Untitled - Saints' Books

"
God
3 80 Material for Instructions. [PART n.
demned to eternal death; let me, then, be crucified in
this life, that I may not be tormented for eternity in the
next.
Let us at least bear the pains that God sends us. A
certain author well observes, that a person who does not
embrace voluntary pains will scarcely bear involuntary
sufferings with perfect patience. And, on the other
hand, St. Anselm says:
will cease to chastise the
1
sinner who voluntarily punishes himself for his sins."
The Good that is
III.
derived from a Mortified Life.
Some imagine that a life of mortification is an un
happy life. No: the life of the man who practises
mortification is not unhappy; but the life of him who
indulges his senses so as to offend God is truly miser
able: Who hath resisted Him, and hath had peace
? A 2 soul
in sin is a sea agitated by the tempest: The wicked are
like the raging sea, which cannot rest? St. Augustine says
that the man who is not in peace with God is an enemy
that wages war against himself. 4 The gratifications
that we give the body fight against us, and make us un
happy: From whence are wars and contentions amongst
you ? Are they not hence- from your concupiscences, which
war in your members ? B
On the other hand, the Lord says: To him that ovcrcometh,
I will give the hidden manna? To them who prac-
1 "
i Cor. ii.
2 "
3 "
Cessat vindicta divina, si conversio praecurrat humana." In
Quis restitit ei, et pacem habuit ?"
Job, ix. 4.
Impii autem, quasi mare fervens, quod quiescere non potest."
Isa. Ivii. 20.
4 "
Ipse sibi est bellum, qui pacem noluit habere cum Deo."
Enarr. in Ps. 75.
6
Unde bella "
et lites in vobis ? nonne hinc, ex concupiscentiis
6 "
vestris, quae militant in membris vestris ?"
James, iv. i.
Vincenti dabo manna absconditum." Apoc. ii. 17.