Part 1, lesson 9

Of the obligation we are under to carry the cross, and cherish the love of it, on account of the Spirit whom we received in Baptism, and who imprinted this love in our hearts.

Q. Can the flesh deserve any thing but contempt, abjection and contradiction ?

A. No.

Q. It is then an effect of the justice of God, that, in Baptism, the love of contempt, sufferings and poverty, is imprinted in the heart of man.

A. Yes; for man, of himself, being nothingness and sin, he ought to have no other desire for himself than to be treated as he deserves, that Ts to say, to suffer contempt, persecution, poverty, etc.

Q. How admirable are the conduct and ways of God over Christians! no, it is not without reason that the scripture calls the mystery of the cr.ass.ji hidden mystery.* Truly, few persons would believe that the cross is so just and reasonable a thing, and that there is such an obligation for us to cherish the love of it in our hearts.

A. This is the misfortune and error of the age; many try to persuade themselves that this is

• AbscoiKlitmn ab eis. Luc. xviii, 3-1 an excess of piety, a devotion reserved to cloisters, and not an obligation for all Christians.

Q. But, by baptism, have we not received the Holy Ghost, that obliges us to live in the love of the cross ?

A. Yes; for according to St. faul,* as I have already said, we are no longer debtors to the flesh, to live according to the flesh ; but we are obliged to live according to the Spirit; and, if we live in the Spirit, we must walk according to the direction of the Spirit,! who imprints in our hearts an inclination for

• Rom. viii, 12.

t Si spiritu vivimus, spiritu et am.- bulenms. Galat. v, 25.

the cross, and gives us at the same time strength to carry it.

Q. Is not this expressed in the ceremonies of baptism ?

A. Yes; for there are two crosses made with the holy oil, one upon the heart, the other upon the shoulders of the person baptized, to denote to us the effect of the Holy Ghost.

Q. What does the oil repre sent ?

A. The Holy Spirit.

Q. What does the cross made upon the heart signify?

A. The love of the cross; be cause the heart is the seat of love.

Q. And that made upon the shoulders ?

A. It signifies the strength to carry the cross; because the shoulders are the seat of strength in man.