, He gives us our neighbor in His stead whom we can benefit and save. "Whatso- ever you do to one of these My least brethren," He says, "you do it to Me." God wishes us to understand that in our neighbor we have endless opportunities for serving and loving Him. In many ways we have been offered It Might Have Been 33 chances for helping, serving, saving even, those about us. How have we used those golden opportunities? There is no one to whom such thoughts will not bring some sense of loss and of regret. Weak and fickle creatures that we are, we do the evil that we will not, and we omit the good that we would do. It is hard for us to keep in mind these great and eternal truths, for we are so set about and distracted by the things of time. Therefore, looking back over the years, who will not be struck sad at the mul- tiplied loss of opportunities? Consider how long you have lived on earth, and reflect how constantly each moment of your con- scious life has crowded upon you the golden gifts of opportunity! We are all but too sadly aware how often we have neglected, missed and squandered our chances of grace and merit. The fruit of these reflections must be to stir us to desire to seize our opportunities yet to come. We shall have to gird our- selves with resolution and strengthen our hearts with charity, so as to make use at least of the hours that still remain before that night cometh wherein no man can work. Thanks to the mercy of God, our oppor- 34 It Might Have Been tunities are never over, until life itself is done. Bright and exquisite as were the vistas of possible achievement in God's serv- ice which have passed and which lie forever behind us, His mercy is continually opening up to us still newer chances of serving and loving Him. It may even be that in His mercy the opportunities to come will surpass those which have gone before. By resolv- ing now to seize upon them as they arise, we shall be able to do great things for God and our neighbor before we die. Happy for us that we are offered so many, many opportunities ! God woos us with manifold graces. His blessings are never exhausted, His mercy never ceases, until we die. Then indeed the way of our opportunities is closed; the door is sealed forever. We shall then, for all eternity, live and be what we choose to be now during our time of probation, when opportunities are thick and bright about u$. Let us take these thoughts to heart betimes. There will come a day, alas, when, having by the mercy of God gained purga- tory, we shall, in that wakeful darkness, think over with sorrow and regret the days of our life. Oh, then how we shall linger // Might Have Been 35 upon and regret each lost opportunity of our life! In that clear and marvelous self- knowledge, in that complete vision of the value of eternity and the nothingness of time, in that light which memory will throw upon our life, we shall see in its fullness the price- lessness of every opportunity of merit and of glory, and the realization will be perhaps one of the keenest of the pangs of purgatory. How wise we shall be if now, while there is yet time, we avert this fruitless suffering. Let us make amends, in the time that remains, for all our lost opportunities. Let us seek to surpass ourselves in vigilance and fervor, seizing each new occasion for self- sacrifice, faith, love and effort in the cause of God and our neighbor during those few and brief hours that still remain of our time of trial and opportunity on earth. ON BEING MADE CLEAN The doctrine of purgatory is hardly counted, by many pious Christians, among the sources of their spiritual consolation. In fact, the thought of purga- tory is, to most of us, a disquieting thought, quite the reverse of consoling. It is a teach- ing of our Faith that there is after this life a state of punishment, wherein the souls of those who have departed this life in the grace of God but with venial sins unforgiven, with the punishment of forgiven sins not yet atoned for, must abide in banishment from heaven until they have satisfied the justice of God and are cleansed and fit for heaven. But to suggest to us that in this doctrine is to be found the source of a truly consoling assurance, is perhaps to go beyond what we have ever thought concerning purgatory. Still, if we consider the name which is given to this place or state of pain, we shall see the glimmerings of that consolation, shining like a distant light through the 36 On Being Made Clean 37 shadows of the misty land of atonement. For purgatory means a place of cleansing, and so we are assured by the very existence of this state of purgation, that when we emerge therefrom we shall be cleansed and free from the last imperfection which tor- mented us upon earth, from the last trace of our faults and our sins. This assurance, if we esteem it rightly, has in itself much consolation. It reminds us that one day, in God's good time, we shall be delivered from the soils and wounds which our transgres- sions have left upon our poor souls. To those who love and serve God, the thought of their unworthiness to meet the sight of the Most Holy and Most Pure, is a real and keen distress. Indeed, the con- viction of man's guilt in the sight of God, is part of the great heritage of human sor- row, and the effort to be cleansed of sin and the consequences of sin, is at the root of many practices of penance and atonement found among pagan and barbarous tribes. The weakness of our nature inclines us to trangress God's law, but once the sin is com- mitted, shame follows fast on its traces, and the unhappy sinner seeks for some means to purge his soul of the stain of his unhappy 38 On Being Made Clean fault. It is thus common to all men who are not hardened in guilt or sophisticated by false theories, or who are not so ignorant as to be unable to comprehend their situation, to desire some means of being freed from their past sins. Hence the rituals of pen- ance and atonement, to be found in all religions; hence the austerities and mortifi- cations which are part of the universal lan- guage of piety; hence men are drawn to severe and difficult practices of purification, whereby they hope to be made clean from sin and the consequences of sin. Thus the means of penance and satisfac- tion which the Church offers her children in this world, are not only a necessity to our fallen and sinful state, they are also the answer to a craving of our nature. The desire to be clean of the consequences of our sin, which is so ingrained in us, and which has given rise to so many non-Chris- tian ceremonies of purification, is answered in a merciful and complete way by the sacra- ments, which offer to the sinner, no matter how deep and terrible his guilt, an oppor- tunity of being cleansed and healed of his transgressions, providing he be truly repent- ant. The craving to be clean from sin is a On Being Made Clean 39 salutary desire, and so God has given to His Church the means to gratify it. Yet in the personal application of these means of cleansing to our own soul, there always remains a certain degree of obscurity. We are, unhappily, sure that we have sinned, as St. Augustine says, but we are not sure that our sins have been forgiven. Still less are we sure that our penances, the use of the sacramentals, the gaining of indulgences, have rid us of all the remains of sin, of all the punishment still due after the guilt has been forgiven, of all the lesser sins which we have not rightly repented of. These things may still soil and burden our soul, even after our serious sins have been for- given. When, then, shall we be certain of being completely friends of God? When shall we know that all traces of our sins have been banished from our soul? The answer is, "When we come forth from purga- tory." Whatever God does, is done well and thoroughly. Whenever He creates a thing for a special object, that object is attained. It is scarcely necessary for us to reason long to convince ourselves that since the state of purgatory has been created by God for the 40 On Being Made Clean express purpose of cleansing our souls from all trace of sin, and making us utterly pure and ready for heaven, this purging of our spirits will be well and perfectly accom- plished. When we emerge from the fiery bath of purgatory we shall be quite clean and fit even for the eyes of God. There will be in us then no speck or stain of human sin. We shall literally be as pure as the angels, and the glory of our sanctifying grace, that gold of the spirit, that gift of God which makes us holy, will shine out with splendor, no longer obscured by the slightest stain. We shall be a worthy associate for the company of the Blessed, and the eyes of the angels and the saints, bent on us with intensest love and welcome, will discover in us nothing unfit for the pure light of heaven. If we can conceive even very faintly the joy of that ecstatic moment, when we shall look our own selves through and through and dis- cover in all our being no speck or stain, we may see what consolation is to be found in the thought of a purgatory. If there existed some marvelous process, discovered by modern medicine, for cleans- ing and rejuvenating the whole human sys- tem, washing out all the accumulations of On Being Made Clean 41 disease, renewing all the organs of the body to the cleanness and vigor of youth, making the frame glow with health and strength and prolonging indefinitely the life of the body in the flush of well-being and physical per- fection, how eagerly the feeble, the diseased and the old, would throng to beg the favor of being treated and cleansed and healed. It would not matter to them that the treatment was painful and tedious, that it was costly and exacting — they would bear the pain for the sake of the future peace. The assured hope of seeing an end to all the infirmities and uncleannesses which vex them, would make them willing to submit to hard condi- tions and to bear agonizing pain. Purgatory is indeed such a cure for the uncleannesses and diseases of our nobler part, the soul. It rejuvenates, so to say, our spirit, jaded and old with the sins of this wretched life. It restores to us that innocence which was ours in the glorious youth of our soul, when we had been born again of water and the Holy Ghost and were without spot in the eyes of God and of His saints. It frees us forever from our spir- itual illnesses, themselves the results of our sins, and ushers us into a glorious existence 42 On Being Made Clean in which sin will be impossible, wh&re we shall forever enjoy the fullest youth and life of the spirit, in a health and joy that knows no end. It is good to think that there is such a remedy for all our soul's evils, such a place of cleansing that can wash and burn from the very inner marrow of our soul all shameful and sickening stains. Again, one sees the willingness with which surgical patients submit to painful and dan- gerous operations to secure even a trifling prolongation of their life, even a brief respite from some terrible disease that is devouring them. They will agree to leave their homes and their occupations, to be cut and burned, to pass long hours of suffering, to risk their precious lives on a chance of being healed. They have no such absolute assurance as has the soul in purgatory, that they will be cleansed and healed. They have no certainty that the result of the treat- ment will be favorable in proportion as their sufferings are dolorous. Yet they put them- selves in the hands of the surgeon, they take the anaesthetic and bear the after conse- quences of an operation, thanking God that there are hospitals and operating rooms and men skilful enough to make the incisions in On Being Made Clean 43 their bodies, which may give some health where before there was illness and corrup- tion. When we pass into the keeping of the angel of purgatory, there will be no doubt- fulness or speculation. With the sureness of a divine decree, our soul will be purged and cleansed of its last stain, made utterly healthy and pure and prepared for the bright wedding-feast of heaven. In that hospital of souls there is no uncertainty of a cure. We shall rest content, even in the anguish of purgatory, because we shall be so sure of our healing, so confident of our eternal vigor of body and soul forevermore. If we were not assured by faith of the existence of purgatory, and by reason, of its complete efficacy to cleanse our souls, we might be driven to worry and to wonder how such creatures as ourselves might ever be made fit for heaven. Nothing defiled can enter there, and which of us but is sure that he has not that spotless innocence that would entitle him to pass the portals of the God of infinite purity? True, by severe penance, by a rectitude of intention and holiness of life that would atone for our past transgres- sions and avoid all new occasions of soiling 44 On Being Made Clean our souls by sin, we might hope to make our- selves so clean of spirit that we could go straight from our death-bed into eternal glory. But we can scarcely flatter ourselves that we are brave enough or strong enough for such a perfect self-purification. Most of us have an abiding conviction that when we have done with this life we shall need a period of cleansing in purgatory, for we are aware that we have not done enough in life to atone for all the punishment due to our sins. Purgatory is therefore our refuge and our hope of cleansing. What we cannot or will not do for ourselves in this life, God's mercy will do for us effectively in purgatory. It would be much better so to live as not to need those searching fires, just as it would be much better for men so to live as never to fall into the hands of physician or surgeon. But since we do fall ill and languish because of our sins, and have not ourselves the strength to overcome our weaknesses, it is a merciful thing that there waits for us at last an effective means to become clean and ready for God's banquet everlasting. There are many other consoling corol- laries from the doctrine of purgatory — more On Being Made Clean 45 than there is space to tell. For one thing, this doctrine reminds us that we can by our good actions and our sufferings, borne in satisfaction of the justice of God, lessen more and more our purgatory and cleanse our soul more and more completely from the stains of sin. The more we do in this world by way of penance and atonement, the less will remain to be done when we are come to purgatory. Even the bearing of the trials and sorrows of every day for the love of God and in reparation for our offences, will lessen our time in purgatory. It is consoling, too, to remember that by the gaining of indulgences w r e can shorten, for ourselves and for others, the time of purifying. The means of gaining indul- gences are multiplied by the Church to encourage us thus to apply the merits of Christ for the satisfying of the temporal punishment due to our sins. Somehow or other the satisfaction must be made, and it rests with ourselves whether it shall for the most part be accomplished in this world, or deferred to the hard ordeal of purgatory. The woes of this world are brief and pass- ing. It will help us to bear them if we think that each of these temporal afflictions, duly 4 6 On Being Made Clean offered up in atonement for our* sins, is of immense efficacy in cleansing our souls. We shall understand all these things far better when we have done with the illusions of life, and entered into the portals of eter- nity. Then our poor soul, conscious for the first time of the hideousness of the stains of sin, and agonized by the desire of being made clean and fit for the sight of God, will cry out for the baths of purgatory. In his poem "The Dream of Gerontius," Cardinal New- man has voiced this desire in a moving lyric: "Take me away," cries out the soul, "and in the lowest deep, there let me be !" The poor souls in purgatory are most grateful to God for providing this cleansing fire wherein they are made pure of what now alone afflicts them — the traces of their sins. Though they suffer, yet they are consoled in the midst of their pain, for they know that every instant brings them nearer to the glory of heaven. So, if we look intently on the doctrine of purgatory, we, too, shall discern therein some comfort and consolation. Whether or not we have courage to cut away, ourselves, the rankness of the wounds of our souls, there is a cure hereafter that will make us utterly On Being Made Clean 47 whole. Whether or not we leave this life quite free from all affection to venial sin, there is a place of purging that will detach us utterly from all that is not perfectly pleas- ing to God, and deliver us from our baser selves, our plague and our shame all our life long. We dread the approach of death because we feel ourselves so unworthy to appear before an all-holy God, from whom nothing is hidden, who searches the heart. But God has had pity on our misery and has provided for us an antechamber to heaven, where, like courtiers of a great prince, we may arrange our disordered vesture and make ourselves quite fit to appear before our Master and our King. This antechamber to heaven is the place or state of cleansing that we meaningly call "purgatory." THE CHEERING THOUGHT OF HEAVEN WE CHEAT ourselves of a consolation that could lighten up the whole path of our lives, when we neglect to think of and contemplate the everlasting joys of heaven. Once deeply grasped, the reality of that place of everlasting peace and glory and delight can cast a holy light upon all the dark places of our life. Not only is the attainment of heaven the consummation of our existence, the fulfilling of all our aspir- ations, the curing of all our woes and the realization of all our ideals and desires, but even the thought of heaven is a medicine for our wearinesses and sorrows, a balm for our wounds, a solace for our griefs and woes. To think rightly of heaven is to understand the world, to judge correctly of life, to esti- mate all things at their true worth, and to see our own course, its sorrows and its joys, in right perspective. Yet we are much more inclined to seek temporal and slight consolations from this 4 8 Cheering Thought of Heaven 49 world and the things around us, than to look for solace from the thought of heaven. One reason for this is that our nature is prone to present and visible things and finds it diffi- cult to aspire to what is spiritual and unseen. While we believe firmly in the existence of heaven, yet this truth has not its due effect in consoling and strengthening our souls, because we make so little effort to realize the meaning of heaven. Immersed in the world of the senses, distracted by material things, we do not grasp the significance of what we firmly believe. In the Apostles' Creed we say : "I believe ... in life everlasting." What an astound- ing profession of faith! We believe in a future life which is to be everlasting, that is, to have no end. Pause for a moment on the meaning of those words. We believe in a life which will begin when we enter heaven, but which will literally and in sober truth have no end. Forever and forever, through uncounted ages, past all imaginable years, we shall continue to live and to live, not this wretched and painful life of earth, with its thousand cares and sorrows, but a life wherein God Himself will exert, so to say, the powers of His Omnipotence to make us 50 Cheering Thought of Heaven perfectly and supremely happy, where we shall at every instant be filled with bliss to the very measure of our capacity, where we shall share in the imperishable and glorious life of the City of the Heavenly Jerusalem, the abode of unending happiness and peace. Our faith is most firm in the existence of this life without end. We believe that death is not the end-all of our conscious existence, but only the term of our suffering and trial in this world. Our present life is but a pre- lude and a preparation. Here, we can scarcely be said to live, so miserable and restricted is our existence. Our lordly faculties are constrained by the conditions of matter; our days are few and full of trouble like the days of a hired soldier; we have not here a lasting city, but we look for the things that are to come. But in that everlasting life, how glorious shall be the expansion of our being! The intelligence, which now is darkened by sin, and limited by the narrow confines of human knowledge, will be so illumined by the Light of Glory, so strengthened and transformed by the power of God, that we shall be wiser than all the sages of earth, shall possess the most thrilling power of thought and be the Cheering Thought of Heaven 5 1 fit associates of the celestial host in heavenly intelligence. Those who are sad at their own limited knowledge and vision, who regret their missed opportunities of educa- tion, may console themselves with the thought that if they love and serve God faithfully in this short life on earth, the power of the Most High will give to them, for all of their life everlasting, a depth and vigor of intelligence that will be the wonder of the Blessed. For our intelligence in the life to come will not be measured by our wisdom and education in this world, but by the fidelity with which we have loved God, kept His commandments and merited eternal glory. So, too, our will, perfected and confirmed in holiness forever by the beatific vision of God, will be incapable of the slightest sin. Strong in all manner of goodness, noble and holy to a degree of which we cannot now con- ceive ourselves capable, we shall be united to the adorable will of God by so sure and unbreakable a tie, that through all eternity we shall be unable to will the slightest thing apart from His infinite good pleasure. Here our will is free, and this freedom, the source of our merit, is also, alas ! the reason of our 52 Cheering Thought of Heaven sins, because our wretched will so often freely departs from the all-holy Will of God. But in the life everlasting, it will no longer be possible for us to sin. We shall see God as He is, and the ravishing goodness of that adorable God will so transport and engross our will as to make us incapable of doing anything, willing anything save as God wills. We shall, so, be utterly safe from any sin or imperfection through all eternity, as sin- less as the Virgin Mother of God herself, as sinless as the Son of God ! What a con- solation to those who groan beneath the weight of their own imperfections, who long to be delivered from their sins! In a similar way, all the faculties of our being shall be exalted and glorified beyond conception. Our imagination, that excellent faculty which yet plagues and misleads so many of mankind, shaLl be purified and strengthened to be a docile and perfect ser- vant of the intelligence. Now, the great reaches of poetry may be obscure to us, our imagination cannot rise, perhaps, on a lofty wing and range from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven. But in heaven all men shall be poets, in the exalted sense that all shall have the keenest appreciation of true Cheering Thought of Heaven 53 beauty. The Infinite Beauty who is God, will indeed fill all minds and hearts, but the lesser beauties of creation will be open to our appreciation as to no poet or sage who ever walked this world. What an existence is this, which waits beyond the door of death, much more near to us than we imagine, much more accessible to us than a dream. All the rosy fancies of poets, all their worlds of vision bright in the light that never was on land or sea, pale into darkness beside the thought of that heavenly country where God Himself is ever busy ensuring with sedulous care the perfect hap- piness of the guests and favored children of His eternity. When we were little we loved the tales of the kingdom of the fairies, where the light and beauty of fancy were lavished in impossible profusion. But heaven is much more than the fairy land of our child- hood — it is a place where the almighty Cre- ator of the universe has exerted the powers of His omnipotence to make glad the hearts of His children, and where the inexhaustible resources of His love shall forever be pre- paring new surprises of joy and glory throughout the endless days of a perfectly happy eternity. 54 Cheering Thought of Heaven Consider, again, the company that will be ours for all ages. Excellent above all the other joys of heaven is the delight of the beatific vision, whereby in a wonderful way we shall see God face to face and know Him as He is. Now we see Him, as it were, in a glass, darkly, arriving at the knowledge of His infinite beauty and perfections from the teachings of faith and from the loveliness and the wonder of His creation. But then we shall behold His very Self, and in a manner that we cannot even conceive, shall be made inexpressibly happy, seeing Him as He is, the Uncreated Beauty, the boundless Glory, the Love and Tenderness most infinite, the Absolute Goodness for whom our whole being craves, the Center of all our great desires, the Goal of all our hopes, to possess whom is heaven, to lack whom is most bitter hell. Our entire life long we are hungering after happiness, and all our efforts, consciously or not, are bent on secur- ing felicity. In God our only lasting happi- ness is to be found. That most glorious Lord can perfectly satisfy even the endless cravings of our nature. We shall rest in the fullness of peace and joy if only we possess God. In heaven we shall possess Him Cheering Thought of Heaven 55 utterly and in the most perfect manner pos- sible to us, for we shall be His chosen friends for all eternity and we shall see Him as He is. Think again of the angels and the saints who are to be our companions throughout an eternity of happiness. In the nine choirs of the celestial spirits, how many excellent and perfect friends wait to welcome us to their company. The angels and the arch- angels, the thrones, the dominations, the principalities and powers, the virtues, cher- ubim, seraphim — we know but the names of these glorious hierarchies and can conjecture only in part the majestic offices which they fulfil in the Court of God. But in each of these exalted choirs of angels are innumer- able bright spirits, beautiful beyond our farthest conceiving, various in gifts, lovely in nature, reflecting each one the perfections of the Divine Essence, so that the company of each will be to us a special and particular joy for all eternity. How happy will be our converse with the blessed angels ! All these angelic natures wait to receive us into their companionship with a friendly joy that we cannot dream of. We are cre- ated to supply those gaps in their ranks that 56 Cheering Thought of Heaven were made by the fall of so many spirits from the gates of heaven into the depths of hell, when God tried His angels to see whether they would obey Him. The angels in heaven must therefore regard us with a spe- cial and brotherly love, seeing in us the future companions of their endless life, the sharers in that eternal paean of love and joy wherewith they praise forever the God who made them. What a welcome we shall receive then from those lovable and glorious spirits when we come to join the choirs of their celestial bliss ! Next turn your eyes on the ranks of the saints, and see with how noble and goodly a human company, by the mercy and kind- ness of God, you are to spend your joyous eternity. See the Sacred Humanity of our Divine Saviour, the Eldest Brother of the elect, the Lamb of God, who has taken away the sins of the world. He is the Light of the New Jerusalem, the Joy of all His peo- ple, whom He has gathered together at last from the darkness of the world into the security and light and peace of the home He has prepared for them from all eternity. How can we imagine the glory of that risen Humanity, bright with the jewels of His Cheering Thought of Heaven 57 sacred Blood, splendid with the light of His rosy wounds, which He keeps throughout all the ages in memory of His saving passion, beautiful beyond even the beauty of the Blessed, whom to see and to adore will be one of the crowning blisses of paradise ! Try to conceive what it will mean to those who have loved Him so long unseen, who have served Him faithfully, according to their lights, in the obscure and difficult paths of this world, who' have tried to follow Him from afar through the mists of life, to see Him face to face and exult in the sweetness of His welcoming smile in the safe home of eternity! Think of the converse we shall hold with that gentle Lord, in whose Hands and Feet and Side are written indelibly the proofs of His boundless love for each one of us, who has been waiting, during all the years of our life, with holy impatience for the moment when He could welcome us to heaven. How much He has to say to us, which will have to wait for that glorious hour because now He has imposed on Him- self the silence of the tabernacle, the reserve that befits Him during our time of probation. But there will come a time when He will give full way to the torrents of holy tenderness 58 Cheering Thought of Heaven which His Sacred Heart has for each one of us. That time will be the day of our endless converse with Him in heaven. Turn in pious contemplation and look upon our Blessed Mother, who likewise waits with holy longing to see us, her own children, safe in the shelter of her mantle in heaven. What manner of pure joy will be ours, when with exulting eyes we look for the first time on the true lineaments of that Most Beloved of women whom we have so loved during all our time on earth ! We have seen innumer- able pictures of the Blessed Mother, and some of them were the glorious imaginings of great geniuses of art, but none of them has quite satisfied our filial devotion because none of them was beautiful enough fitly to represent the most lovely and most holy of all the daughters of Eve. But in heaven we shall look for all eternity upon the very countenance of our Mother, and shall know that her smile holds for us in particular all the fondness of a mother's love. It has been the delight of some of the most favored of the saints to have the privi- lege of a vision of the Mother of God, and one moment of that blissful contemplation would have been enough to lighten the Cheering Thought of Heaven 59 whole pathway of their after lives. We shall all have in heaven, not merely the privilege of a single vision, but the constant companionship of her whom, after our Blessed Lord, we love the best of all creation. It is impossible for us to realize the felicity which this one joy of heaven will bring us. One look, one word from Blessed Mary would fill us with delight. How often, how long she will speak to us throughout the bright day of eternity ! When we think of the company of the saints in heaven, words fail to describe their number or the variety of their happy com- panies. There await us, in countless throngs, the ranks of the patriarchs and prophets, all the souls who were saved within and without the law before the coming of Our Lord upon earth. His apostles and disciples and all the faithful and chosen souls of that day who saw and heard the Word Made Flesh during the time of His ministry upon earth, await us in heaven. The glorious throng of martyrs await us, too, their robes all shining, washed in the blood of the Lamb; the throngs of confessors, the choir of virgins, the saints of all ages, from the first soul which entered heaven after Our Lord's ascension, to the 60 Cheering Thought of Heaven latest come forth from purgatory, all this shining company will welcome us to converse everlasting. Many of our own friends and relations are there, expecting us with a joyful eagerness of desire, and it will be part of our everlasting joy to see reflected in their eyes the splendors of our own beatitude. All this, and much more that we can faintly discern concerning that place of our eternal glory, is not a happy dream; it is a fact as literal and real as this present life, indeed more real and more enduring, for the City of God, the New Jerusalem is to last, unchanged, forever. At this very instant the angels and the blessed inhabit those gracious mansions which are ours for the desiring, and our own place is ready the moment after our death when we shall be freed from the stains of sin, either by our own prayer and penance or by virtue of the purifying flames of purga- tory. "In My Father's house," said Our Lord, "there are many mansions." One of those eternal and blessed abodes is already waiting to be ours for all eternity. As we realize more the ecstatic happiness of heaven, we shall take more consolation from that thought for all the sorrows and trials of the world. The more we grow to Cheering Thought of Heaven 61 esteem and to love the joys hereafter, the less we shall crave for and regret the pleasures of this life. The thought of heaven is thus at the same time a remedy and a consolation for our griefs and afflictions, and an antidote against that worldliness, that too-great love of this life and its perishable goods, which is a danger of these comfortable and pleasure- seeking times. As our Christian faith assures us of the existence of heaven, so also does Christian hope encourage us to look forward with a firm expectation to enjoy one day all its ineffable delights. True, if we considered only our own weakness and wickedness, we might grow discouraged at the thought of the straight and narrow way in which we must walk toward heaven. But we must not rely on our own resources. There is One who strengthens us and by the assistance of His grace, given to us in abundance in His good time, we firmly hope to win some day the joys of heaven. This firm hope grounded in Christ and relying on His holy promises, will not be disappointed. As men who are on hard service in foreign lands keep with them the picture of their home, and console themselves during weary 62 Cheering Thought of Heaven and dangerous hours by thinking of the joyful return that will be theirs after so much loneliness and toil, so may we, exiles from our true country of heaven, lighten the miseries of our lot by thinking of the bright home-coming and eternal joy that will be ours at last. The reality, when by God's grace we attain to it, will surpass all our most golden dreams, for we are incapable even of imagining the joys of heaven. Eye hath not seen nor ear heard nor hath it entered into the mind of man to conceive the joy that God has prepared for those who love Him. What matter, then, if the way be dark or the paths rude that lead to such a country of peace and of 4 delight? What matter that our brief days on earth are full of toil and trouble, if so calm and happy an existence awaits us beyond the tomb? We can bear our trials lightly and offer up willingly our sorrows and labors to the Lord, if we remember always with St. Paul that we have not here a lasting city, but we look for that which is to come. CONFORMITY THE virtue of conformity to God's will, by which we are inclined always to wish what God wishes, to be satisfied with what He decrees, to regulate our wills by the infinitely holy and wise desires of our Father in heaven, is a sublime means of growing in merit and holiness. It is likewise a singular aid to contentment and happiness, and a source of constant consolation. If we will whatever God wills, we are sure always to have all we wish, to suffer nothing that we do not wish to suffer, to enjoy whatever we desire, to be filled with all the good things we long for, because we shall wish, desire, long for nothing but the accomplishment of God's will in us and in all other men; and this most holy and mighty will of God is sure to be accomplished, most perfectly and com- pletely, in ourselves and in every mortal, now and to the end of time. By conforming our wills to the will of God, we, therefore, par- take in some sense in His assured peace and 63 64 Conformity infinite power. We anchor our shifting and changeable will, so prone to drift astray, to the changeless, mighty, unerring will of the Infinite. All our uneasiness and disquiet come from a want of conformity of our will with the will of God. Our anxieties and questionings, our regrets and anticipations, would be dis- pelled did we but rest tranquilly in the will of God. Our own will is like a tiny skiff on a rough ocean, perilously tossed from crest to crest of angry waves, but when we mount upon the will of God, we are borne onward with even and resistless motion, for the puny tempests of human circumstance have no power to shake the infinite might of the Master of the Universe. We shall be wise to strive and to pray for this extraordinary virtue of conformity, which makes us, in a sense, sharers no less in the peace than in the power of the Most High. Serious thought about the reason- ableness and blessedness of conformity to the will of God, will likewise aid us in acquiring it. There is an indulgenced prayer of the Church, which suggests in short compass some moving thoughts concerning the most holy will of God. Conformity 6$ "May the most high, most just, and most amiable will of God," it says, u be done, praised and exalted above all things for- ever!" Repeating these significant words* reflecting about their meaning, will carry us far along the way of conformity to the will of God. The most high will of God! The more we meditate on the heights and depths of God's will, the more we shall be over- whelmed with the sense of God's greatness and our own littleness. There is no propor- tion between God and ourselves. He is infinite greatness, we endlessly little; He is all-wisdom, we are foolish and short of vision. It is of the nature of God to be all- perfect and all-holy; we, in our finite natures, are most imperfect, limited and wretched. What we know of God is indeed true, so far as it goes, but our knowledge is, like ourselves, very limited and imperfect. There are in God endless heights beyond the heights that we know, and depths beyond the depths we can comprehend. The will of God, therefore, is lofty beyond our comprehending. It is above all His works and reaches even from end to end of the universe. There is no detail of all His 66 Conformity myriad creation, no atom of the earth, no dust of the stars, but the most high will of God directs, overrules, and guides it to His own purpose, to the accomplishment of His designs, to the working out of His eternal glory. Could we comprehend the meaning of the will of God, its holiness, its beauty and power, the sureness of its accomplish- ment, the great ends to which it moves with unerring precision and irresistible might, how fervently we should pronounce these words of the indulgenced prayer : "May the most high . . . will of God be done, praised and glorified forever I" "The most just will of God." Again, could we but realize the justice of God's will, we should be filled with an insatiable thirst and hunger for its accomplishment. God is essential justice. With us poor mortals, justice is a quality which we may either possess or lack, without ceasing to be human. But in what concerns the attributes of God, all is infinite, necessary, eternal. Hence, in God is essential justice, which cannot fail. If, by an absurd supposition, God were not infinite justice, He would not be God. From this truth, which we learned when we studied the catechism, it follows necessarily that Conformity 67 each provision of God's will must be infi- nitely just and holy. "Thou art just, O Lord," exclaims the Holy Scripture, "and Thy judgments are right." Whether or no we can discern the justice of God's will, we are certain, both by reason and by faith, that an infinite equity governs all His decrees. The fault is not with the all-holy will of God, if some of His judgments seem to us difficult to understand, but with our own limited and imperfect apprehension. Whether we see it or not, the justice of God's will is without measure and without bounds. Knowing that God is all goodness, all wisdom and all jus- tice, we are sure that His holy will is in all things infinitely good and just. We sometimes come to have for a man so perfect a confidence in his equity and honor, that no matter what he does, we are persuaded beforehand that it must be honor- able and right. Our faith in his integrity is so great, that it outweighs all suspicions, ill-appearances, semblances of wrong that may rise up against him. In proportion as our trust is absolute, our conviction is strong that he will do no injustice, and when sus- picions arise in us or accusations are brought by others, we wave them aside with the 68 Conformity thought: "He is too honorable and good to do anything that is not just." If this confidence of ours were multiplied a million times, it would not approach the confidence which we ought to have in the jus- tice of God. Even with the most upright of men, honor and justice are no part of his nature. It is still possible for him to err from justice ; there is no essential contradic- tion in thinking of him as otherwise than just. But with God, to be infinite justice is a part of His being. It is as impossible for Him to be other than just, as it is for light to be darkness, for heat to be cold, for gold to be clay. Hence, no matter how appear- ances may puzzle us, no matter how the shortness of our own apprehension may con- fuse us in estimating the significance of human events, we must always be entirely sure that God's will is justice itself. It would be easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for God's will to fall short of infinite justice by so much as the measure of a hair. Whatever, therefore, God wills to allow in our lives, it is infinitely just for Him to allow it. Whatever He sends, it is most just for Him to send it; whatever He decrees Conformity 69 it is infinitely just for Him to decree it. We conclude the justice of men from their actions. If a man is just in his acts, we say- he is a just man. With God we must act otherwise. Since He is essential and infinite justice, and we know this beforehand by reason and by Faith, we must reverse the manner of our judgments and say, u God wills this, therefore it is just." If we are ever tempted to question any one of God's decrees, there is no need for us to reason concerning the fact itself which has stirred up our questionings. We need only look up into the heavens and remember that it is of the very essence of God to be infinite justice. "Doubt thou the stars are fire; doubt that the sun doth move; doubt truth to be a liar; but never doubt I love," says Hamlet in the play, protesting his fidel- ity. But to assure ourselves of the eternal and infinite justice of even the least of God's decrees, we might heap together all the antitheses of the universe. It is impossible that God should be, in anything whatsoever, any less than infinitely just. "May the most just will of God be done, praised, and glori- fied forever!" God's will, the prayer likewise reminds us, 70 Conformity is not only most high and most just; it is also infinitely lovable. "The most amiable will of God!" This, too, is a thought we much need to dwell on. It is sometimes easier for us to realize that God's will is infinitely high and just than to bring home to ourselves that it is also infinitely lovable, endlessly deserv- ing to be loved. It is not enough for us to be resigned to the will of God because it is right and good. We should also arouse in our hearts a burning love for that most ami* able will." We can persuade ourselves, both by reason and by faith, of the amiableness of the will of God, yet it is perhaps by making acts of love of the will of God that we shall more surely come to the realization of its infinite lovableness. There is, alas! a great gulf between knowing and believing that God's will is endlessly to be loved, and actually loving that holy will as it deserves. "The heart has its reasons which the reason can scarcely understand." By setting our heart aflame with love for God's holy will, we more speedily arrive at the practical conviction of its infinite lovableness. Here again we must steer our course by reason and faith, and not suffer the little per- Conformity 71 plexities and troubles of the moment to obscure our mind's and our heart's vision. God's thoughts are not our thoughts nor are His ways our ways. We see but a small fragment of life, and see it very imperfectly. God sees the whole great round and discerns and comprehends it most completely. No wonder, then, that we cannot always perceive the lovableness of God's will in its particular dispensations, because we are too ignorant and too poorly equipped with judgment, to appreciate the vast and lovable ends which God has in all His works. In proportion as our love for God is great and strong, we shall find it more and more easy to love whatever His holy will ordains. "I know," said St. Francis de Sales, "that whatever is, is the work of God, and I love whatever God does." With the conviction that all things are the expression of the will of God, and that His will is infinitely to be loved, should come likewise a great love of all things for the sake of God. One only thing must we detest and abhor, as God does, and this thing is sin. Sin alone, of all things in the universe, is not the work of God, but even out of sin God's will draws His own greater glory and the good of those who love 72 Conformity Him. It will be one of the ecstatic surprises of our eternity, to see how God has made even the sins of men work for His glory and for the accomplishment of His plans for those who love and serve Him. Even in this world we sometimes obtain amazing glimpses of the manner in which God's will makes use of all things to bring about His great designs. Yet here we can see but a tiny part of His holy purposes. Now, we must believe and trust and love; hereafter, we shall behold and rejoice and praise. This interesting prayer concludes with the petition that God's will may not only be done, but also praised and exalted above all things, forever. It is a most reasonable petition, and one which is sure in one way or another to gain accomplishment. Willingly or unwillingly, to their eternal honor or their eternal shame, here or hereafter, all God's reasonable creatures must praise and exalt above all things His most just, most high and most amiable will. Those who, in this time of probation which we call life, are sin- cerely desirous to do, praise and exalt the will of God, become His friends and familiars and merit hereafter eternal glory. Those who refuse to conform their free wills Conformity 73 to the will of God in this life, shall acknowl- edge and glorify His will at the judgment day and fulfil that holy will in their own punishment. But, willingly or unwillingly, here or hereafter all reasonable beings shall own and accomplish God's most holy will. By making acts of the love of God's will, and taking care betimes to join our will to His, we may assure for ourselves a glorious conformity to His designs in this life and in the next. Our great nobleness and the dig- nity of our nature consist, indeed, in this, that we can freely love, fulfil and exalt the most high and just and amiable will of God. The will of God manifests itself to us in many ways. The voice of our conscience declares to us that holy will and bids us order our daily lives according to the dictates of right reason and of faith. The events of our days disclose to us what God has ordained or permitted, to give us opportunities of merit. The directions of those who have authority from God to counsel or command us, are very clear showings forth of His will in regard to our activities and occupations. Even public events and the great course of history indicate to us in what manner God wills to exercise His elect and through what 74 Conformity trials and successes He means to work out the salvation of mankind. If we regard the world and our own life with the eyes of faith, our days become a procession of messengers from God, declar- ing, each one in its turn, the biddings of His holy will. Joys and sorrows, successes and failures, good days and evil, the countenance of friends and the resistance of enemies, what are they all but messengers of the will of God? If we lose sight of their meaning and their message, if we grow blind to the light of faith and attend only to the plausible but false wisdom of this world, we shall miss many an opportunity of merit here and glory afterwards, many a precious chance to love and serve God and to give Him some small return for the inestimable riches of His providence. If we clear our inward vision by thought and prayer, conform our wills to the most excellent will of God, direct our intention by what we know of His, then we shall profit alike by the sun and the shadows of life, by its rude places and its smoother ways, for all things will serve to bring us forever nearer to the most blessed God. It will become our delight to accomplish, exalt and praise the Conformity 75 will of God, most excellent, most wise, most lovable, most sure to be accomplished, most beneficent and holy. The prayer of our life on earth will be this, which also will be the paean of our rejoicing in eternity: "May the most high, most just, and most amiable will of God be done, praised and exalted above all things forever!" GOD'S CONDESCENSION IT IS Pentecost Sunday. I have said, this morning, the Mass of the Holy Ghost and the first part of His Office. "Come, Holy Spirit," sighs the Church during these divine mysteries, "fill the hearts of Thy faithful and kindle in them the fire of Thy divine love. Send forth Thy spirit and they shall be created and Thou shalt renew the face of the earth." Each feast of the Church has, so to speak, its own soul, its central truth and leading inspiration. Every feast as it comes, brings also some message to our indi- vidual self, some bit of sweetness, some striking thought which is the light of the mystery reflected upon the waters of our heart. Upon this Pentecost morning there comes to one some realization of the small tendernesses, the little condescensions of Almighty God. The Holy Spirit is called by the Scriptures and by the Fathers of the Church the Finger of God. It is He, according to our manner 76 God's Condescension 77 of speaking, who works the wonders of grace and brings about the sanctification of souls. Of course, the actions of God are all common to all of the Divine Persons, but we attribute this or that work of the Divinity to one or the other, to the Father, the Son or the Holy Spirit, according as the action itself seems to us to be more closely connected with His personal characteristics. Since the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, is their mutual love, and is called in Holy Scripture the Goodness of God, the Charity of God, we attribute to Him the workings of divine grace in the souls of men. To those who have meditated on the nature of God, and have been able to con- ceive, in some dim way at least, of His boundless dignity, unspeakable holiness and limitless perfection, there is a breathless wonder in the thought of God's amazing condescension in dealing with His world. Indeed, so astonishing and beyond our unaided reason to conjecture, is the gracious- ness of the Most High toward His creatures, that it altogether escaped even the keenest intellects of old. While paganism thralled the ancient world, some keen intellects did discern that God is one, that there is one 78 God's Condescension great Creator of the Universe who has laid down the laws that govern His Creation. But they could not achieve the truth, even in their most subtle musings, that the Almighty is all-merciful too, and loves with an infinite and condescending love each one of His human creatures. It needed the revelation of God Himself to convince us how intimate are His dealings with our souls. We are, though we may seem important to ourselves, in reality most insignificant compared to the vast scheme of God's uni- verse. Match yourself, as the meditation of the Spiritual Exercises suggests, with the great crowd of people who live in your own state, or even city. What are you among so many? Imagine, if you can, the multi- tudes who live in this whole nation, in other countries, in the entire world. Fourteen hundred millions of human souls inhabit the earth at this instant, yet what is that bound- less crowd, compared to the generations that have gone. What are they all, compared to the angels of heaven? And what are all these to God? Now return upon yourself, tiny detail that you are in this huge pano- rama of creation, and think what part of God's Condescension 79 God's care and thought you can demand as of your own good right ! Yet the Holy Spirit deals with your soul as though there were no other in the world. He speaks to you, assists you in your efforts in His service, nourishes your supernatural life, is busy with you, during all your con- scious hours, enlightening, strengthening, consoling. The name by which we call His condescending and merciful aid for the per- formance of good and the avoidance of evil, is actual grace, the supernatural help of the Holy Ghost which aids us to perform good actions. The Holy Scriptures, which are God's authentic message to mankind, and which are supplemented and explained by the authentic teachings of His Church, speak much of the workings of the Holy Spirit in the souls of men. They reveal what we should otherwise never have known without God's teaching, the constant care with which the Most High cherishes, nourishes and sup- ports our supernatural life. They show us the Holy Spirit, whose nature is so infinitely above our own, who is the very God of heaven and earth, the all-blessed, the all- sufficient, dwelling in the holy company of the Father and the Son, Himself His own 8o God's Condescension heaven and the delight of all the just, yet intimately and continually concerned with the slightest motions of our poor hearts. They reveal to us with what condescension beyond all comprehending this merciful Lord deals with us, enlightens our mind, moves our will, is ever ready with the strong aid with- out which we can do nothing meritorious of heaven, nothing worthy of our eternal destiny. Holy Scripture speaks in particular of the Holy Spirit as giving light to our minds and strength and fire to our hearts. His divine aid is brought to us through those two lordly faculties which are the highest in our nature, our intelligence, with which we conceive the truth, and our will, whereby we choose and resolve and thus shape our destiny here and hereafter. It is the effect of the grace of the Holy Spirit to enlighten our minds to see the way of justice, so that we may discern our duty and know the will of God, and to warm and fire our wills so that they may be energetic, courageous and firm in doing God's will and in serving and loving Him. Who has not experienced, who does not constantly experience, these illuminations of the mind and flamings of the will which are God's Condescension 81 the work of the Holy Spirit in the soul? You are reading some good book, it may be that you have read it several times, but the message conveyed by a certain paragraph never impressed you very forcibly. Then, on a sudden, the passage glows and burns with a new meaning. The truth, which had so often passed, half understood, through your mind, now blazes out and brands itself on your consciousness with an intense reali- zation. At the same time your heart, which had before been cold and unresponsive to the message of this truth, leaps and pulses with new fervor and resolution. Aided by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit (for it is His touch on the mind and the soul that works these wonders), you make sacrifices, achieve heights of prayer, love of God and self-denial, that would have been entirely beyond your reach but for the help of the grace of the Holy Ghost. Even when we do not advert to the effects of His blessed influence, the Holy Spirit is still busy with us, whispering to our heart, illuminating our dull mind with heavenly realizations, teaching us new ways of serving God, reminding us of the faults that we should amend, planting in us the seeds of 82 God's Condescension needed virtues. As though there were in His entire creation no other object of His solicitude and love, this Infinite Being, this personal Love, this unwearying Comforter, deals with our dull mind and perverse heart with utter affection, patience undismayed, untiring care. The thought of God's immense and con- stant condescension in giving us the inspira- tions of His grace, should stir our souls to an answering loyalty, a zeal for His love and service that will carry us out of our- selves. How unresponsive we have been to His inspirations, and yet the quiet voices of the pleading of His grace have never ceased. How undutiful we have been to the sugges- tions of His guidance, still, hour by hour He points out to us new opportunities of holi- ness. The patience of the Holy Spirit in renewing the offer of His help after we have rejected His grace for the thousandth time, is one of the wonders of the benignity of God. If anyone had treated our suggestions and offers of assistance as we have treated those of the Most High, we should long ago have ceased utterly to try to help him. Yet the Holy Spirit never grows weary. He God's Condescension 83 pursues us with the gentle pleadings of His grace until we die. Ah, the immense mystery of God's con- descension toward men, and of man's incom- prehensible ingratitude ! Consider the state of the whole world to-day. Let your fancy roam again over the earth, seeing the count- less multitudes of men and women, in cities and country places, in this land and in coun- tries far away. In the heart and soul of every one of that inconceivably great swarm of human creatures, the Holy Spirit is inti- mately busy, moving the dull hearts to the love of God, inclining the darkened intelli- gences to comprehend His commandments and to see the duty that lies before them. There is no one of all the reasonable beings in the world, to whom this Infinite Love and Wisdom does not offer the guid- ance of His grace, the help of His power. Yet, think how His advances are scorned, His grace wasted and refused, the eternal allurements of His heavenly kingdom rejected and repelled for mean and fickle pleasures and for the good things of this perishable world. But many of the swarming millions to whom God's condescension is shown in vain, 84 God's Condescension think nothing of the Holy Ghost and in no way realize what heavenly kindness is at work in their hearts and minds. Like the Jews of old they know not what they do when they are deaf to grace, refuse to be guided by the Holy Spirit, and neglect the whispers of God in their hearts for the loud, strident call of the flesh and the world. We ourselves who are instructed in the ways of God, it is we who are most inexcusable for neglecting His holy inspirations. We should treasure the good thoughts that come to us, the motions of love of God, of charity to our neighbor, of zeal for the welfare of the Church, that flame up in our will. For it is thus that the Spirit of God, the Comforter, condescends to address us, to help us, to urge us on toward heaven. If the smile of a great man, his encouraging word, the sugges- tions he makes for our welfare, move us in response, to energy and gratefulness, how we should start up and labor to correspond with the motions of God in our hearts. For a greater than man is here, encouraging us, admonishing, consoling. We should be filled also with a vast desire to make amends to the Holy Spirit by our own swift and generous answer to His God's Condescension 85 promptings, for the many who refuse His grace and ignore the suggestions of His voice in their hearts. Loving the Infinite Love we should be eager to show our appreciation for His amazing condescension by the readi- ness of our obedience to the motions of His grace within us. If we prize as we should the awful privilege of having the Spirit of God in us, a privilege given to those who are children of God and heirs of heaven, we will listen for the first whispers of divine grace, now prompting us to love God more, now warning us against the growth of an evil habit, now suggesting some present good deed. By listening and obeying promptly our spiritual hearing becomes keener. We grow thus more docile and pliable to the leading of the Holy Ghost. If God could be sad, surely His divine goodness would be afflicted by the hardness of the hearts of men to His grace. The world, which would become an earthly para- dise if it were obedient to Him, is made a valley of tears by the disregard of men for the voice of God in their hearts. Let us very pointedly determine that at any cost we at least will revere and follow the breath- 86 God's Condescension ings of the Holy Spirit. Let it not be in vain that the Most High so often leans down to us from the height of His glory and con- descends so constantly to whisper to our minds and fire our hearts. THE RICHNESS OF OUR HERITAGE Perhaps we have sometimes been prone to envy, because of the greatness of their graces and the fervor of their early faith, those primitive Christians who received the teaching of the apostles them- selves and lived in the warmth and splendor of the rising of the Son of Justice, before the charity of men had grown cold. They are indeed to be envied, those first-fruits of Christ's Church. With them the crown of martyrdom was so ordinary a blessing, that they did not mark the tombs of the martyrs in the catacombs with any special sign during those first years of persecution — it was too common and usual a lot to call for special distinction! Great graces flowed freely in the infant Church, and our Blessed Lord, newly come into His kingdom, showered down favors with a royal hand. But we of these latter ages of the Church have consolations and riches of our own, which even the early Christians did not pos- sess in such abundance. We are heirs to the 87 88 The Richness of Our Heritage accumulated thought, fervor and devotion of all the Christian centuries. Every epoch of history has added to the richness of our heritage. If we would but count over the treasures of devotion, example, teaching, which the years have hoarded up for the Church of this day, we should be carried away with gratitude. During nineteen cen- turies the Holy Ghost has labored in the midst of His people, to raise up saints, whose teaching still remains to us, to inspire great devotions whose fire still enkindles us, to prepare glorious episodes in the history of the Church, of which the memory still inspires us, to give to the faithful those sac- ramentals and means of grace which are now and ever ready at our hand. All these things, priceless and various, belong to us because we are of the body of the living Church whose Head is Christ. This living Church, unchanging through the ages, carries down through the years the unbroken tradition, entire and unalloyed, of the teaching of the Saviour of the World, and this teaching is itself the core and center of our heritage. His Faith and His sacra- ments we inherit as of right, when we become members of His Church through Baptism. The Richness of Our Heritage 89 But around the teachings of the Faith, and beside the sacraments, like the tracery that clings to the mighty capitals and soaring arches of a Gothic cathedral, have accumu- lated rich deposits of thought, devotion, his- tory, which are likewise our own, our herit- age, because we are of the living Church of God. That self-same Church, identical and individual, has been present at and presided over every phase of the world's history since the Christian era began. She is herself, indeed, the prime actor and central figure of all Christian history. She possesses, there- fore, and gathers to herself all the Christian tradition, and gives it to her children. While other societies are born of the world and doomed to a precarious existence at the will of men, the Church is assured of a life breathed from the lips of Christ and promised by Him to endure forever. Like a careful mother, therefore, she gives to each generation of Catholics the fruits of devo- tion, thought, grace, prayer, experience, example, inspiration, which she has gleaned from the years gone by. "I was there," she can say, pointing to the vanished centuries, "and gathered these things for you; I am here, and bring them to you. The heritage 90 The Richness of Our Heritage which you likewise leave for your brethren still to come, I shall also keep in my bosom and shall give to the generations yet unborn." Count over, if you can, the rich items of that inheritance. Look first of all at Cath- olic history, with its examples of heroism, wisdom, sanctity, and all Christian virtues. Speaking of the education of clerics in the sixth century, a learned writer remarks that they were not obliged, like those of the present day, to study the history of the Church for nineteen centuries, for the very simple reason that the history of the Church in those days ended with the sixth century! The remark brings home to us how much we possess of inspiring example and heroic story which the Catholics of that day did not have because the events had not yet come to pass. The lives of the saints beyond that day were not yet acted, much less written. The great course of God's providence in the life of the Church after them could not be traced and glorified, because it had not yet been shown forth in events. Holy names, great events and sainted memories which are dear and familiar and inspiring to ourselves, were quite unknown to that time. Catholics had then, of course, their own heritage of The Richness of Our Heritage 9 I history, but it was much less varied and ample than our own. The Litany of the saints had then only been written in part, so to say, on the heart of the Church. The richness of the Fran- ciscan story, the conquests of Dominic and Ignatius, the exploits of their sons, were still in the dim future. The stories of Teresa, of Catherine of Siena, of Francis Xavier, of Louis of France, of Bernard of Clairvaux — to name only a few among the thousands of great examples — had not been told. Every nation has poured a flood of bright tradition and shining memories into the brim- ming fountains of the Christian story, and we are the possessors of those replenished fountains. Consider, again, our inheritance of Cath- olic devotion. Comprehending utterly the hearts which He has made, the Holy Spirit, while ever maintaining the unchanged teach- ing of Christ in His Church, gives to every time an element of variety and interest in the spiritual life by inspiring new devotions, based on Catholic dogma and supported by it, but developing into new forms of piety and fervor which stir our hearts. Of these special devotions some have their day and 92 The Richness of Our Heritage then cease to be, like the great devotion to St. Menas the Martyr, which was so popular in an early century. Others, appealing to the hearts of generation after generation, become a part of the permanent inheritance of the Church, and enrich its spiritual life. In this regard, we are especially blessed, for the latter ages of the Church have been particularly rich in new and appealing devo- tions, while many of the devotions of the early Church have been wonderfully devel- oped and made easy. Thus, from the day of Pentecost itself, devotion to the Blessed Sacrament was part of Catholic practice, and this is witnessed by the paintings on the walls of the Catacombs, those graphic and ingen- uous records of the primitive Church. But the Blessed Sacrament was not then pre- served on a hundred thousand altars as it is to-day, nor exposed for the constant venera- tion of the faithful. It was generally only during the Holy Mass that the Blessed Sacrament was present before the adoring flock of Christ. It was then distributed in holy communion, and the remainder was con- sumed by the priest. Thus the presence of Our Lord in the Sacrament of His love was only for short intervals. He came and went The Richness of Our Heritage 93 like the glimpses of sunshine in a cloudy sky. Now, on the contrary, the Sacrament of Love is kept by day and by night on many altars, so that any one of the faithful can come and pray and adore, or at least can make spiritual visits and communions at some near-by church or chapel where Jesus always dwells. How much this means for us we can perhaps comprehend by imagining how we should feel, if to-morrow the Blessed Sacrament were removed from all our altars and it were decreed that hereafter It should only be present before us during the Holy Sacrifice. Yet, by so much we have the advantage of our remote forefathers in the Faith. So, too, devotion to the Blessed Virgin was one of the favorite devotions of the early Christians, as one sees again when he goes through the Catacombs and looks at the ancient paintings on their walls of the Mother and the Child. But we have fallen heirs not only to that primitive and most tender devotion, but to all the subsequent development of meditation and praise, con- cerning the Mother of God. Ours is all the wealth of art, literature, prayer, service, which the years have brought to the shrine 94 The Richness of Our Heritage of that Most Beloved Woman whom every generation delights anew to honor and call blessed, with its own accents echoing the praise of all past ages and prophesying the praises of all generations yet to be. The rosary, the prayers and hymns of the Church to Mary, the numberless particular devotions that have grown up about her name, the countless shrines in her honor, the memory of her many favors, and apparitions, the miracles granted through her intercession — all these things are our inheritance, and they have wonderfully enriched us with a thou- sand means of honoring the Mother of God. What shall we say, then, of the new devo- tions, unknown in their present forms to early ages, with which Our Lord in His goodness has kindled the failing charity of the earth? Devotion to the Sacred Heart comes naturally to one's mind, that consum- ing flame of fervor, kept and known from early days in the hearts of some great saints, but now uncovered and spread abroad that it might enkindle the entire earth. Recall the tender and burning words which Our Lord addressed to St. Margaret Mary, and through her to all coming generations of His The Richness of Our Heritage 95 people, pleading for our love, disclosing the tenderness and the desires of His most Sacred and wounded Heart. To have' heard of such accents from the lips of Our Lord, would have filled with ecstasy the saints of former generations, but it was not given to them to hear. Consider how this mes- sage of the Sacred Heart would have stirred the charity of St. Bernard, inflamed the love of St. John of the Cross, thrilled St. Igna- tius, enraptured St. Philip Neri, yet not to them but to us have the holy accents come. With what eagerness would St. Aloysius have practiced this devotion, yet it was unknown to him in its present form, as we have received it from the revelations made to St. Margaret Mary. Our heritage is by so much richer than theirs. We have been favored by so much, beyond their generation. In older times too, frequent communion as it exists amongst us to-day was unknown. In apostolic times, it is true, the faithful communicated at every Mass which they heard. But as customs changed, the holy practice of daily communion became more and more rare until at last even the greatest saints were not allowed to go to communion oftener than a few times a year. Thus, St. 96 The Richness of Our Heritage Louis of France, who sighed to receive the Blessed Sacrament more frequently, was per- mitted to do so, it is said, only five or six times a year. Even in latter days, as our Holy Father Pius X, of happy memory, declared in his immortal letter on Frequent and Daily Communion, there was a dispute as to how often ordinary Catholics should receive. Now, the Holy Father by that same letter has settled the dispute forever. It is the wish, he says, of the Pope, the wish of the Church, the wish of Our Lord Him- self, that every one who can do so, who is in a state of grace and has a good intention in receiving, should approach the Holy Table often, and if possible every day. Consider what would have been the exultant joy of the saints of old to hear so marvelous and so authentic an invitation. Yet it is to our time and not to theirs, that this favor has been given, and it will descend to future days as a part of the Catholic heritage. We might continue at great length the enumeration of the richness of our inheri- tance, but each one for himself may easily develop the long series of our blessings. We are, in a sense, the spoiled children of God. Knowing the special dangers and trials to The Richness of Our Heritage 97 which the Catholics of latter times would be exposed, He has prepared from eternity these special helps to fortify and console us. We shall be wise, then, to use to the full the extraordinary graces which lie so ready for us. It would be a calamity indeed to miss our due share of the bounty of our Father's house. Those families in which great riches are hereditary, whose temporal inheritance; is rich and extensive, have usually two desires regarding their possessions. They are anx- ious, each generation of them, to enjoy to the full themselves the advantages of their inheritance, and they wish to preserve and increase it for the benefit of the children who shall come after them. We may well imitate the wisdom of these children of this world, in regard to our Cath- olic heritage. Since we are of the house- hold of the Church, we enjoy by the title of children of the household the accumulated riches of the ages of Catholic piety and devo- tion, the great examples of Catholic history, the treasures of holy art, the splendors of Catholic literature, the thousand aids and incentives to goodness that have been gath- ered within the portals of the enduring 98 The Richness of Our Heritage Church of God through toiling and suffering ages. It behooves us to help ourselves, so to say, to our share of this inheritance. We must become familiar, by hearing and read- ing, with our possessions. We must explore, so to say, the treasure-chambers of our Mother the Church. If we are strangers to Catholic history, aloof from Catholic devotion, out of touch with the life of piety of the Church, we resemble children who leave the house of their father without hav- ing seen the good things he has prepared for them, and neglect to enjoy their inheritance because they do not even know in what it consists. Converts, who come at a mature age into the Church, are often carried away with enthusiasm at the wealth and warmth of devotion, the glories of tradition, the treas- ures of example, the color and light and life which they find in their Father's house. They are like lost children, who, found and brought home at last after they have wan- dered in the dark and the cold, take in with immense appreciation in comparison with their former poverty and loneliness, the blessings that now are theirs. But the Cath- The Richness of Our Heritage 99 olic who has been born and brought up in the midst of these riches is too often indif- ferent to them. He goes outside of His Father's house for consolation and joy, look- ing for happiness where it is not to be found, and neglecting what the great ages have pre- pared for him. We should be wiser, being so rich in our spiritual possessions. Since we are offered so freely such great goods, we should at least stretch out our hand toward our inheritance. The second aspect of the human wisdom of great families in regard to their temporal riches must not escape us. They seek to hand on to their descendants a well-kept and increased inheritance, and so too should we. In proportion as we use and treasure the heritage of the Church, those who come after us will know and profit by what we leave to them, with honor and appreciation. In learning it well and using it eagerly, we are preserving and increasing the Catholic inher- itance for coming generations. Let us pray to realize our own great riches and opportunities. There was never a time when the heritage of the Church was greater than now, for every year of Catholic life has ioo The Richness of Our Heritage added to that treasury. We, the latest heirs of all this devotion, history, example, ritual, must learn to profit by God's exceeding pre- cious gifts. Let us pray not to be unworthy of the greatness of our heritage ! CONFIDENCE IN MARY TO have a deep and childlike trust in the Blessed Mother of God, is a source of the most profound and genuine consolation. Such a confidence ensures, indeed, its own fulfilment. The more we rely on that most powerful and merciful Mother, the more surely we shall experience her bounty and feel the fruits of her intercession. To have confidence in Mary is to be filled with a practical convic- tion of this truth, to look to her unfalter- ingly in every trial, to expect from her hands all manner of succor and relief. Not only does this ingenuous and simple trust guar- antee its own accomplishment (for the Best and Truest of women cannot disappoint those who so trust in her), but the firm expectation is in itself a comfort incompar- ably precious. Like a child who walks con- fidently through the dark, holding its mother's hand, we pass peacefully and in calm of mind through all the vicissitudes and IOI 102 Confidence in Mary dangers of this life, clinging to the hand of our Mother in heaven. To the Catholic who knows the teachings of his holy Faith in regard to the Blessed Mother, it is very easy to stir up in his heart this precious confidence. Such an implicit trust is indeed a logical and very simple con- sequence from what we know of the char- acter, the office and the place in God's provi- dence of this Most Beloved and Blessed of all women. When we read the lives of the saints, who realized so deeply the teachings of the Church about the Mother of God, we were surprised at the childlike simplicity with which they showed their reliance upon her aid. Rather, it should astonish us that every Catholic has not a similar trust, for what we know of her love, her power and her mercy should make us look for her help with a simplicity of expectation that would surpass the peace of the little child in his mother's arms. The reasons for confidence in Mary are very obvious, very certain, and they sweep us with irresistible logic toward a sure expectation of her aid in every need or dan- ger of our lives. Any one of these reasons might make us trust implicitly in her assist- Confidence in Mary 103 ance, but taken altogether, they compel our assent if only we shall duly attend to them. Whoever has the Catholic faith and does not rely on the intercession of God's Mother, has either not comprehended or not realized the truths which he believes. Everything in the character of Mary gives us reason for implicit confidence that she will protect all her children who rely on her. One by one we may tell over the gifts of nature and of grace, the dignities of office and of power given her by her Divine Son, and at each step in our ascent of the peak of her prerogatives we come on new reasons for confiding in her love and mercy, and never discover a single cause for doubting either her power or willingness to aid us in every need. It is good to count over, even briefly, the reasons of our confidence in Mary. The trust that they will engender in us is needful and precious beyond telling. The character of the Blessed Mother of God is one of intercessor, advocate, mother of all Christians. It is her office to plead for us with her Divine Son, not only in the great and terrible crises of our lives, but in our daily needs and little perplexities. Nothing is too great for her power, but 104 Confidence in Mary nothing is too slight for her motherly care. The very first instance recorded in sacred history of her intercession, shows this with moving power. It was at the marriage feast of Cana, The watchful eye of the Blessed Virgin, ever intent on observing the needs of her children, saw, even before the chief steward whose charge this was, had observed it, that the wine for the guests was nearly exhausted before the wedding feast was over. It was one of those insignificant but painful happen- ings that hurt so sorely. The joy of the young couple was to be turned to confusion before all the company. It was too late to send elsewhere for more wine. Humanly speaking, there was nothing for it but to let the unconscious and smiling pair be shamed before all their guests. Still, what strange circumstances, accord- ing to usual ways of judging, for Christ's first miracle! His hour was not yet come for those marvelous outpourings of mercy and healing which attested His divine mis- sion. Not yet had He begun to preach and to heal the people. Was His first public miracle to be the relief of a pitiful bit of human embarrassment, the saving of this Confidence in Mary 105 young pair from a momentary discomfiture? Perhaps the Blessed Mother chose this very occasion to exercise her office of advo- cate with her Divine Son, to show us that no one of our small necessities is beneath her notice or beyond her willingness to aid us. She was confident, too, that Our Lord would listen to her even in this trifling thing, even though His hour was not yet come. Though His words mav have sounded like a refusal, "Woman, what is that to Me and to thee? My hour is not yet come;" she says to those who serve, "Whatsoever He shall say to you, do ye." The water is made wine, the first of Christ's miracles is worked in Cana of Galilee, and for all time the spirit and power of Mary is made known to all Christians, a spirit of tender and motherly interest in all that concerns even the humblest of her children, and a power that can obtain unerr- ingly from her most loving Son the least, even as the greatest, of favors. In this miracle the Blessed Mother stands proclaimed as the pitying intercessor for us all, in all our needs. We need not wait until some agonizing crisis is upon us, we may confidently appeal to her in the little trials of every day. For this is the office io6 Confidence in Mary which her Divine Son in His blessed provi- dence has allotted to her. She is to be in very deed the mother of all mankind, as solicitous for our slightest need, as careful to avert the least danger from us, as is a most tender mother in regard to her child. It is at the end of His public life that Our Lord declares to us the universal mother- hood of Mary. Just as He had indicated it to us by the first miracle at Cana, He chose to proclaim it in the most solemn and moving manner from the pulpit of the cross. Dur- ing the last moments of His life, while He hung with glazing eyes in the throes of His death agony, He looked down and saw standing at the foot of the Cross His Mother and St. John, the disciple whom He specially loved. In this Beloved Apostle the Fathers of the Church teach us to see the representa- tive of all the members of Christ's Church. Then, turning His dying eyes upon His Blessed Mother, He said to her : "Woman," using the same term with which He had addressed her at the marriage feast of Cana, "Woman, behold thy son," and to St. John: "Behold thy Mother!" It was a solemn and formal gift, the dying gift of Our Lord to St. John, and in his Confidence in Mary 107 person to us all, of the Mother of God to be our mother. The voice of Divine Authority, as potent when He spoke from the cross of His agony as when of old He said the fiat that made the world, ringing down the ages forever, declaring to each generation of Christians that Mary is their mother. Those who are of His fold hear that voice, and there is born in their hearts a filial trust and affection which surpasses any other trust or love that is given to woman. That voice of infinite authority pierced also the deepest places of Mary's most obedient heart, and begot there such a mother's love as no other heart of woman could ever hold. "Thenceforth," says the Gospel, "the Beloved Disciple took her for his own." But thenceforth also, the most blessed Mother of God took for her own not only St. John, but every soul of us all in the Church of God, from the beginning even until the day of doom. It is a thought upon which to build an absolute confidence. Imagine to yourself the most devoted and dutiful mother in the world who cherishes an ailing child. Think of the ceaseless vigilance, the tireless assiduity, the forethought, the solicitude of such a one, for io8 Confidence in Mary everything which concerns the welfare of her son. Yet, such a mother has never heard the voice of God Himself articulately admon- ishing her to be a dutiful mother. Our Blessed Mother has heard such a voice, and the memory of it is graven the more deeply on her heart, because every detail of the passion of her Beloved Son is forever clear to her memory. We ourselves may forget the sublime gift which Our Saviour offered us from His cross, but the Mother whom God has given us never forgets. We may wander very far from the ways in which she would have us go. We may seem abandoned by men, and heaven itself may seem closed to us. But to the Mother of God, we are still her chil- dren, erring children it may be, ruined and lost, yet who have been given her for her sons and daughters beneath the cross of her Son. So she will watch over us, will assist us, will count our steps and prepare for us grace after grace and opportunity after opportunity until such time as the last hour allotted to us for this life of trial is ended. Then, with what a Mother's smile, if we have not been too rebellious to her kind persuasions and motherly solicitings, she will Confidence in Mary 109 welcome us to heaven who has done so much to bring us thither. From any corner of the world, therefore, from any pass of life, we have only to lift up our eyes to heaven to see there, enthroned at the right hand of her Divine Son, our very Mother. The angels and the archangels pay her reverence. The nine choirs of celes- tial spirits all hail her as their Queen. The august company of patriarchs and prophets, the blessed throng of apostles and disciples, the shining army of martyrs, the glorious ranks of the confessors and the virgins, all the angels and the saints of heaven, acclaim her as their Mother. She is exalted unspeak- ably above all other creatures, powerful beyond all the combined hierarchies of the Blessed. She is the glory and honor of the Celestial Jerusalem, the delight of the Holy Trinity, the Daughter, Mother, Spouse of God, the Immaculate, the sinless, the joy of heaven and of earth. Yet this most exalted and most beloved of all women leans from her lofty throne to peer beyond the light of heaven into the shadows of this world. From the summit of her beatitude she follows with a mother's eyes the devious pathway of every one of her children who are still in no Confidence in Mary the vale of tears. In the Woman above all women, clothed with the sun and with the moon beneath her feet, we have each of us a most loving as well as a most powerful Mother. The slightest whisper of our prayer does not escape her ears. The most obscure of our necessities is not unknown to her. With the insight and power given her by her Son for our weal, she discerns our needs before we ourselves are aware of them, and answers our petitions before the words are cold upon our lips. We cannot have too great a confidence in the love and power of our Mother in heav