Here We Begin to Treat of That Practice of Mortification

4 Pet principal means that we can take on our part to gain this mortification and victory over ourselves, is to practise ourselves much in denying our own will and contradicting our desires, and giving no satisfaction to our fiesh nor letting it have its own way. In this manner, little by little, you overcome nature, uproot vice and passion, and introduce and plant virtue. St. Dorotheus gives us very profitable advice hereon. When you are molested with any passion or bad inclination, if you yield to your weakness and choose to put the thing in execution, be sure, he says, that this passion and inclination will take deeper root and grow stronger and will trouble you more from that time onwards. But if you manfully resist the passion and evil inclination, it will progressively diminish and every day have less strength to combat and molest you till it comes to lose all its strength and give you no further trouble or annoyance. This is also very important when there is question of temptations, as we shall declare later on. It is very important to resist first beginnings, to the end that the evil habit may not bring us little by little into greater difficulties.

The saints say that we have to deal with our body as a horseman mounted on a furious and ill-bridled horse, which may with industry and courage be mastered and made to go where you wish and at the pace you wish. So it is necessary to rein in tight and not neglect the spur; in that manner you will be master of your body and make of it what you want, that it shall go where you wish and at the pace that you wish. But if you have not the courage and dexterity to govern it and master it, it will master you and fling you down some precipice. The way that men are wont to take with an animal that has some bad propensity, in order to cure it, is not to let it indulge the same. Now this must also be the way for us to take to be rid of the evil propensities and inclinations of our flesh, not to allow any indulgence in what it likes, but contradict and vigorously oppose all its appetites and desires.

To animate us more to this exercise, it will be a great help always to act on the principle that we laid down at the beginning, that this outward man, our flesh and sensuality, is the greatest adversary and enemy that we have, and as such is always at work making mischief for us, lusting against the spirit, against reason, and against God. One of the chief reasons why the saints say that self-knowledge is a most efficacious means to overcome all temptations is that he who practises this, well understanding his own weakness and misery, aS soon as an evil thought or desire makes its appearance, sees at once that it is a temptation of the enemy, going about to snare and overthrow him, and stands on his guard and gives it no credence nor hearing. But he who does not know himself does not know the temptation when it comes nor take it for such; rather the temptation seems to him very reasonable, and sensuality a necessity, and so he is easily overcome by temptation. It will help you greatly to mortify yourselves if you remember that you carry about with you the greatest enemy you have, and understand that all these impulses and temptations that come to you come of your flesh and sensuality, which as your deadly enemy aims at procuring your evil. Thus you will easily mortify yourself and cast it off, for who will trust his enemy?

St. Bernard affords us another good consideration, saying that we must deal with ourselves and with our body as with a sick man entrusted to our care, who asks for and desires much that would do him harm, and must be refused accordingly; and what is for his good, though he has no taste for it, must be given him, and he made to take it. Oh, if we could succeed in taking ourselves for sick persons, and steadily held that all these impulses and desires that come to us are sick man’s whims and persuasions of our enemy seeking our evil, how easily should we cast them off and overcome them! But if you do not take yourself for a sick man but for a healthy, and do not take yourself for an enemy but for a friend, you are in great danger. How can you resist that which you think is not evil, but good; not a deception, but truth?

St. Dorotheus relates that, when he was in the monastery in charge of the spirituality, and all the monks came to him with their temptations, one day there came to him a monk to give him an account of a temptation that he had to gluttony, which went so far as to make him steal things to eat. He asked him very lovingly why he did this, and he answered that for the hunger that possessed him what was given him at table was not enough. He advised him to go to the abbot and declare his necessity; but to that he made great difficulty, saying that he was too ashamed. “Wait, then,” said Dorotheus, “and I will find a remedy for that.” So off he went himself to the abbot and gave him an account of the straits the monk was in. The abbot left the case to him, telling him to do whatever he thought proper for a remedy. Thereupon St. Dorotheus called the dispenser and bade him at whatever hour this monk asked for breakfast or lunch to give him all he asked for. The dispenser obeyed and gave things with quite a good grace. Thereupon the patient began to do well and for some days stole nothing; but little by little he reverted to his bad habit. He went with many tears to St. Dorotheus to tell his fault and ask for a penance; for he had this good point about him, that he owned up to his faults at once—a very efficacious means to prevent their going on long. Dorotheus asked him: “Has not the dispenser given you what you asked? Has he ever said No to you?” “The dispenser treats me very well,” he replied, ‘and all that I ask for he gives me; but Iam ashamed to go so often to him.” “Would you be ashamed to come to me,” said Dorotheus, “seeing that I know your temptation and you have told me all about it?” He said he would not; whereupon he told him to come to him, and he would give him all he wanted, and he must not steal any more. Dorotheus was infirmarian at the time and in a position to treat him well. This satisfied him for several days; but presently he returned to his evil habit and came with many tears and great confusion to tell his fault and ask for a penance. Said St. Dorotheus: “But how is this, brother? You are not ashamed of asking me, and I give you all you want; why do you go on stealing?” He answered: ‘Father, I don’t know how it is, nor why I steal; the vice and evil habit carries me away. I am in no necessity, nor do I eat what I steal, but give it to the ass.” And so it was found; for they went to his cell and there he had figs, grapes, apples, and bits of bread, hidden under his bed; and there he left them till they began to go bad; and then, not knowing what to do with them, he took them to the stable and threw them to the ass. Hence we see, says St. Dorotheus, the sad state to which passion and evil habits bring a man and what reason we have to take ourselves for sick men and enemies. This unhappy monk saw well that he was doing wrong and wept and distressed himself greatly for having done it, and yet it seems he could not restrain himself from doing it again. Wherefore the Abbot Niskeron well said that he who lets himself be carried away by passion and bad habits comes to be the servant and slave of the same.