Jean-Pierre Camus

“ He who thinks that he knows something and does not know how to save his soul, does not yet know what it is most important to know. Those who know many things without knowing themselves, and without knowing God in the manner in which even in this present life he can be known and desires to be known, resemble the giants in the fable, who piled up mountains and then buried themselves beneath them.
Do not, however, think for a moment that, in order to save our souls, or to be truly devout, we must be ignorant; for, as sugar spoils no sauce, true knowledge is in no wise opposed to devotion. ”

“ He considered similar fashions of speech to be even more intolerable than the words of vain persons who are the sport of their hearers, and whose empty boasting makes them to be like balloons, the plaything of everybody. A mocking laugh is sufficient to let all the wind which puffs them out escape. Words of humility coming merely from the lips, and not from the heart, lead surely to vanity, though by what seems the wrong road. Those who utter them are like people who take their salary gladly enough, but insist on first making a show of refusing and of saying that they want nothing. ”

“ Oh! how blessed are the souls who live on the will of God alone. Ah! if even to taste a little of that blessedness in a passing meditation is so sweet to the heart which accepts that holy will with all the crosses it offers, what must the happiness be of a soul all steeped in that will? Oh! my God, what a blessed thing is it not to bring all our affections into a humble and absolute subjection to the divine love! This we have said, this we have resolved to do, and our hearts have taken the greatest glory of the love of God for their sovereign law. ”

“ Consider, my dear daughter, this great Artificer of mercy, who changes our miseries into graces, and out of the poison of our iniquities compounds a wholesome medicine for our souls. Tell me, then, I beseech you, if God works such wonders with our sins, what will He not effect with our afflictions, with our labours, with the persecutions which we have to endure? No matter what trouble befalls you, nor from what direction it may come, let your soul be at peace, certain that if you truly love God all will turn to good. ”

“ Truly, the lover of holy poverty can always find a means of practising it, even in the midst of riches.
Blessed Francis, indeed, always welcomed poverty with a smiling countenance, though naturally it be apt to cast a gloom and melancholy upon the faces both of those who endure it and of those who only dread it.
Involuntary poverty is surly and discontented, for it is forced and against the will. Voluntary poverty, on the contrary, is joyous, free, and light-hearted. ”

“ If we be still assailed, we must call to our aid constancy, which is a kind of double-lined buckler of patience, impervious to the most violent thrusts.
But should evil tongues, growing yet sharper and keener, cut to the very quick, longanimity, which is an unfailing, undying patience, is ready to enter the lists, and eager to help us. For when persecution, instead of yielding to our patience, is only the more irritated thereby, like a fire which burns more fiercely in frosty weather, then is the time for us to practise the virtue of longanimity. ”

“ I ask you, Philothea, would it be proper for a Bishop to wish to lead the solitary life of a Carthusian monk? If a father of a family were as heedless of heaping up riches as a Capuchin; if an artisan spent the whole day in church like a monk; if a monk, like a Bishop, were constantly in contact with the world in the service of his neighbour, would not the devotion of each of these be misplaced, ill-regulated, and laughable? ”

“ Virtue does not consist so much in habit as in action. Habit is in itself an indolent sort of quality, which, indeed, inclines us to do good, but does no more, unless inclination be followed by action.
"How shall he who has no one in command set over him learn obedience? He who is never contradicted, patience? He who has no superior, humility? And how shall he who, like a misanthrope, flies from intercourse with other men, notwithstanding that he is obliged to love them as himself, how shall he, I say, learn brotherly love? ”

“ For a priest to sin, I tell you, is to give occasion to devils to mock at the lives of our clergy, and to blaspheme our Holy Faith, I ask you also to have pity on yourself, and on your own soul which you are losing for all eternity, and to seek anew God's favour, I exhort you in the name of Jesus Christ to return to God by a true repentance, I conjure you to do this by all that is most holy, and sacred in Heaven, or on earth, by the Blood of Jesus Christ which you profane, by the loving-kindness of the Saviour, whom you crucify afresh, by the Spirit of Grace against whom you are rebelling. ”

“ The Sovereign Spirit of our God is everywhere, and without His Will or permission no other spirit dare stir. Those who fear this Divine Spirit ought not to fear any other. You are beneath His wings, like a little chicken under those of its mother; what do you fear? In my youth I, too, was a prey to these imaginations, and in order to get the better of them I forced myself when quite a child to go alone into places which my fancy had peopled with fantastic terrors. I went alone, I say, but my heart was armed with confidence in God. ”

“ For myself, I know of no Christian perfection other than to love God with our whole heart and our neighbour as ourselves. All other perfection is falsely so entitled: it is sham gold that does not stand testing.
Charity is the only bond between Christians, the only virtue which unites us absolutely to God, and our neighbour.
In charity lies the end of every perfection and the perfection of every end. I know that mortification, prayer, and the other exercises of virtue, are all means to perfection, provided that they are practised in charity, and from the motive of charity. ”

“ We must do all things from love, and nothing from constraint. We must love obedience rather than fear disobedience. I leave you the spirit of liberty: not such as excludes obedience, for that is the liberty of the flesh, but such as excludes constraint, scruples, and over-eagerness. However much you may love obedience and submission, I wish you to suspend for the moment the work in which obedience has engaged you whenever any just or charitable occasion for so doing occurs. This omission will be a species of obedience. Fill up its measure by charity. ”

“ Are we not meriting for God, when we do a good work in a state of grace and for the love of God? And ought not the love of God which seeks nothing but His interests, that is to say, His glory, to be the chief end and final aim of all our good works, rather than the reward we thereby merit, which is merely an accessory? ”

“ He is, indeed, our Light and our Salvation; when we walk through the valley of the shadow of death we need fear nothing if He is at our side. He is the Light of the world; He dwells in light inaccessible, light that no darkness can overtake. He alone can lighten our darkness. ”

“ The spirit of Seneca inflates the soul and puffs it up with pride, that of Christianity rejects the knowledge which puffs up in order to embrace the charity which edifies. In short, there is the same difference between the spirit of Seneca and the christian spirit that there is between virtues acquired by us, which are, therefore, dead, and virtues that are infused by God, which are, therefore, living. Indeed, how could this philosopher, being destitute of the true Faith, possess charity? And yet well we know that without charity all acquired virtues are unable to save us. ”

“ In short, if Purgatory is a species of hell as regards suffering, it is a species of Paradise as regards charity. The charity which quickens those holy souls is stronger than death, more powerful than hell; its lamps are all of fire and flame. Neither servile fear nor mercenary hope has any part in their pure affection. Purgatory is a happy state, more to be desired than dreaded, for all its flames are flames of love and sweetness. ”

“ Surely those who complain of being slandered are over-sensitive! Their little cross, made of words, is so light that a breath of wind carries it away. The expression, 'stung me,' meaning 'abused me,' is one that I have never liked, for there is a great deal of difference between the humming of a bee, and its stinging us! We must indeed have sensitive ears, if mere buzzing stings them!
"Truly, those were clever people who invented the proverb: 'A good name is better than riches'; preferring reputation to wealth, or, in other words, vanity to avarice. ”

“ Augustine: Too avaricious is that heart to which God does not suffice. "Assuredly, he who is not satisfied with God is covetous indeed." This word covetous produced a powerful effect upon the heart of one who, in the days of her prosperity, had always hated avarice, and had been most lavish in her expenditure, both on her own needs and pleasures and on works of mercy. It seemed as if suddenly the eyes of her soul were opened, and she saw how admirable, how infinitely worthy of love God ever remained, whether with those things she had possessed or without them. ”

“ In order to persuade us that he was right, he used to warn us against thinking that perfection depends on the number of our good works, exterior or interior. When asked what then became of that insatiable love of which the masters of the spiritual life speak, that love which never thinks that it has reached the goal, but is always pressing on farther and farther, spanning the whole extent of heaven with giant strides, he answered: "The tree of that love must grow at the roots, rather than by the branches." ”

“ Strive, my dearest daughter, to become every day more pure in heart.
"This purity of heart consists in setting on all things their true value, and in weighing them in the balance of the sanctuary, which balance is only another name for the wilt of God." In the same way in his Theotimus he teaches that acts of the lesser virtues are often more pleasing to God, and consequently more meritorious, because done with great love, than the most splendid virtues when practised with less of heavenly charity. Charity is the pure gold which makes us rich in immortal wealth. ”

“ By meekness he did not understand a kind of honeyed sweetness, too often mixed with a good deal of affectation and pretention. A wolf's heart may be hidden under the fleece and gentle seeming of a lamb, and underneath an outside covering of humility may lurk secret arrogance, such that while appearing to lie down to be trodden under men's feet, those humble after this fashion may by pride in their own pretended state of perfection be putting all men under their own feet. ”

“ It is true that there you suffer great mortifications of heart, seeing yourself so imperfect and so deserving of reproof and correction, but is not this the very thing you ought to seeks mortification of heart and a continual sense of your own misery? Yet, you say, you cannot do such penance as you would. My dear daughter, tell me what better penance can be given to an erring heart than to bear a continual cross and to be always renouncing self-love? ”

“ How many vessels of contempt have been, by the change of the right hand of God, transformed into vessels of honour?
To despise no one, which is the second dictum, seems at first sight to contradict the first, if, by "the world" be meant the vicious and not merely their vices. It is certainly very right to despise no one, but it is still more reasonable and more advantageous to ourselves, who wish to advance in perfection, to value and esteem all men, because created by God to His image, and because fitted for partaking of His grace and of His glory. ”

“ Let them talk—it is but a storm in a teacup, a tempest of words that will die away and be forgotten. We must be sensitive indeed if we cannot bear the buzzing of a fly! Who has told us that we are blameless? Possibly these people see our faults better than we see them ourselves, and better than those who love us do. When truths displease us, we often call them slanders. What harm do others do us by having a bad opinion of us? We ought to have a bad opinion of ourselves. ”

“ Where is your unfailing compassion?' I answer, my compassion is as great and as sincere as ever; for God knows how much I love you, since I love you more than myself, and how I should reproach myself if I allowed my heart to be hardened against you. It is, however, too clear that the injury you have received is resented by you, since you complain of it. We do not usually complain of what pleases us, quite the reverse, we are glad and rejoice and expect to be congratulated, not pitied. ”

“ It was his opinion that when we complain, however justly, a certain amount of self-love is always at the bottom of the complaint, and that a habit of grumbling is a positive proof of our being too tender of ourselves and too cowardly.
After all, of what use are complaints? They do but beat the air and serve to prove that if we suffer wrong it is with regret, with sadness, and not without some desire of revenging ourselves. An ungreased wheel makes the most noise in turning, and in like manner, he who has the least patience is the first to grumble. ”