That in Temptations the Just Are Further Proved and Purified, and Take Root Better in Virtue

THE saints further say that the Lord would have us tempted to prove our virtue. As in winds and tempests it appears whether a tree is well rooted, and as the valor and strength of a knight and good soldier is not brought to light in time of peace, but in time of war, in encounters and conflicts, so the virtue and strength of a servant of God is not evidenced in time of devotion and comfort, but under temptations and trials. On the words: I am ready and not afraid to keep thy commandments (Psalm exviii. 60), St. Ambrose says that, as he is the better pilot and worthy of greater praise who has the knowledge and skill to steer a ship in time of tempests and squalls, when the ship seems now to be going to the bottom and now to be lifted up by the waves sky-high, rather than one who can steer and guide it in time of calm and fine weather; so he deserves greater praise who is able to steer and guide himself in time of temptations, in such way that neither does prosperity lift him up to pride, nor adversity and trial frighten and dismay him. Therefore does God send temptations, as He dealt with the people of Israel, allowing hostile tribes to dwell around them, that in them he might make trial of Israel, whether they would hear the commandments of the Lord, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses (Judges iii.4). And the Apostle Paul says: Divisions must needs arise, that they who are approved may be made manifest among you (I Cor. xi. 19). God hath tried them and found them worthy of himself (Wisdom iii. 5). Temptations are the strokes whereby God discovers the fineness of the metal; they are the touchstones whereby He tests His friends; thereby He comes to see what stuff each one is made of. And as men on earth like to have trusty and tried friends, so also does God, and therefore He proves them.

As vessels are proved in the furnace, says the Wise Man, and silver and gold in the fire, so are the just proved in temptation (Ecclus. xxvii. 6). St. Jerome says: When a mass of metal is burning in the fire, it does not show itself whether it is gold, or silver, or any other metal, since it is then all of one color and seems all fire; so in time of consolation, while fervor and devotion last, all has the look of fire, and the nature of the individual does not appear: but draw the mass out of the fire, let it cool, and you will see what it is. Let that fervor and consolation pass; let trial and temptation come; and then the stuff that each individual is made of will come to light. ‘When in time of peace a man takes the way of virtue, one does not know whether that is virtue, or whether it springs from a good natural disposition or some particular relish that he has for the exercise and the absence of rival attractions; but when he perseveres under the assaults of temptation, it shows well that he does things on the motive of virtue and love of God.

Temptation also serves to purify a man more. As the goldsmith purifies silver and gold by fire and rids it of all its dross, so the Lord wishes to purify His elect by temptation, that they may be more agreeable to His Divine Majesty (Psalm Ixv. 10). J will burn them as silver is burned, and prove them as gold is proved, says the Lord by Zachary (xiii. 9). And by Isaias: I will clear thee of thy dross in the crucible, and take away all thy tin (i. 25). This is the work of temptation in the just; it consumes and destroys in them the scum of vices and love of worldly things and of themselves, and makes them more ardent and purified. It is true, says St. Augustine, that not all gather this fruit from temptations, but good people only. Some things, put in the fire, at once soften and melt away, like wax; other things harden, like clay. So good people, in the fire of temptation and trial, are softened, knowing and humbling themselves; but the wicked are hardened and made more obstinate. Thus we see that of the two thieves on the cross, one was converted, while the other blasphemed. So St. Augustine says that temptation is a fire, in which gold comes out brighter, and straw is consumed; the just is made purer and more perfect, and the wicked more utterly lost. It is a storm, in which the just weathers it out and the wicked is drowned (Exod. xiv. 20-28). The children of Israel found their way through the waters, which served them as a wall to the right and the left, while the Egyptians sank and were drowned in the same waters.

St. Cyprian brings this reason to encourage us in tribulations and persecutions and persuade us not to fear them;

because Holy Writ teaches us that God’s servants rather increase and multiply thereby, as it tells us of the children of Israel, that the more they were oppressed and harassed by the Egyptians, the more they increased and multiplied (Exod. i. 12). And of Noah’s ark it is said that the waters of the deluge rose in flood and lifted the ark above the mountains of Armenia (Gen. vii. 17) ; so the waters of tribulations and afflictions lift up and greatly perfect a soul. If you are not purified by temptation, it will be because you are not gold, but straw, and so remain black and foul. Gerson says that, as the sea by its storms and tempests casts out of itself the impurities that it has gathered, and remains clear and purified, so the spiritual sea of our soul is cleansed and purified by temptations from the impurities and imperfections that it is apt to gather from an unwholesome peace and tranquillity, and to that purpose God sends them. Again, as a good husbandman prunes his vine that it may bear more fruit, so the saints say God our Lord, Who likens Himself in the Gospel to a husbandman, prunes His vines, that is, His elect, that they may fructify more. Hvery branch that beareth fruit in me, he will prune it that it may bear more fruit (John xv. 2).

What has been said is further confirmed by this, that the effect of temptation is to make the contrary virtue strike deeper root in the soul. The holy Abbot Nilus says: “As frosts and storms make shrubs and trees take deeper root in the soil, so do temptations make the contrary virtues take deeper root in the soul”—Plantas enutriunt venti et tentatio confirmat animae fortitudinem. Virtue is made perfect in temptation [in infirmitate], that is, is established, solidly grounded, and made steadfast (II Cor. xii. 9). When a disputant assails a truth and you defend it, the more reasons and arguments he brings to assail it, the more reasons you find to establish and confirm it. So with the servant of God—the more temptations the devil brings up in opposition to virtue, the more motives and reasons God’s servant finds to preserve it and resist the temptation; then, too, he makes new resolutions and practises more acts of the virtue in question, which thus takes root and is strengthened and grows the more. Thus it is very well said that temptation acts on the soul like blows on the anvil, which harden it more and make it more solid and strong.

Besides this, which is the ordinary course of things, St. Bonaventure says that God our Lord is wont to bestow extraordinary consolations and rewards on those who are much tempted to any vice and show themselves faithful in temptation, by bestowing on them in an eminent degree the contrary virtue. Thus St. Gregory relates of St. Benedict how manfully he resisted a strong temptation of the flesh by throwing himself naked among brambles and thorns; wherefore the Lord gave him such perfection of chastity that thenceforth he never more experienced any impure temptations. We read the same of St. Thomas Aquinas, how with a blazing brand he put to flight a woman who came to solicit him; God thereupon sent angels who girded tight his loins as a sign that He bestowed upon him the gift of perpetual chastity. In the same way St. Bonaventure says of those who are tempted against faith, or with temptations to blasphemy, that the Lord is wont to give them afterwards great clearness and strong light of faith and a burning love of God, and the same with other temptations. He quotes to this effect that text of Isaias (xiv. 2): They shall capture and subdue those who sought to capture and subdue them. That is a thing that gives great comfort in temptations. Take comfort and animate yourself to fight, my brother, for the Lord wishes the contrary virtue hereby to strike deep roots in your soul; He wishes to bestow on you an angelic chastity. A lion came out to meet Samson, and he met it and slew it, and afterwards he found in it a honeycomb (Judges xiv. 6, 8). So does temptation look like a lion at the outset: but do not be afraid of it; meet it and overcome it; and you will see how afterwards you find therein very great sweetness and pleasure.

Hence also it will be understood how on the contrary, when one lets himself be carried away by temptation and yields to it, the bad habit will grow by the doing of the acts that belong to it, and therewith the temptation will also grow and be stronger in future because the vice will have taken deeper root and got more mastery over the man. So St. Augustine observes. Jerusalem hath sinned a great sin, therefore hath she become unstable, says the Prophet Jeremy (Lam. i. 8), weaker and more apt to fall again; as the Wise Man also says: The sinner will add sin to sin (Ecclus. iii. 29). This is a very important warning for those who are assailed with temptations. The devil with such people is wont to deceive and blind them, getting them to believe that the temptation will cease by their gratifying it. A very great delusion! Rather, if you comply with the temptation, it will strike deeper root, and the passion and appetite will grow upon you, and henceforth will have greater force and more mastery over you; it will come back to overthrow you more easily time after time. They say well that this is like the case of dropsy; the more the dropsical man drinks, the thirstier he grows; or of the miser—the more he gets, the greater does his covetousness become. So in this case take it for an understood thing that, when you let temptation carry you away and yield to it, it will grow as many degrees as you yield, and you will lose so many degrees of strength. And when you resist and show fight, not yielding to it, virtue and strength grow in you to a proportionate degree. Thus the means to gain the victory over temptations and evil inclinations, and attain peace and quiet, is never to give in to them or let them have their own way. In this fashion, little by little, with the help of the Lord, the temptation and passion gradually loses strength until it ceases to give any trouble at all. This should greatly encourage us to resist temptations,