VII. The “Instruments of Good Works”

Summary. — Religious Profession inaugurates the true monastic life. — I. Why St. Benedict compares the monastic life to a “ spi¬ ritual workshop ". — II. The instruments he puts in our hands that we may excel in it. — III. In what way we are to make use of them ; divers stages. — IV. The part that, in our ascetic industry, proceeds from the divine co-operation. —

V. Love is the supreme mainspring of this undertaking. —

VI. Fruits of a life guided by love. — VII. Persevering strength requisite in order to attain final success.

It is under the guidance of Christ Jesus that we must return to God. Christ is the Leader Who shows us the way and brings us to the supreme end. Faith yields us up to Christ, by causing Him to reign in us — a reign which is accepted in substance on the day of Baptism, and renewed in its full extent on the blessed day of our monastic Profession : at that hour we overcame the world by an act of practical faith, in order to surrender ourselves entirely to Christ and attach us to Him alone without looking back : “ Behold we have left all things, and have followed Thee ” : Ecce nos reliquimus omnia et secuti sumus te.

But religious Profession is only the beginning of our real monastic life, as the donation that Christ made of Himself to His Father’s good pleasure on entering into the world, was but the ineffable prelude to all His humano-divine activity. The faith that gave us up to Christ when we pronounced our Vows ought to continue to be a daily prin¬ ciple of action in us ; it ought, if it is to be perfect, to blossom into love, and, through a motive of love, set all our energies in motion, in order that we may work out our union with Christ Jesus.

It is truly thus that our Holy Father, " filled with the spirit of all the just, ” according to the saying of St. Gregory a, conceives the cenobitical life which we have embraced by our profession. See for yourselves. The first vow that he makes us pronounce is that of stability which binds us to the cenobitical society and fixes us in the monastery until death : Usque ad mortem in monasterio per sever antes 3. But under what aspect does he present this monastery ? Under that of a “ spiritual workshop. ” Trades are not learnt there, but the soul is exercised in seeking God. The spiritual workshop is also “ a school of the Lord’s service ” : Dominici schola servitii. In this workshop, in this school, the holy Legislator places what he calls the “ instruments of good works, ” the “ tools of the spiritual craft ” : Instrumenta honor um operum, artis spiritualist.¹

Let us try to understand the profound teaching hidden under these expressions. Why does St. Benedict compare the monastic life to a “ spiritual craft ”. What are the “ instruments ” that he places in our hands that we may learn to excel ? In what manner are we to make use of them ? We shall have to recognise the part that, in our ascetical industry, proceeds from the Divine operation ; finally we will explain how love must be the supreme mainspring of the whole of this undertaking, and with what firm perseverance we must continue in it so that it may be crowned with success.

I

The essentially practical terms that our Holy Father employs sufficiently emphasize that an urgent work of activity is traced out for us.

For St. Benedict, the necessity of good works is evident. The lofty aim he sets before us, namfely, to find God, is not to be obtained without good works. “ If we wish, " he says in the Prologue, “ to dwell in the tabernacle of His Kingdom, we must run thither — and he uses this term run time after time — by good works... ” We shall only become heirs of the Kingdom of Heaven if we fulfil by our deeds the requisite conditions for obtaining this inheritance. It is for this reason, he adds, that a “ delay, ” a “ respite ” is granted to us by God in this present life 4.

What are the works that the holy Legislator exhorts us to accomplish and for which he gives us “ instruments of the spiritual art ? ”

First of all remark the exactitude of this last expression. Ars, says St. Thomas, est ratio recta aliquorum operum facien - dorum. Art consists in giving a faithful material reproduc¬ tion of an idea, of an ideal. Consider a work of art. It exists, to begin with, in the thought of the artist ; it is this thought that guides his hand ; and when the work is executed it is often but an imperfect reflection of the ideal formed and cherished by the master’s genius. God, if we may thus speak, is the greatest of artists. The whole creation is but the outward expression of the ideal that God forms to Himself of all things in His Word. As the artist finds his delight in the work that reproduces his thought, so crea¬ tion, in coming forth from God’s hands, was seen by Him to be “ very good ”, because it responded perfectly to the ideal of its Divine Author : Viditque Deus quae fecerat et erant valde bona 2. The Holy Spirit stirs up the Psalmist to contemplate nature thereby to glorify the God of creation. Domine, Dominus nosier, quam admit abile est nomen tuum in universa terra: “ O Lord, our Lord, how admirable is Thy name in the whole earth ! ” Omnia in sapientia fecisti: “ Thou hast made all things in wisdom. ” We do the same as the Psalmist when, at the chanting of the Benedicite of Lauds, we lend to all beings the accents of our lips, the life of our understanding and of our heart, in order to praise God for having made them.²

But there remains a great difference between us and ma¬ terial things. They are but a vestige, a far-off reflection of the Divine Beauty. Man, on the contrary, was created with an intellect and a heart in the image of God : Faciamus hominem ad imaginem et similitudinem nostrum 5. Such is the secret of the dignity of man and the ineffable love that God bears towards him. “ My delights are to be with the children of men ” : Deliciae meae esse cunt filiis hominum 6. God loves His image in us. Now, as you know, this image has been degraded, disfigured by original sin and by our personal sins. All spiritual art is hence to consist in repairing the consequences of this degradation, and of restor¬ ing to the soul its primitive beauty, in order to give God the joy of seeing His image more perfectly reflected in us.

God is the first to work at this restoration. To this end, He sends His Son, “ perfect God and perfect Man ” : Perfectus Deus, perjectus homo 7. As God, Christ is “ the image of the invisible God and the brightness of His glory:” He is the adequate and substantial image of the eternal perfections ; He is perfect God, pure and spotless Light, begotten by Light. As Man, He is likewise perfect, surely the most beautiful of the children of men ; His soul is im¬ maculate, adorned with the plenitude of grace. Christ is the beloved Son in Whom the Father recognizes Himself ; in the midst of creation, He is the Divine Masterpiece in Whom is all the Father’s delight.³

And it is Christ Who becomes for us the type, the example which we must reproduce in order to restore the divine beauty to our souls and to be admitted into the heavenly kingdom. How many times have we not meditated on these truths ? He Who created us has willed that Christ shall be the very form of our predestination : Praedestinavit [nos Dens'] conformes fieri imaginis Filii sui.

The “ new creature ” : nova creatura 2, who is the child of adoption in Christ Jesus, reproduces in God’s sight the traits of His beloved Son. God’s great desire is that we should resemble His Son Jesus as perfectly as possible. Therefore the whole method of the spiritual art consists in keeping the eyes of the soul unceasingly fixed upon Christ our Model, this humano-divine Ideal, in -order to reproduce His features in us. It is thus that we shall rehabilitate our nature and raise it to its first splendour ; and it is thus we may be assured of the delight and liberality of the Heavenly Father, because then He will recognize in us the many brethren of the First-born : XJt sit ipse primogenitus in multis fratribus 3.

But you will say : Has not baptism washed away sin and has it not clad us with Christ Himself ? Quicumque in Chris¬ to baptizati estis, Christum induistis 4. Assuredly ; however we have as yet but the principle of our progressive assimilation ; evil tendencies remain in us ever ready to break out in sinful deeds which disfigure the soul. On the one hand it is in removing these stains and overcoming these tendencies, and on the other hand in developing this resem¬ blance to Christ by the practice of virtues, that we tend to perfection.

What in fact is a Christian ? “ Another Christ, ” all antiquity replies. And who is Christ ? The Man-God. And He comes to destroy sin by His death ; He brings life whereof He has the fulness. To renounce sin and participate in this life, such is the programme so clearly traced out by St. Paul to the neophyte on the day when by his baptism he becomes Christ’s disciple : “ So do you also reckon. that you are dead to sin, but alive unto God, in Christ Jesus Ita et vos existimate, vos mortuos esse fteccato, viventes autem Deo, in Christo Jesu. And this twofold formula is the sum¬ mary of the whole work of the Christian and of all religious asceticism.⁴

Manifestly St. Benedict makes this the starting point of the perfection that he wishes to develop in his monks. Through Christ’s grace, the Christian dies to sin and lives to God : St. Benedict wishes us to carry out this plan to its full achievement. Like the simple Christian, the monk is the child of God, called by God to eternal beatitude, having Christ as Head and being sustained by the grace of Christ. But if he starts from the same point as the simple Christian, the monk goes further in order to reach a beatitude which, substantially the same, is yet capable of degrees reaching to ever ascending heights. The simple Christian dies to sin ; the monk, by his vows, renounces created things, renounces himself. The simple Christian lives, through grace, for God ; the monk must have in view perfect charity where every human motive power disappears. The monk seeks to bring to realisation the fulness of the Christian life ; he must possess within himself a deeper degree of “ death ”, but also a more powerful intensity of “ life ” than is the case with the ordinary faithful. To the precepts the observance of which leads to the Kingdom of Heaven, he adds the practice of the counsels which give a greater vigour and perfection to the merely Christian life.

Hear how the great Patriarch himself presents these ideas : he first makes the monk listen to the Divine voice : “ The Lord, ” he says, “ seeks His workman in the multitude of the people, and cries out : “ Who is the man that will have life, and desireth to see good days. ” The end is here indicated : the divine life, God’s beatitude shared here below in faith, up above in the brightness of eternal light. “And if, ” continues the holy Legislator, “ thou respondest to this invitation by the words “ I am he : ” what will be the Lord’s reply ? “ Turn from evil, and do good ; seek peace, and pursue it. ” Here is characterised the twofold work to which St. Benedict would have us apply ourselves while living in the monastery : Avoid evil and do good ; and by the same fact, possess peace. Very general terms in which he summarizes the spiritual craft.

So true is it that our Holy Father sees in monastic holiness only the normal but full expansion of baptismal grace, for his spirituality, — I cannot insist too much upon this — proceeds directly from the Gospel j it is all steeped in. it, and this it is that gives it that seal of greatness and sim¬ plicity, of strength and sweetness, which especially charac¬ terises it.⁵

II

In practice, the fulfilment of this maxim " to turn from . evil and do good” is apportioned according to specifically divers precepts and manifold acts^. St. Benedict thus furnishes his spiritual workshop — - the monastery — with various instruments, which the workmen — the monks — have to learn how to handle and continue to use.

But what are these “ instruments ” ? The holy Lawgiver calls by this name sentences taken for the most part from Holy Scripture, others borrowed from the ancient Fathers of the Church and the early monastic writers. These are sentences, aphorisms, maxims which point out some fault to be avoided, some vice to be uprooted, some virtue to be practised. These axioms which, by their concise form, recall the formulas of the Decalogue, are easily retained by the memory, and the mind turns them over to derive fruit from them, and puts them into practice when the moment comes : they are to help us to overthrow the obstacles opposed to the Divine action in us and to practise acts of virtue.

As souls are different and have not the same tendencies to evil, or identical aptitudes for good, our Holy Father has multiplied instruments : seventy-three are to be counted. When a man of the world reads over the list 2, he is nearly always astonished to see St. Benedict giving his sons recom¬ mendations which concern only the order of natural morality or the life of the simple Christian. “To love God with all one’s heart, all one’s soul, all one’s strength ; to love one's neighbour as oneself ; to honour all men ; not to do to another what one would not have done to oneself ; to tell the truth from heart and mind ; not to kill, not to steal, not to bear false witness ; to relieve the poor ; to visit the sick ; to console the afflicted. ”

Why does our Blessed Father thus blend counsels so general or so specifically Christian with exhortations of purely mo¬ nastic inspiration ? It is undoubtedly because, in his time, Christian civilisation had not penetrated everywhere and the atmosphere that Christians breathed was yet laden with evil effluvia, the persistant remains of Paganism or relapses into barbarism. In his monasteries were to be found noblemen who had known the most decadent periods of Roman society, there were also Goths scarcely freed from their brutal passions. For the use of such kind of disciples, it was necessary to publish anew even the precepts of the natural law and the current truths of the Gospel. We know moreover that these precepts implicitly contain all the perfection of the corresponding virtues.⁶

Another and deeper reason guided the Holy Lawgiver in his choice : in thus blending sentences of the Christian life with those that concern monks only, St. Benedict wished to emphasize the plainly “ Christian " character that he meant to give to his spirituality. The monk was to be first of all a man who observes the natural law, and then fully practises the Christian law. Religious perfection comes from the same root as Christian perfection in general ; the holy Legislator combines the precepts and the counsels in close conjunction : never has the Evangelical ideal appeared more indivisible.

This is why the Patriarch does not arrange his instruments according to an altogether systematic order which would result from a methodical plan all traced out in advance. In this again, he resembles the Gospels, he is eminently simple

— which does not prevent him from being sure — in his manner of leading souls to God. However, certain groups stand out clearly : here are instruments that concern our duties towards God ; there are those that regulate our rela¬ tions with our neighbour ; finally others that more directly concern ourselves.

But whatever be the number and diversity of the said instruments, we must use them with discernment. We can¬ not attempt to employ them all at the same time, any more than we can practise all the virtues at the same time ; souls are different and needs are various.

Some of the sentences recall general dispositions that ought always to animate us : “To love God with all our heart and with all our soul ; — to prefer nothing to the love of Christ ;

— to desire eternal life with all the intensity of our love ;⁷

— to keep guard at every hour over the actions of our life ;

— not to forget that God beholds us everywhere. ”

Other instruments are to be utilised at certain hours, for example at the moment of temptation : ” To dash down at the feet of Christ evil thoughts as soon as they arise in the heart. ”

Others are particularly fitted to root out some vice or repress some evil inclination. It is for each soul to see what are the perverse inclinations that have the ascendency and tend to disfigure the divine image within it. When the soul is attached to the creature, it is fashioned to the image of this creature, and every bad tendency that is not striven against becomes, by the deeds that proceed from it, the origin of many stains that we have to remove in order to be made like Christ Jesus. With one soul it is pride that dominates and becomes the principle of a host of reprehensible deeds. To such a one our Blessed Father gives proper instruments for repressing the divers manifestations born of his pride : “Not to love contestations ; to fly from vain¬ glory ; — if one sees any good in oneself, to attribute it to God, and not to oneself ; — on the contrary, to impute to oneself the evil that one does and to believe oneself the cause of it ; — to hate one’s own will ; — not to wish to be esteemed as holy before one is so ; but first of all to be holy that it may be with more truth that one is so called. ”

With another, it is levity of mind that hinders divine union; in the morning this soul is recollected ; at Communion Our Lord descends into it and embalms it with the perfume of His Divinity ; but, having left the oratory, this soul gives way to dissipation, indulges in useless words. If this im¬ perfection is not fought against it will, during the day, make the monk lose a part of the fruits of his union vrfth Christ. What ought he to do ? Take the instruments appropriate to his defects : “ Watch over his actions at every moment of his life ; — keep his tongue from all unruly discourse ; * — not love much speaking. ” And so forth.

It is for each one to know himself in the light from on high and to seek what is still wanting to him ; there is no one, however advanced, who will not find in this workshop the necessary instrument for perfecting in his soul the ineffable traits of the Divine Model.

III

Not only are souls different, but one and the same soul goes through different stages which our Holy Father has well defined.

The spiritual craft has its beginnings, and like all beginnings; these are painful. The entrance into the way of salvation is always narrow : Via salvtis non est nisi angusto initio incipiendo x. Why is this ? Because it is a “ conversion ” which we have to bring about. A man must divest himself of his way of envisaging things, of his manner of acting ; he must renounce himself, go against his vicious habits, the tendencies of concupiscence, apply himself to uprooting vices, to destroying and rectifying, feature by feature, that caricature of God to which a soul plunged in sin may be likened ; and this with so much the more perseverance as habits contrary to the virtues predominate in us. To get a statue out of a block of marble, one must first rough-hew the block. When we arrive at the monastery, we are a little like these rough blocks. In His goodness, God subjects us to His interior action, but gives us also into the hands of our Superiors and to our own personal efforts in order that from this work may come forth little by little the realisation of the Divine ideal. If we do not courageously take the necessary instruments and employ them faithfully, we shall remain very nearly in the state of unhewn blocks. Then as we are yet novices in the art to be practised, we are awkward, clumsy in the use of the instruments ; hence we must feel our way ; there are hesitations, perplexities, doubts, which may further increase what is rough in the work itself. It is a laborious stage to be gone through, but it is a necessary one.

Moreover St. Benedict takes care to encourage the soul at the outset. In this spiritual workshop, in this school where we learn to seek God, he has it at heart, he says, to establish nothing rigorous or too arduous a. He uses very great discretion ; he is a father. To one who comes to place himself under his direction, he says : “ If for the amendment of vices or the preservation of charity, things are a little strictly laid down: ” Si quid paululum restrictius... processerit, “ take care, lest, under a cowardly emotion, you fly from the way of salvation of which the entrance is strait Non illico favore perterritus refugias viam salutis 3.

What argument does he employ ? Does he relax anything of the vigour of the precepts ? Does he dissemble the obligation of self-renunciation ? Far from it, as we have seen. But he shows already the facilities and joys of i. Prologue of the Rule. — 2. Ibid. — 3. Ibid.

Gtetat, tkc Ida*) at th* Monk. acquired virtue, and gives a foretaste of the intimate rewards promised to effort. “ In the measure one advances in the observance and in faith, ” he says, the heart is enlarged and enables one to run with unutterable sweetness of love in the way of God’s commandments * '. Processu veto conversationis et fidei, inenarrabUi dilectionis dulcedine curritur via mandatorum Dei. When one is generous from the outset, and attentive to the light of faith, love increases, for God gives Himself the more ; and, with the presence of God, the joy of being in His service abounds. The heart is enlarged, our Blessed Father affirms. That is as much as to say the heart is the capacity of loving, and this capacity is infinite as regards the object whereto the soul must tend. “ Thou hast made us for Thyself, O God, and our heart is restless till it rests in Thee ” : Fecisti nos ad Te, et inquietum est cor nostrum donee requiescat in Te. The actual capacity of the heart is measured by the object of its present affections : if this object is small, the heart becomes small ; if this object is infinite, the heart enlarges its power even to the infinite. To one who sees God, creatures appear small : Videnti Creatorem angusta est omnis creatura, say St. Grego¬ ry, in speaking of St. Benedict himself.

Now, when one truly seeks God, without going aside after creatures, without any self-seeking, the heart is gradually enlarged ; God fills it and, with God, joy floods it.

Furthermore, this very joy augments the capacity of love ; and then, says our Holy Father, — this is the second stage — one runs in the way of the commandments : there are no longer those painful beginnings, those oft repeated efforts with which one struggled, but, with the ever increasing light of faith, fervour stirs one up in God’s service and renders that service full of sweetness. Then, whatever be the vicissitudes of life, the monk " never departs from the teaching of the Divine Master, ” Who is the Truth, " but perseveres in His doctrine, ” the light of the soul ; and if he shares in Christ’s sufferings it is that he may deserve by patience also to enjoy the bliss of His Kingdom.

The last stage marked out by St. Benedict is that of perfect charity. This stage, he says, is attained when the soul is " purified from its vices and sins ” munda a vitiis et peccatis 5. Not only does the soul no longer obey its vicious habits, for it has uprooted them all as far as a creature can ; but, in its activity, it no longer has any human mainspring of action, for all that it does, it does solely for the love of Christ and the attraction of virtue : universa... inci-pit custodire, non iam timore gehennae, sed amore christi... et delectatione virtutum. The soul has placed the love of Christ in the centre of itself, and this love makes it find everything light, however painful it be : then with great facility and perfection it acquits itself of labours that formerly with manifold efforts it only accomplished imperfectly. Virtue has become to it almost a second nature : Absque ullo labor e, velut naturaliter 2.⁸

The state that we are describing is that of perfect charity, of the perfection of union with God : the soul no longer seeks aught but Him alone ; it no longer wills anything except His glory ; it no longer acts except by the movement of the Holy Spirit. Are there then no more trials to undergo ? no more sufferings to endure ? Yes, indeed ; but the unction of grace sweetens every trial, and love finds in the cross a new opportunity of manifesting itself and increasing. Love is the principle of those wonderful interior ascensions that the Lord, by the action of His Spirit, operates and manifests in purified souls : Quae Dominus in operario suo mundo a vitiis et peccatis Spiritu Sancto dignabitur demonstrare 1

IV

But whatever be the stage in which the soul is, its work, however, is never anything but a work of co-operation. The soul is not alone : God works in it and with it : for He is ever the first Author of its progress.

Doubtless, at the outset, when the soul is yet encumbered with vices and evil habits, it must needs apply itself with virility and ardour to remove these obstacles which are oppos¬ ed to divine union. The co-operation that God requires of it at this period is particularly great and active, and is reveal¬ ed very clearly to the conscience. During this period, God grants sensible graces that uplift and encourage. But the soul experiencies inward vicissitudes : it falls, then rises up again ; it labours, then rests ; it takes breath again, and then goes forward on its way.

As far and in the measure as the soul advances, and x. Rule, ch. VII. S* Augustine, Tract. V in I Joan. n° 4, thus characterises these three stages : Caritas cum fuerii nata nutritur ; cum fuerit nutrita roboratur ; cum fuerit rohorata perficitur. S. J homas (ii-ii. q. 24, a. 9) classes the three categories ot souls after this manner : the incipientes, the proficientes, the perfecti. — 2. Rule, ch. vii. — 3. Ibid. obstacles give way, the inner life becomes more homogeneous^ more regular, more uniform ; the action of God is felt to be more powerful, because it is more free to act and because it meets with less resistance and more suppleness in the soul : then we rapidly go forward in the path of perfection.

All this economy of our religious life is explained by the fact that all holiness is of its essence supernatural. God alone is the Author of it ; and if He does not Himself build the house it is in vain that the masons labour : Nisi Dominus aedificaverit domum in vanum labor averunt qui aedificant earn. Our Lord has so clearly given us this fundamental doctrine. “ I am the Vine, you are the branches ; abide in Me that you may bear fruit, for without Me you can do nothing” : Sine me nihil potestis facer e a. " Let no one, ” says St. Au¬ gustine in commenting upon this passage, “ imagine that he can, by himself, bear the least fruit. Whether it is a matter of doing much or doing little, one can only succeed through the help of Him without Whom we can do nothing. If the branch does not remain united to the vine and does not draw the nourishing sap from the stem, it cannot by itself produce the least fruit ” : Sive ergo parum, sive multum, sine illo fieri non potest sine quo nihil fieri potest... nisi in vite manserit et vixerit de radice, quantumlibet fructum a semetipso non potest ferre 3.

St Benedict well knows these important truths and their different aspects. He does not tell us to abstain from good works ; quite the contrary, as we have seen at the beginning of this conference : we must do all that depends upon us. Although our Lord is the Fountainhead of our sanctification. He sees it good to leave to us a share of work to perform ; for we are causes, really such, although entirely subordinate to the Divine causality. It is only on the condition that we generously and faithfully contribute the said share that He will continue and consummate in us the work of our sanctification. To imagine then that Christ will take upon Himself all the work would be a dangerous illusion ; but to believe that we could do anything whatsoever without Him would be no less perilous. We must be convinced too that our works are only of value by reason of our union with Jesus.

Among the instruments that the Holy Legislator puts into our hands there is one which expressly concerns this necessity of referring everything, in the work of our perfection, to Divine grace : “ To attribute any good one⁹

*33 sees in oneself to God, and not to oneself ; as to the evil always to impute it to oneself and recognize it as one’s own ” : Bonum aliquod in se cum viderit, Deo applicet, non sibi ; malum vero semper a se factum sciat et sibi reputet . But in what way does St. Benedict teach us how to make this conviction enter into the very trend of our life ?

First, he inculcates the necessity of prayer, at the very beginning of every undertaking. In his Prologue, after having shown the end — to seek God, — and marked the way — Christ, — he immediately tells us not to put our hand to any good work without earnestly beseeching God to bring it to a good end : In primis, ut quidquid agendum inchoas bonum, ab eo per fid instantissima oratione deposcas . Weigh well all these terms, for each has its value. In primis : first of all, ” “ before all, ” the thing that he most wishes to teach us, is to have recourse to the One Who is the first and principal Author of our sanctification, because without His grace we can do nothing.

Quidquid... bonum: "whatever be the work proposed, " that is to say a “ good ” work, morally good, which procures the glory of God, for it evidently cannot be question of an evil work, of a work wherein the creature, or the seeking after self enters as the principal end, or trom which God would be absent. Instantissima oratione: “ with most earnest prayer, " for it is necessary to knock that God may open, to seek so that we may find, to ask so that we may receive. And what must we ask ? That God will perfect our work : ab eo perfici. Manifestly, the holy Patriarch here has in mind the text of the Apostle : " For it is God Who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will " : Deus est qui operatur in vobis et velle et perficere pro bona voluntate.

And see how our Holy Father himself applies this recom¬ mendation in his Rule. When monks go on a journey or return from one 2 ; on entering into their functions as weekly servers at table and on ending their week’s service 3 ; in receiving guests 4 ; in ail these actions, so simple and ordinary in the course of our life, and in yet others, he wishes that the Community should go to the oratory there to invoke God’s help.

The work ended, the good achieved, St. Benedict further wishes that we should refer the glory to Him without Whom we can do nothing. Those who seek God, he writes in his Prologue, are not be puffed up by their good observance ; i. Philip, ri, 13. — 2. Rule, ch. lxvii. — 3. Ibid. ch. xxxv. — 4. Ibid. ch. liii

*34

“ knowing that the good which is in them comes not from their own power but is wrought by the Lord, they magnify the Lord Who worketh in them ” : Operantem in se Dominum magnificant, “ saying with the Prophet, Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto Thy name give the glory L ” “ Again ” he adds, “ the Apostle Paul attributed nothing of the success of his preaching to himself, but said : By the grace of God I am what I am, and elsewhere : He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. ”

You will say : Are not our works our own ? Certainly they are, since it is we who act ; but these works are good only if we accomplish them, moved by grace, in the faith and love of Christ. We are the branches, Christ is the root. Is it the root that bears fruit ? No, it is the branch, it is we ourselves ; but it is the branch, inasmuch as it is united by the trunk to the root and draws its sap from the root ; it is we, inasmuch as we are united to Christ Jesus and draw grace from Him. If, at the sight of a branch covered with beautiful fruits, we believe they are produced by the branch, abstraction made of its union with the root, we are in error ; the branch only produces fruits by drawing from the root the sap necessary for their formation. So it is with us ; never let us forget this ; the branch separated from the trunk, from the root, is a dead branch : such is our lot unless we remain united to Christ by grace.

This union comprises moreover an indefinite number of degrees ; the intenser and stronger it is, that is to say the fewer obstacles we oppose to grace, and the deeper our faith and love, — the more numerous will be the fruits that we shall bear.

It is, then, very important to direct our mind and heart towards God, with faith and love, before beginning anything whatsoever it may be : our mind, in order to have no other end before us but the glory of our Heavenly Father ; our heart in order to have no other will save His : a two-fold result which is the realisation of the “ very earnest prayer ” required by St. Benedict. This prayer which ought to be oft repeated throughout the course of the day, need not be long : being most often reduced to a simple turning towards God, to a spiritual spark rising up to Him, it rather resembles in form what in these latter days we call ejaculatory prayer. What gives it price and value is the rectitude of intention, the purity of our faith and the intensity of love. All this teaching wonderfully harmonises with our Holy Father’s asser- tion that a soul’s progress towards perfection goes together with progress in faith. Faith increases love ; love as it becomes greater, surrenders the soul more and more to the action of Christ Who works in us by His Spirit, and this action of Christ becomes more and more powerful and more fruitful in the measure that vices are uprooted, that the soul becomes more detached from creatures and that every human mainspring of action vanishes.¹⁰

The great Patriarch strives in his Rule to open widely the avenues of our souls so that the grace of the Gospel may abundantly penetrate therein and produce all its effects of holiness : operantem in se Dominum magnificant. He has no other end in organising the workshop of the spiritual craft and in giving us entry into it, than to ensure all freedom for the Divine action within us. He wishes us to seek God by our good works, but at the same time to rely solely upon His Divine Son Christ Jesus.

Once being thoroughly and practically convinced that all good comes from God, we are for ever guaranteed against discouragement. Indeed if, without union with Christ by faith and love, we can do nothing, with this union we can do everything that God expects of us. Our oneness with Christ accords very well, not with sin — above all deliberate or habitual sin, even venial — but with our weaknesses, our miseries, and the short-comings inherent upon our fragility. Our Lord knows that “ the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh weak. ” Let not our faults then cast us down nor temptations discourage us. The last instrument that our Holy Father marks out is “ never to despair of the mercy of God ” : Et de Dei misericordia nunquam desperare. Even though we only know how to handle the other instruments imperfectly, let this one at least never be out of our grasp, nunquam. The devil delights, throughout the course of our spiritual life, in urging us to sadness, to discouragement, because he well knows that when the soul is sad it is led to abandon the exercise of good works, and that to its great detriment. When therefore a like sadness arises in our heart, we may be assured that it comes from the devil or from our own pride, and that, if we give way to it, we shall be listening to the devil who is so clever at playing upon our pride. Could 'a movement of distrust, of despair, come from God ? Never, nunquam. Were we to fall into great faults, were we to have the unhappiness of living a long time in unfaithfulness. the Holy Spirit would doubtless urge us to penitence, to expiation, to immolation : St. Benedict exhorts us to weep for our past sins and to amend them, but he would also stir us up to hope, to confidence in God " rich in mercy 2. ” To distrust ? To discouragement ? To despair ? Never. As long as we are here below we must never lose confidence : because the satisfactions and merits of Christ Jesus are infinite, because the Eternal Father has willed to place in Him all the treasures of grace and holiness that He destines for souls, and these treasures are inexhaustible ; because Jesus prays and pleads for us with His Father : Semper vivens ad inter pellandum pro nobis. Our strength is in Him, not in ourselves : Omnia possum in eo qui me confortat.¹¹

“ O Lord, let the action of Thy mercy direct our hearts, for without Thee we are not able to please Thee " : Dirigat cor da nostra quaesumus, Domine, tuae miser ationis operatio: quia tibi sine te placer e non possumus 4 /

V

Praiseworthy though it be ardently to seek God by good works and especially by works of the Rule, we must yet be forearmed against a certain erroneous conception of perfection, which is sometimes to be met with in not very enlightened souls. It may happen that these place the whole of perfection in the merely outward and material observance. Although the word I am going to use is severe, I do not hesi¬ tate to pronounce it : the abovesaid prejudicial idea would border upon pharisaism or would risk leading to it and that would be a great danger.

You know what our Divine Saviour, Who is very Truth and Goodness, said to His disciples : “ Unless your justice abound more than that of... the Pharisees, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. ” These words are truly those of Christ. He Who would not condemn the woman taken in adultery ; Who vouchsafed to speak with the Samaritan woman and reveal heavenly mysteries to her in spite of her guilty life : He Who consented to eat with the Publicans, socially disqualified as sinners ; Who allowed Magdalen to wash His feet and wipe them with the hairs of her head ; He Who was so “ meek and humble of heart 6, ” publicly hurled anathemas at the Pharisees : “ Woe to you... hypocrites, because you shut the kingdom of heaven against men, for yourselves do not enter in. "¹²

The Pharisees passed in the eyes of the multitude as holy personages. They esteemed themselves saints, and made all perfection consist in the exactitude of outward observan¬ ces. You know too how their fidelity to the letter and this exactitude were so fastidious that the examples^ given of their formalism are sometimes ludicrous x. Not content with thus scrupulously keeping the Law of Moses, which already constituted a heavy burden, they added thereto a whole catalogue of prescriptions of their own invention — what our Lord called “ the tradition of men 2. ” All this was so well observed exteriorly that in this respect there was nothing with which to reproach them : impossible to find more correct disciples of Moses. Gall to mind the Pharisee whom Christ depicts going up to the Temple to pray. What is his prayer ? “ My God, I am a man altogether irreproach¬ able ; I fast, I gjve tithes : Thou canst not find me in fault on any point, Thou oughtest to be proud of me 3. " And in the literal sense, what he said was true : he did observe all these things. However, what judgment does Jesus pass upon him ? This man went out of the Temple without being justified, his heart empty of God’s grace. Why this condemnation ? Because the unhappy man glorified himself for his good actions and placed all his perfection in merely outward observance, without troubling himself about the inward dispositions of his heart. Therefore our Lord tells us that unless our justice is greater than that of the Pharisees we shall have no part in the Kingdom of Heaven.

Do we enter into the deep signification of these words ? What is the Christian life ? A list of observances ? In nowise. It is the life of Christ within us, and all that Christ has appointed to maintain this life in us ; it is the Divine life overflowing from the bosom of the Father into Christ Jesus and, through Him, into our souls. There is the supernatural life in its foundation and at its fountainhead ; and without this all the rest is nothing. Are we to understand by this that the exterior prescriptions of Christianity are to be disdained ? Far from it. Their observance is at once the normal condition and the obligatory manifestation of the interior life. But the first is the more important, as the soul, in man, is more important than the body : the soul is spiritual, immortal, created to the image of God ; the body, a little earthly clay ; but the soul is only created at the mo¬ ment of being united to the body, and the exercise of its

1. See Christ in His Mysteries, ch. XI. Some aspects of. the Public Life. — faculties depends on the good constitution of the body. In the Church of Christ, there are also the soul and the body. Following the normal law, it is necessary to belong to the body, to the visible Church, and observe her commandments, in order to participate in her intimate life, the life of grace ; but the Christian life must not be placed principally in the outward observance of material ordinances.¹³

In the same way, the essence of the monastic life does not consist in the horarium of our daily life. It may happen that a monk succeeds by force of will and energy in keeping all the rules, and yet has no monastic spirit, no true inner life : there is the body, but not the soul. And in fact it is not so rare to find religious whose spiritual progress is very slow, although their outward exactitude lends itself to no reproach. It is because there is often only self-seeking and self-complacency in this exactitude, or because they look down on their brethren who do not appear to be so faithful ; or else because they put their perfection in the exterior observance itself. Now, of themselves these observances are small matters : one is worth as much as another x. As Christ Himself said, John the Baptist drank no wine, and he was blamed ; the Son of man ate of what was set before Him, and the Pharisees still disapproved of Him, for they were a race of M hypocrites 2. ”

If it is then somewhat indifferent, in itself, what our exte¬ rior practices be, it does not the less remain that we have promised to keep them : hence, this observance, when animated by love, is extremely pleasing to God. I say : “ animated by love. ” It is in the heart, that perfection lies ; for love is the supreme law. Christ Jesus " searches hearts and He sees that one who says and believes he loves, but without proving it by deeds, does not love. But likewise one who exteriorly keeps Christ's words, and does not act from love, does not truly keep these words. We must join the doing of His word with His love, because His chief word and the abridgment of His doctrine is that we must love. ”

The observing of the Rule does not constitute holiness, but it constitutes a means of arriving at holiness. You may say : Must we not observe all that is prescribed ? Certainly we must ; for oftentimes an habitual and wilful infidelity upon such or such a point of the Rule — prayer, charity, silence, work, — suffices to shackle our progress in the path of perfection. Only, bear this well in mind : — What is important in our observance is the inner principle that animates us. The Pharisees observed all things exactly but it was that they might be seen and applauded by the multitude : and this moral deviation utterly spoiled all their works. As to the outward observance, kept mathematically, but for its own sake and without anything to ennoble it, we may at least say that it is in nowise perfection.¹⁴

The interior life must be the soul of our exterior fidelity. It must be the result, the fruit and manifestation of the faith, confidence and love that govern our heart. The Rule is the expression of God’s Will. Now the fulfilling of the Rule out of love constitutes fidelity. Fidelity is the most precious and delicate flower of love here below. Up above, in heaven, love will blossom out into thanksgiving, in delight and enjoyment, in the full and entire possession of the beloved object ; here, upon earth, it is manifested by a generous and constant fidelity to God, despite the obscurity of faith, despite trials, difficulties, oppositions.

After the example cf our Divine Model, we ought to give ourselves unreservedly, as He gave Himself unreservedly to the Father on entering into the world : Ecce venio, “ Behold I come... that I should do Thy will ” : Ut faciam volunlatem tuam. Each morning, when, after Holy Communion, we make but one with Him, let us renew our disposition of wishing to belong entirely to Him. O Jesus, I wish to live by Thy life, through faith and love ; I wish Thy desires to be my desires, and, like Thee, out of love for Thy Father, I wish to do all that may be pleasing to Thee : I have placed “ Thy law in the midst of my heart ” : Et legem, tuam in medio cordis mei 2. It is pleasing to Thee when I faithfully keep the prescriptions of the Christian law which Thou hast established and those of the monastic code which I have accepted; as proof of the delicacy of my love for Thee, I wish to say as Thou hast said Thyself : Neither a jot nor a tittle shall be taken away by me from Thy law : Iota unum aut unus apex non praeteribit a lege donee omnia fiant ; grant me Thy grace that I may not let the least thing pass that could give Thee pleasure, in order that, according to Thine own word, being faithful in small things, I may likewise become so in great things ; grant above all that I may ever act out of love for Thee and for Thy Father : Ut cognoscat mundus quia diligo Patrem 6; my sole desire is to be able to say like Thee " I do always the things that please Him ", Quia placita sunt ei, facio semper.¹⁵

This is the programme that our Lord traced out for the Blessed Bonomo, an Italian nun : “ Before each of thy actions, offer all to Me, with thy whole being, asking of Me the help and grace to do nothing except for Me : for I am thy End, thy God, and thy Lord Whom thou oughtest to please 2. ”

All things done in love — love being the mainspring of all our activity and the guardian of all our fidelity : is not this the very formula of perfection ? Love it is that mea¬ sures, in the last resort, the value of all our actions, even of the most ordinary.

Thus St. Benedict points out as the first " instrument ” the love of God : “ In the first place, in primis, to love the Lord God with all one’s heart, all one’s soul and all one's strength. ” This is as much as to say : Place love in your heart before all things ; let love rule and guide you in all your actions ; it is love that is to put in your hands all the other instruments of good works ; it is love that will give a high value to the most insignificant details of your days. Little things, says St. Augustine, are little in themselves, but they become great through the faithful love with which they are done : Quod minimum est, minimum est ; sed in minimis fidelem esse magnum est.

Outward observance, sought after for its own sake, without the inward love which quickens it, is a formal show — even a Pharisaical show. An interior love pretending to dispense with the exterior faithfulness which is its fruit, would be an illusion, for our Lord tells us that he who loves Him keeps His commandments 4. And this is true of the monastic life as it is of the Christian life. Christ Jesus says to us : You protest that you love Me ? It is for My Name’s sake that you have left all things : Propter nomen meum 8 ? Then keep faithfully the least points of your Rule.

The ideal we ought to have in view is the exactitude of love : not scruple, nor anxiety never to make a mistake, nor the wish of being able to say : “ I will never be found in fault:” there is pride in this. It is from the heart that the inner life springs ; and if you possess it, you will seek to fulfil by love all you have to do with the greatest purity of intention, and the greatest care possible. Universa l. Joan, vin, 29. 2. La BM Bonomo, moniale bdnddictine by D. du Boure

£54- Read above aJJ in The Book of Special Grace of S‘ Mech tilde, chapter XX VII of the 3 d part : How the heart of man is united to the Heart of God . „ 3* De aoctrina Christiana , L. IV, c. 18. Was it not Pascal who wrote : things as well as great for the sake of the majesty of Jesus Christ Who does them m us ? ” — 4 Joan, xiv, 21. — 5. Matth/xix, 29. custodire... amore Christi: St. Benedict says, the monk ought to be faithful in all things “ for the love of Christ. ”

Let us take care then not to content ourselves with regulating the outward behaviour ; God must have His own spectacle ; that is to say, a heart which seeks Him in secret a. And this is what our great Patriarch asks of us : that we should seek God in the sincerity of our hearts : Si r ever a Deum quaerit 3„

VI

In this exactitude which is born of love there is something easy, wide, free, lovable, joyous. On the contrary, if a monk places all his perfection in merely outward observance, it often happens that, when even without any fault of his own, he is unable to carry out such or such a prescription he is troubled and upset ; he imagines that his spiritual edifice is about to crumble into ruins, and that perfection is not for him. If this happens repeatedly he gets discouraged, and this sense of discouragement is easily to be understood, since, for him, all is summed up and made to consist in outward observance.

On account of this same false principle, it will sometimes occur that he fails in charity towards his brethren and creates friction. Having to choose between the observance and an accidental occasion of helping someone, he will not hesitate : “ The observance before everything ! ” This is servitude to the "letter”, with its aridity and hardness. See how the Pharisees reproached our Divine Saviour for healing the sick on the Sabbath day 4 : under the pretext that the Sabbath was a day of rest, they even reproached the disciples because, being hungry, they rubbed the ears of corn in their hands to eat.

Opposed to this, one who loves Christ Jesus and does all for love, enjoys, at the same time, a great liberty in regard to observances. In fact, not placing his perfection prin¬ cipally in material practices, he does not seek them for them¬ selves ; and when, in consequence of some circumstance, he is prevented from accomplishing them, he is not unduly troubled, because he is not attached to them. And if, as may happen, he sees one of his brethren in need, he does not hesitate, first of all to help his brother, even if such or such a prescription — we are supposing, of course, that it does not oblige under sin — has to be put aside. Some might say as the Pharisees said of Jesus : “ This man is not of God, who keepeth not the sabbath 1 ; ” but this is taking scandal in a Pharisaical spirit to which no attention must be paid.¹⁶

Let us learn by this that we ought not generally to make ourselves the judges of how our brethren observe the Rule. There are some who, outwardly, may appear less correct than others, yet whose inner life is more intense. The ideal would be doubtless that there should be nothing to blame in them, but it is not for us to set ourselves up as censors of our brethren. Let us not then be Pharisees ; lest thinking so much of being a monk, it may befall that one is no longer either Christian, or human, and fails in the great natural precept of charity.

See how well these truths were understood by our great Lawgiver. He assuredly esteemed the monastic observances which after a long experience he had himself laid down. But none the less he knew how to make them cede to a higher motive. When for example on a fast day a guest arrives, St. Benedict wishes that, out of humanity and charity for this guest, the prior who receives him, shall break his fast : Jejunium a prior e frangatur propter hospitem 2. A Pharisee would not have acted thus : he would have fasted and... made his guest fast ! But our Holy Father “ full of the spirit of all the just, ” places perfection before all things in charity, whether it goes directly to God, or is manifested to Christ in the person of the neighbour.

You will not mistake my meaning. I in nowise mean to sanction failings in the observance, nor to excuse negli¬ gences, the letting things go ; far from that ; I only want you to appreciate each thing at its true value. Never forget that the very source of the value of our deeds is in our oneness with Christ Jesus by grace, in the love wherewith we perform our actions. To this end, we must, as our Holy Father says, direct our intention towards God before each good work that we undertake, with great intensity of faith and love ; Quidquid ugendwn inchous bonurn, ab eo per fid instantissima oratione deposcas 4.

VII

What we have undertaken for God and put under His protection, we must never, by our own fault, cease to pursue.

It is only at the cost of persevering faithfulness, says¹⁷

St. Benedi ct, that we shall deserve the reward promised to the good servant.

Perseverance is. in fact, the virtue that consummates and crowns all the others.

We must be careful to distinguish this virtue from the gift of final perseverance by which we " die in the Lord ; ” this gift is purely gratuitous, and, says the Council of Trent, “ none can, with absolute certitude, be assured that it will be granted to him L ”

However, the Holy Council adds, “ we ought to have and to keep the most lively confidence in God’s help, for God is all-powerful to finish in us the good that He has begun, unless we ourselves be unfaithful to grace ” : Nisi ipsi illius gratiae defuerint 2.

The means then given to us in order that we may count upon this infinitely precious gift, the gift exceeding all others, is daily fidelity ; and we shall carry out well and to its end the great work of our whole life, if we carry out well and to its end each work that we undertake for God : this is the object of the virtue of perseverance.

St. Thomas most justly links this virtue to the virtue of fortitude. What indeed is fortitude ? It is a disposition of steadfastness which inclines the soul to support valiantly all evils, even the worst and most continuous, rather than forsake good ; pushed t the supreme degree, fortitude goes so far as to endure martyrdom.

This virtue of fortitude is particularly required by cenobites living together in a monastery. It seems truly as if Provi¬ dence, in instituting cloisters, had, besides its principal design, a secondary one. The principal design is to create the coenobitarum fortissimum genus*, the secondary design to receive now and then weak souls who rely upon the strong. Thus in a forest of giant trees, beautiful and power¬ ful, shrubs are not completely excluded from the soil where the former flourish. Here and there shrubs live in the shade of their great elders and protectors, but they do not make the forest. St. Benedict does not intend to discourage weak souls, but it is chiefly to the ambition of the strong that he opens the avenues to perfection. It is in conformity with the spirit of the great Patriarch that the abbot does not always repulse a postulant who avows his fears in face of the temptations of the world and declares that one of the reasons that brings him to the cloister is the desire of security, provided that this postulant “ truly seeks God, ” and that there is an underlying seriousness in his character. But the holy Lawgiver addresses himself above all to resolute souls; they alone are able to attain these “ summits of virtute ” : culmina virtulum, indicated by St. Benedict.¹⁸

This in fact is because fortitude is not only the principle of “ aggression " aggredi, but it is likewise that of “ endurance ” sustinere ; and as this requires more steadfastness of soul than the former, it constitutes, says St. Thomas, the principal act of the virtue ol fortitude : Principalior actus fortituaims est sustinere 2. Now, the religious life, faithfully led in the cloister, at once demands and teaches this endurance ; of its nature, it tends to establish in the soul a steadfastness which can even go so far as to be heroic, and this so much the more real in that it is the more hidden.

This is because, on the one hand, the changeableness of our nature is extreme, and, in the long run, the life tells on the firmest will. On the other hand, the life led in community offers nothing to poor nature that can flatter or distract it. Daily to bear generously and in the obscurity of faith 3, the monotony inherent to the claustral life, stability in the same place, the accomplishment ol the same ever repeated exercises, however minute they may be, the yoke of obedience, above all when it goes against or offers violence to nature ; and that, as St. Benedict wishes, with patience, in silence, without growing weary or giving in ”. Tacita conscientia patientiam amplectatur et sustinens non lassescat vel discedati. Daily to acquit oneself carefully of the task assigned by obedience, however humble, hidden from sight, or thankless it may be, without that strong incentive to human activity which is the struggle against exterior obstacles, without seeking compensation from crea¬ tures, without encountering those distractions those diver¬ sions, so frequent in the world, which break the uniformity of occupations, — all this requires of the soul singular endurance, self-mastery and firmness 5.

We understand God’s saying in Holy Scripture : “ The i. Rule, ch. x-xxii. — 2. 11-11, q. cxxm, a. 6. — 3. All things being otherwise equal, it requires more faith for anyone living the hidden life with God (Whom he does not see experimentally) than for one who performs outward works of which he can estimate the progress and measure the result of his efforts. — 4. Rule, ch. vii. — 5. One day Mabillon was asked to reveal the extraordinary actions, which to his way of thinking would manifest or testify to the perfection of life of one of the most eminent religious of the Congregation of Sl Maur, D. Claude Martin. This great monk wrote but two lines, but they contain a most profound truth : " I know nothing of Dom M artin except what everyone has seen, but his constant and uniformly good life holds for me the place of a miracle. ” Vie de D. Claude Marlin , Tours 1697, p. 388. patient man is better than the valiant : and he that ruleth his spirit, than he that taketh cities ” ; Melior est patiens viro forti, et qui dominatur animo suo expugnatore urbium; we understand why St. Benedict qualifies disobedience as " sloth 2, ” and the weapon of obedience which he gives to his disciples, as “ strongly tempered 3, ” and it is enough to read the fourth degree of humility in order to see to what heights of heroic endurance he invites his sons to climb 4.

Thus, if faithfully observed, the Rule becomes a principle of fortitude ; in disciplining the will, it tempers it as steel is tempered ; directing the will, it increases its energies tenfold and saves it from dispersing them 6. It has become a common¬ place to speak of the patience of true monks at work, of their holy pertinacity and faithfulness to their task 6. They have given the example of conscientious and persevering toil under every form. Thus they became, in the middle ages, the pioneers of Christian civilisation in Europe. Would such results have been possible if the cloisters had only contained feeble souls ? Assuredly not.

We are not then astonished that the great monks showed themselves to be strong souls. Where, if not in the cloister, did holy missionaries like Boniface and Adalbert find the secret of crowning with martyrdom a long apostolic life and incessant labours ? Where did such as Anselm, Gregory VII and Pius VII obtain that wonderful steadfastness of soul which sustained them in their memorable conflicts for the liberty of the Church ? Again it was in the cloister. It was the common life of the cloister that tried and moulded their souls, strengthened their characters and made them so intrepid and magnanimous that no danger affrighted them, no obstacle held them back, who, according to the noble saying of Gregory VII himself to the monks of Cluny, “ never bent beneath the domination of the princes of this world and remained the courageous and submissive defenders of St. Pe¬ ter and of his Church... Monks and abbots have not failed this Holy Church their Mother. ”

It is this daily endurance in the common life, this toilsome

1. Prov. xvi, 32. — 2. Prologue of the Rule. — 3. Ibid. — 4. It is remarkable that in this single paragraph the great Patriarch heaps up terms signifying endurance : once the words sufferre, non discedere, non lassescere ; twice the word patientia and four times that of sustinere. — 5. Read on Uiis subject the beautiful pages of Buathier, in Le Sacrifice, ch. XVI, Le Sacrifice et la VolonU. — 6. The holy Lawgiver wars against every form and manifestation of instability, versatility, caprice. See for example, ch. xlviii; he will have the monks to read per ordinem ex integro the books given them by the abbot to be read during Lent. — 7. Cf. Berli&re, L. c., ch. n et in, L’apostolat monastique; l’ oeuvre civilisatrice.

Christ, the Ideal or the Monk. fidelity, that St. Benedict requires of us in this workshop where he distributes our tasks and provides us with the instruments of our sanctification. It is “ day and night ” die noctuque, that is to say “unceasingly”, incessabiliter, that he would have us use these instruments, without being wearied by the length of the task, without being discouraged by our want of success, without letting ourselves be cast down by our failures.

The virtue of fortitude constantly exercised, preserved and sustained until our last day constitutes perseverance. And it is to acquire this that our great Patriarch exhorts us so explicitly when he tells us never to depart from the teaching of the Divine Master, but to persevere in His teaching in the monastery until death : A b ipsius nunquam magisterio discedentes, in ejus doctrina usque ad mortem in monasterio persever antes 2.

In order to quicken and sustain us in the practice of endurance, our Holy Father places the Divine Ideal before our eyes ; he appeals to the supreme motive: the love of Christ Jesus : “ That we may by patience share in the suffer¬ ings of Christ”: Passionibus Christi per patientiam participemur 3.

Indeed it is to Christ Jesus we must cleave. We cannot be His disciples if, having put our hand to the plough, we look back and shirk the weary labour. Only he who perseveres unto death shall be saved : Qui per sever aver it usque in finem hie salvus erit 5. Christ Jesus prepares a place in His Kingdom only for those \yho have continued with Him in trial . Vos estis qui permansistis mecum in tentationibus meis, et ego dispono vobis regnum 6.

• iisten *° ^ese grave words of teaching from the infallible Truth. Let us ask God daily, for the gift of final perseverance, and repeat the praver that the Church puts upon our lips each day at Holy Mass : “ O Lord, establish our days in Thy peace, deliver us from eternal damnation, and vouchsafe to number us in the flock of Thy elect. ”

Make us ever adhere to Thy commandments and never suffer us to be separated from Thee 8. ”

If we are faithful, despite temptations and difficulties, the day of reward promised by God will come for us ; this is the assurance the great Patriarch gives us in ending this chapter on The Instruments of Good Works ” : Ilia merces nobis a Domino recomp ensabitur quam ipse promisit. If we

7' ~ 2- Prolo^e of the Rule. — 3. Ibid. — 4. Lilc. xx, 62.— ’ 2’ aion XXI1’ 28'29’ ~ 7- Canon of the Mass. 8. Prayer x. Rule,

5. Matth. , _ before the Communion. have had that constant application which love brings to the perfect fulfilment of our Heavenly Father’s wishes, if we have done “ always the things that please Him, ” Quae piacita sunt ei facio semper 1, we shall certainly receive the magnificent reward promised in these words by Him Who is Faithfulness itself: “Well done, good and faithful servant : because thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will place thee over many things : enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. ”

Each Saint on entering into Heaven hears these blessed words that form the welcome he receives from Christ Jesus. And what are these things in which Our Lord gives him a share ? God Himself, in His Trinity and His perfections ; and, with God, all spiritual good. The soul vail be like unto God for it will “ see Him as He is ” : Similes ei erimus, quoniam videbimus earn sicuti est.

Through this ineffable vision, which succeeds to faith, the soul will be fixed in God, and will find in Him the Divine stability ; it will for ever be knit in a perfect embrace, and without the fear of ever losing Him, to the Supreme and Immutable Good: Participatio incommutabilis boni.

Whilst waiting till the splendours of eternal light shine before our purified sight, let us often repeat this prayer of the Church which well epitomises the different points of this conference : “ O God, Who in Thy love dost restore the beauty of innocence, direct towards Thee the hearts of Thy servants ? that the fervour of love which is born of Thy Spirit may make them steadfast in faith, and faithful in practising Thy Law ” : Deus innocentiae restitutor et amator, dirige ad te tuorum corda servorum: ut spiritus tui fervore concepto , et in fide invenia?Uur stabiles, et

IN OPERE EFFICACES4.

1. Joan, vni, 29. — 2. Matth. xxv, 21. — 3. S. Aug. Episi. ad HonoraX. cxl, 31. — 4. Feria iv. post Dominic. II Quadrages.

A. — THE WAY OP ABNEGATION (Reliquimua omnia)

Footnotes

1. 1. Matth. xix, 27. — 2. Dialog, lib, u, c. vm. — 3. Prologue of the Rule.
   ↩
2. 1. Prologue of the Rule. — 2. Rule, ch. IV. The metaphor of "instrument", " workshop " is an inheritance that comes to us from the East ; we find these terms in the language of the asceticism of the first centuries and of the Fathers of the Desert. Cf. likewise S‘ Thomas, 11-11, q. 184, a. 3, c. fin ; q. 188, a. 8, c. fin. — 3. Cf. Ps. xvin, 6 ; cxvm, 32 : Viam mandatorum tuorum cucurri. — 4. Prologue of the Rule.
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3. x. I-II, q. 57, a. 3. — 2. Gen. 1, 31. — 3- Ps. vin, 1. — 4- Ps. cm, 24. — 5. Gen. 1, 26. — 6. Prov. viu, 31. — 7. Creed attributed to S* Athanasius. — 8. Col. 1, 15 ; Hebr. 1, 3. ↩

4. 1. Rom. viii, 29. — 2. Gal. vi, 15. — 3. Rom. vm, 29. — 4. Gal. in, 27.
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5. 1. Rom. vi ii. — 2. Prologue of the Rule.
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6. 1. We know that this maxim constitutes, according to the philosophers, the first principle of the moral order. — 2. Rule, ch. IV.
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7. 1. Cf. S. Gregor. Dialog. 1, n. S* Benedict is seen overthrowing the idols of Monte Cassino; before this he had endured the infamous proceedings of a bad priest ; he had only just escaped being poisoned by the wicked monks in the neighbourhood of Subiaco.
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8. 1. Prologue of the Rule. — 2. S. Aug. C.onfes. lib. I, c. 1. — 3. Dialog, lib. 11, c. xxxv. — 4. Prologue of the Rule. — 5. Rule, ch. vii.
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9. l„ Ps. cxxvx, i. — • 2. Joan, xv, 5. — 3. Tract, in Joan, lxxx, 3. ↩

10. 1. Prologue of the Rule; Ps. cxm. — 2. I Cor. xv, 10. — 3. II Cor. x, xy.
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11. 1. Matth. xxvi, 41.
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12. 1. Rule, ch. IV. — 2. Eph. 11, 4. — 3. Hebr. vn, 25. — 4. Collect for the eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost. — 5. Matth. v, 20. — 6. Ibid, xi, 29. — 7. Ibid, xxiii, 13.
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13. 2. Marc, vii, 8. — 3. Cf. Luc. xvm, 11-12.
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14. 1. See what we have said above p. 59 on the width of St. Benedict ’s views on this matter. — 2. Cf. Matth. xi, 18-19 ; Luc. vii, 33-34. — 3. Bossuet, Meditations on the Gospel , The Last Supper, 93th day.
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15. 1. Ps. xxxix, 8-9. Heb. x, 559. — 2. Ps. xxxix, 8-9. — j. Mattii. v, 18. — 4. Cf. Luc. xvi, 10. — 5. Joaa. xiv, 31.
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16. 1. Rule, ch. vii. — 2. Bossuet, Meditations upon the Gospel, The Sermon on the Mount, 20tt day. — 3. Rule, ch. lviii. — 4. Luc.vi,ii. — 5. Matth.xn,2.
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17. i Joan. IX 1 6. — 2 Rule, ch. tin. — 3. S. Greg. Dialog. L. 11, c. vm. — 4. Prologue ot the Rule. ↩

18. 1. Sess. VI, c. 13. — 2. Ibid.— 3. n-it, q- cxxxvi, a. 2. — 4. Rule, ch. 1.
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