Alfonso Rodríguez

“ In the governments of the world, men are eagerly employed in procuring wealth, honours, dignities, and preferment, and scarce make any efforts to acquire virtue. But in religion all their study is to deny their own will; all their application is to discover the means whereby to become more perfect; every man lives in peace and charity, without contention, without murmuring, without complaint; their only emulation is to excel each other in obedience, humility, and virtue. ”

“ This is the thought which should always accompany us, at table, at our going to bed, and getting up; in all our actions and in all our exercises, at all times, and in all places during our whole life. This is our only business. If we do this well, we need desire nothing more, and in fact, it is not worth our while to trouble ourselves even for a moment about everything else. ”

“ By this, however, I do not mean, that gaining general esteem or good will should be our motive for embracing virtue. I only assert, that when it shall be known that virtue is the only thing esteemed in religion, we shall be more convinced, that it is the only thing truly deserving of esteem. For every one coming thus to the knowledge of the true way in which he should walk, will devote himself without reserve to virtue — will apply himself solely to his spiritual advancement, and will believe that everything else is but vanity and folly. ”

“ What, think you, is the reason, why the same man is, at one time, dejected and disgusted, and at another time is content and at ease in the performance of his religious duties? Let him not attach the blame thereof to the duties themselves, nor to the superiors, but let him impute this inconstancy to himself, and to the little relish he has for virtue and mortification. A strong, healthy man, says Father Avila, will, with ease, carry that burden, which a child or sick person cannot raise from the ground. ”

“ Our nature is so feeble, and we are so relaxed by the evil habits we have contracted, that we must take our aim considerably higher than the mark, if we wish to reach it. Man is become so weak by sin, that to attain an ordinary degree of virtue, his thoughts and desires must soar much higher. But some will say, " All I propose is to avoid mortal sin: this is the only perfection I aspire to." It is much to be feared, that you will not reach this point you propose to yourself, for the string is slack. ”

“ Gregory says, " Men who are digging for a great treasure, the deeper they dig the more earnestly and diligently they go on still in their work; for hoping they are not far from what they looked for, they imagine that a little more pains will bring them to it; and by these hopes they encourage themselves to work afresh, without being tired. In like manner those who truly take to heart the great affair of their salvation, the farther they are advanced in the way of perfection, and the nearer they approach, they are still the more pressing to arrive at it. ”

“ It is this fire of his love, this insatiable desire of his greater glory, which ought continually urge us to elevate ourselves towards him, and make us advance in virtue.
This desire once truly imprinted in the soul makes us exert ourselves with fervour and diligence to attain what we wish for. For we are naturally active in seeking and finding out the things we have an inclination for; and it is for this reason the Wise Man says, a The beginning of wisdom is to excite in our hearts an earnest desire thereof. ”

“ He would have us feel an earnest desire of acquiring virtue and perfection, that the object of our desires being granted, we may know how to esteem and preserve it as a most precious jewel. For in general, whatever is not earnestly wished for is, when obtained, not much esteemed. One of the principal reasons why we make so little progress in perfection is, because we do not desire and long for it so earnestly as we ought; we have some desires, it is true, but then they are so weak and languid that they vanish almost as soon as they are felt. ”

“ I say the same to you: do not imagine that all the work is done, and that you are already out of all danger, because you are become a religious; for it will avail you nothing to be a religious, unless you do those things, for which you have entered into religion; for you are not come thither, to be a man of great learning, nor to become a great preacher, but solely and purely to become a true and good religious, and to aspire continually after perfection. ”

“ Imagine to yourselves how quick the flame rushes among reeds, when they are set on fire, and you will conceive how the just advance in virtue, when their hearts are once inflamed. This was the case with the ancient hermits, who, for this reason, were so far from having need of a superior to spur them on in their duties, that they needed one to moderate their zeal. But if we feel not these desires in our hearts, so far from one superior being sufficient for ten religious, ten superiors, notwithstanding their united efforts, would not make one religious man perfect against his will. ”

“ All desire of honour, praise, and vanity is, properly speaking, that world thou hast renounced. Do not suffer thy heart to be seized anew with these follies; for it will be of no service to keep thy body shut up in a cloister, if thy heart still sighs and longs for the esteem of men, and so hurries thee continually back again to the world." Thus did these great saints encourage and fortify themselves; and so should we in like manner animate and strengthen ourselves against all the difficulties we can meet with in religion. ”

“ To conclude — I say that this point is so essential and so necessary to be observed by every good Christian that we ought to hold it for a general maxim, that- as long as we consider the smallest things in devotion, as matters of great importance, all will go well with us, and we shall attract the blessings and assistance of Heaven. But, on the contrary, if we neglect them, we shall expose ourselves to great danger; for it is only by this carelessness and indifference that sin can find entrance into the soul of a religious. ”

“ They, on the contrary, who persevere with fervour in their devotions and spiritual exercises, not only remain with ease in that degree of perfection they had already attained, but in a little time ascend much higher. Thus they never lose time, nor diminish what they have once acquired. They are not like the tepid and negligent, who spend their whole life in alternate fits, of tepidity and devotion, destroying by their negligence what they have acquired by their fervour, doing and undoing, building up and putting down, without ever bringing any of their projects to perfection. ”

“ It is the privilege and the excellence of spiritual things to satisfy, and at the same time, to excite our appetite; to quench, and still to excite our thirst; and in a word, to cause, that the more we eat and drink of them, the more we hunger and thirst after them. But then it is a hunger, which, instead of making us faint and weak, renders us strong and hearty; and it is a thirst, which, instead of pain, imparts great pleasure to us. ”

“ Let every one therefore remain firm at his post, like a good soldier; let him take care that through his fault a battalion so strong and so well formed be not broken. Let him take heed that religious discipline be not relaxed through his irregularity. In fine, let him imagine that in religion his mother addresses him in the language, wherein the mother of the Machabees addressed her youngest son, encouraging him to suffer and to die courageously for the observance of the law. ”

“ That the more a man ascends a hill, the more extensive will be his prospect; in like manner, the nearer we come to the top of the mountain of perfection the greater we perceive the extent of virtue to be. ”

“ But if men would apply themselves with the same fervour to virtue, as they do to be eminent in profane sciences, they would find the acquisition of it more easy, and its possession much more advantageous. And yet, would it be at all surprising, if, in acquiring the science of the cross, and in securing our eternal salvation, we display as much zeal as we do in acquiring profane science, and in cultivating our minds? ”

“ You have happily escaped all the storms raised against you, in the tempestuous sea of the world; but take precaution lest you be wrecked in the harbour of religion. For as it would avail nothing that a ship should have weathered all the storms, and escaped all the rocks at sea, if she is wrecked in port; so it would be of no advantage to you to have resisted all the assaults of the strongest temptations, if afterwards you yield to weaker ones and thereby lose your soul. ”

“ But if you are not liberal towards God, how can you expect he should be so towards you, and if you offer your gifts to him with a parsimonious hand, must you not expect that he will treat you in the same manner? If you are afraid of doing too much for him, if you hold always the compass in hand to measure what you are obliged to under pain of sin, and examine whether the omission be mortal or only venial; if, in fine, you intend to give God no more, than what you think to be precisely his right, you plainly shew you are a miser, and oblige him to be more sparing of his blessings towards you. ”

“ It is the same with those who, instead of attending to that which is most essential in a sermon, to that whence they could extract the so necessary nourishment of their souls, stop at the rind, and attend to nothing more than to the plan and division of the discourse, to the strength and beauty of the language — in a word, to that which is only an idle ornament and a vain artifice of eloquence. ”

“ Let every one, therefore, use his utmost endeavours, that no man may say of him, you are a good infirmarian or a good porter — you are a great scholar, a learned doctor, or a celebrated preacher; but you are not a good religious man. For in fact, we entered religion only to become true religious. It is this character we ought to prefer to all others — it is this we ought to seek after with the utmost diligence, and have perpetually before our eyes. ”

“ And an excellent musician was wont to say, that it grieved him to find he understood nothing of music; because he discovered in that science things of such vast extent, that he perceived he could never arrive at any perfection in it. On the contrary, the ignorant, who are not sensible of their own wants, and who see not how many' things they have still to learn, readily imagine that they know a great deal. ”

“ For though without a particular revelation from God, we cannot have in this life an infallible certainty that we are in the state of grace, yet there are signs that give a moral probability of it, and the surest mark we can have is to feel in our hearts an ardent desire of daily perfecting ourselves more and more in virtue. So that there can be no need of any motive but this to urge us to cherish this desire, since it gives us, in some measure, an assurance that we are in the state of grace, than which nothing in this life can be of greater consolation. ”

“ Consider how holy and perfect he is; think on what your birth obliges you to, and endeavour to shew by your actions, that you are the true children of such a father; take examples from your brothers also, and if you will, look upon your eldest brother Jesus Christ, who most freely gave his blood and life to repair the losses felt by all our race, and to restore it to its former splendour. But if so great an example dazzles you, look upon your other brothers who are as feeble as yourself, born in sin as you were, subject to passions, temptations, and evil inclinations as you are. ”

“ Persevere in the same sentiments of humility and spiritual comfort; be convinced that you are still under the same obligations, as you were the first day, and in this manner you cannot fail of making great progress. In fine, think often with what modesty and devotion you behaved yourself at first after your admittance; remember how obedient, how humble, how fervent, how exact, and how resigned you were then; continue always the same, and you will daily improve more and more, and continually advance in virtue and perfection. ”

“ Can it be, that we should ever be able to come near the perfection of our heavenly Father? "Can any man be just in comparison of God?" (Job, iv. 17.) No, certainly. Whatever degree of perfection we can possibly arrive at, there will still remain an infinite distance between his perfection and ours. And yet our Saviour says to us, "Be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect." To let us understand that in the career of virtue there are no bounds, and therefore we should never be satisfied with what we have already done, but should labour continually to acquire what we still want. ”

“ Those who lead a spiritual life, says he, are like, a man in the midst of a rapid river; if he stops but for a moment, and strives not continually to bear up against the stream, he will run great risk of being carried down. Now the course we ought to take is so directly opposite to the current of our nature corrupted by sin, that unless we labour and force ourselves to go on, we shall certainly be hurried back by the impetuous torrent of our passions.
" The kingdom of heaven is to be taken by storm, and it is only the violent that carry it." ”