Untitled - Saints' Books

"
"
"
The
450 Appendix.
know how to love God and to practise virtue ? The
wise men of this world, who seek only to acquire a great
name, are deprived of the celestial lights that the Lord
gives to the simple: Thou hast hid these things from the
wise and prudent (the wise and prudent of the world),
and hast revealed them to the little ones. 1 The little ones are
the simple minds that bestow all their care on pleasing
God alone.
St. Augustine proclaims him happy who knows God,
his grandeur, his goodness, even though he should be
ignorant of all other things: "Happy he that knows
Thee, although he knows nothing of those 2
things."
He
that knows God cannot but love him; now he that loves
God is wiser than all the men of letters that know not
how to love him.
unlettered," exclaims the same
holy Doctor, will rise up and bear away heaven." 1
How many rustics, how many poor villagers, reach
sanctity and obtain eternal the life, enjoyment of which
for a moment is better than the acquisition of all the
goods of this world! The Apostle wrote to the Corin
thians: for I judged not Myself to know anything among
you but Jesus Christ, and Him crucified* How happy
should we be if we succeed in
knowing Jesus crucified,
in knowing the love that he has borne us and the love
that he has merited for us by sacrificing for us his life
on the cross, and if
by studying such a book we suc
ceed in loving him with an ardent love!
A great servant of God, Father Vincent Caraffa,
writing to some young ecclesiastics who were engaged
in studying to qualify themselves for the work of sav-
1 "
Abscondisti haec a sapientibus et prudentibus, et revelasti ea parvulis."
Matt. xi. 25.
3 "
Beatus, qui te scit, etiamsi ilia nesciat."
Conf. \. 5, c. 4
Surgunt indocti, et coelum rapiunt!" Conf. 1. 8, c. 8.
4
Non enim " judicavi me scire aliquid inter vos, nisi Jesum Chris
turn, et hunc crucifixum." I Cor. ii. 2.