Of the Perseverance We Ought to Have in Virtue, and What Will Aid Us Thereto

ST. AUGUSTINE, on the words of St. Paul: No one is crowned, but he who lawfully fighteth (II Tim ii. 5), says that to fight lawfully is to fight with perseverance to the end, and that he it is who deserves to be crowned who does this. St. Jerome also says: “Many enter on the way of virtue and perfection, but few persevere in it to the end”— Coepisse multorum est; ad culmen pervenisse paucorum. There went out of Egypt, says Holy Writ (Num. i. 1-47; xiv. 29-30), six hundred thousand men, besides women and children, and of all that number two only entered the Land of Promise. Thus it is no great thing to begin well; the difficulty is not there, but in persevering and ending well. St. Ephrem says that as when you build a house, the difficulty is not in laying the foundation, but in raising the building to its perfect height; and the higher the building is raised, the more the labor and expenses increase: So in the spiritual building, the hardest task is not to lay the foundation, but to carry your work on to perfection; it will avail us nothing to have begun well, unless we also end well. “In Christians,” says St. Jerome, “we consider not how they begin, but how they end. St. Paul began ill, but ended well; Judas began well, but ended ill.” What did it avail him to have been an apostle of Christ and to have worked miracles? What will your good beginnings profit you if you come to a bad end? It is to perseverance alone that the crown is promised. He who shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved (Matt. xxiv. 13). Jacob saw Almighty God not at the foot, nor in the middle, but at the top of the ladder; to let us know, says St. Jerome, that “it is not enough to begin well, nor yet to go on doing well only for a time, unless we hold on and persevere to the end.” St. Bernard says: “Put the term of your journey and perseverance where Christ put it, of whom St. Paul says: He was obedient unto death (Phil. ii. 8) ; because however far you run, if it be not unto death, you will not gain the crown.”

Christ our Redeemer gives us a special warning of this in the holy Gospel: Whosoever setteth his hand to the plough, and looketh back, is not fit for the kingdom of heaven (Luke ix. 62). As also when at another time He bids us remember Lot’s wife (Luke xvii. 32). What was it she did? God having brought her out of Sodom in order to save her from the fire that consumed the city, she stopped upon the way and turned to look behind her, and immediately, in the very place where she turned her head, she was changed into a statue of salt. What does that signify? Do you know what? St. Augustine says: “Salt seasons and preserves things; and therefore our Savior would have us remember Lot’s wife to the end that, looking upon what happened to her, we may preserve ourselves with that salt, and take warning therefrom to persevere in the way of goodness that we have entered upon, and not turn back, for fear lest we also be turned into statues of salt, from whence others may take salt for their preservations and perseverance, seeing our fall. How many do we see nowadays who serve us only for statues of salt, for our preservation! Let us, then, be wise at other men’s cost and do nothing to make other men wise at ours.

St. Augustine and St. Jerome further add that to begin well and end ill is to make monsters, since those works and actions which begin by being good according to reason and end in evil and sensuality, are grotesque figures, as if a painter to the head of a man should add the neck of a horse; such a thing it is to begin well and end badly. With this St. Paul reproaches the people of Galatia who had gone back: Are ye so senseless that, having begun in the spirit, ye are ending in the flesh? Who hath bewitched you? (Gal. iii. 3).

That we should be able to persevere and obtain this reward from the Lord, it is necessary to take care to establish ourselves well in virtue and mortification, lest for want of solid foundation we come to deteriorate and fall. Wormeaten apples quickly fall and never ripen, but the good and sound ones remain on the tree until they come to maturity. In the same manner, if your virtue be not solid and your heart be vain; if there be within it some little worm of presumption, or pride, or impatience, or other irregular passion, that worm will by degrees gnaw away and consume all the pith of it and weaken the substance and vigor of your virtue and endanger your perseverance. The Apostle says: It is very important to confirm and fortify your heart by grace (Heb. xiii. 9) with true and solid virtues.

Albertus Magnus well explains how we should be well grounded in virtues so as to be able to continue and persevere in them. He says that a true servant of God ought to be so grounded in virtue and have it so deep fixed in his heart, as to have it always in his power to practise it and not depend upon what others may do and say. There area sort of people that seem to be humble and very peaceable so long as nothing thwarts them and all things happen to their liking; but upon the least cross accident that occurs, this peace vanishes and they come out in their true colors and show what they are. In this case, says Albertus, this virtue of peace and humility is not in them, but in the people about them. It is the virtue of others and not yours, because they take it away and make you a present of it when they please. This is being good by the virtue of another, as people in the world say when they are praised:

“So it shall be by our favor, sir.” And they say true. [Hso sera para virtual de vuestra merced; i.e., “My merits are your kindness;” i.e., “It is very kind of you to make me out so.”] You ought to be good, not by another’s virtue but by your own virtue, the virtue that is in yourself and does not depend on others. These people are well compared to still cesspools; if you let them alone, they emit no bad smell: but if you stir them up, they are unendurable. Thus people, so long as you do not touch them but let them go on according to the taste of their own palate, seem clear water; but stir them up a little, and you will see what an odor they send forth. Touch the mountains, and they will smoke (Psalm exliii. 5).