A Year with the Saints. Anonymous

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СКАЧАТЬ was the same with St. Vincent de Paul. Though his virtues were known to all, in spite of the contrivances that he used to conceal them, yet to him alone they remained unknown; because, by putting his own baseness continually before his eyes, he cut off the view of them; so that, although he was rich and abounding in virtues and celestial gifts, he always esteemed himself poor, needy, and destitute of all spiritual good. Thence came the title that he usually gave himself: "This poor wretch."

      When St. Teresa reflected upon the favors she received from God in such great abundance, she humbled herself the more on account of them, saying that the Lord sustained her extreme weakness in this way, and that these supports proved how great was her tendency to fall, as a house is shown to be tottering, by the props set up to hold it.

      14. Vain self-complacency and the desire of making a show of being spoken of, of having our conduct praised, and of hearing it said that we succeed well and are doing wonders----this is an evil which makes us forget God, which infects our holiest actions, and is, of all vices, the most injurious to progress in the spiritual life. I do not understand how anyone can believe and hold it as a truth of faith that he who exalts himself shall be abased if he desires to pass for a man of worth, a person of prudence, foresight, and ability.----St. Vincent de Paul

      The widely known Franciscan, Brother Justin, entered the Order of St. Francis after refusing great favors and most honorable offices which the King of Hungary offered him. He then advanced so far in religion, that he had frequent ecstasies. One day while dining at the table in the monastery, he was raised in the air and carried over the heads of the Religious, to pray before a picture of the Virgin which was painted high on the wall. On account of this wonder, Pope Eugenius IV sent for him and embraced him, not allowing him to kiss his feet; then, seating him by his side, he had a long conversation with him, and gave him many presents and indulgences. This favor made him vain, and St. John Capestran meeting him on his return, said: "Alas! thou didst go forth an angel, and thou art come back a demon!" In fact, increasing every day in insolence, he killed a monk with a knife. After a term of imprisonment, he escaped into the kingdom of Naples, where he committed many crimes, and finally died in prison.

      A holy monk once passed a night in a convent of nuns where there was a boy continually tormented by a devil. Through all that night the child remained undisturbed, and so, in the morning, the monk was requested to take him home to his monastery and keep him until the cure was complete. He did this, and then as nothing more happened to the boy he said to the other monks, with some complacency: "The devil made light of those nuns in tormenting this boy; but since he has come into this monastery of God's servants, he has no longer dared to approach him." No sooner had he said this than the boy, in the presence of them all, began to suffer as he had previously, and the monk bewailed his error. Another monk once boasted, in presence of his abbot St. Pachomius, that he had made two mats in one day, when the Saint reproved him and ordered him to carry the two mats on his shoulders before the other monks and ask the pardon and prayers of all, because he had valued these two mats more than the Kingdom of Heaven. He also commanded him to remain five months in his cell without ever allowing himself to be seen, and to make two mats a day for all that time. From his earliest years, St. Thomas Aquinas was always opposed to receiving praise, and he never uttered a word which might lead to it. Therefore, he never felt any temptation to vanity or self-complacency, as he himself testified to Brother Reginald, saying he rendered thanks to God that he had never been tempted by pride. St. Vincent de Paul made this resolution to close the path against self-complacency: "When I am performing some public action, and may complete it with honor, I will perform it indeed, but I will omit those details which might give it luster or attract notice to myself. Of two thoughts which come into my mind, I will manifest the lower, to humble myself, and I will keep back the higher, to make in my heart a sacrifice of it to God; for it is at times expedient to do a thing less well outwardly, rather than to be pleased with ourselves for having done it well, and to be applauded and esteemed for it; and it is a truth of the Gospel that nothing pleases the Lord so much as humility of heart and simplicity of word and deed. It is here that His spirit resides, and it is in vain to seek it elsewhere." This resolution he observed carefully. One day when traveling with three of his priests, he told them, by way of diversion, an adventure which had once happened to him. But in the midst of his story he stopped short, striking his breast, and saying that he was a wretch, full of pride and always talking of himself. When he reached home, prostrating himself before them, he asked pardon for the scandal he had given them by talking about himself.

      15. What is it, O my God, that we expect to gain by appearing well before creatures, and by pleasing them? What does it matter to us if we are blamed by them, and considered worthless, provided we are great and faultless before Thee? Ah, we never come fully to an understanding of this truth, and so we never succeed in standing upon the summit of perfection! The Saints had no greater pleasure than to live unknown and abject in the hearts of all.----St. Bernard

      A holy bishop, in order to live unknown, left his diocese, and putting on a poor dress went secretly to Jerusalem, where he worked as a laborer. There a nobleman saw him several times sleeping on the ground, with a column of fire rising from his body even to the heavens. Wondering at this, he asked him privately who he was. He answered he was a poor man who lived by his work, and had no other means of support. The count, not satisfied with this, urged him to reveal the whole truth, and the bishop, after exacting a promise of secrecy during his lifetime, told him who he was, and how he had left his country to escape from renown and esteem, as he held it to be unworthy of a Christian, who ought always to have in mind the insults and reproaches heaped upon his Lord, to enjoy the honor and reverence of men.

      St. Nicholas of Bari twice threw money secretly, by night, into the house of a gentleman of ruined fortune, that he might be able to give dowries to his daughters, without which they could not be married. On a third visit for the same purpose, he was discovered, and hastily fled.

      The Abbot Pitirus, a man celebrated for sanctity, desired to know whether there was in the world any soul more perfect than his own, that he might be able to learn from such a one how to serve God better. Then an Angel appeared to him, and said: "Go to a certain convent in the Thebaid. Four hundred and ninety nuns dwell there, among them one called Isidora, who wears a diadem upon her head. Know that she is very far more perfect than thyself." Isidora was a good young girl, who had set her heart upon abasing herself for Christ's sake as much as she could. So she wore a rag twisted around her head, went barefoot, remained always alone, except when she was obliged to be present at the common exercises; she did not eat with the others, but collected for her own food the scraps they had left; and for drink she used the water in which the dishes had been washed: so that all the rest looked on her with so much aversion, that no one could have been induced ever to eat with her. She was, in fact, the jest and scorn of all, and by all insulted, ill-treated, and looked upon as a fool. She, however, never spoke ill of any, harmed no one, never murmured nor complained of any ill treatment she received. Pitirus then arrived at the convent, and after requesting the abbess to send all the nuns to the grate, he could discover upon none of them the sign given by the Angel, so that he confidently asserted that they were not all there. "Indeed," they answered, "no one is absent, except a fool, who always stays shut up in the kitchen." "Well, send for her," he replied. But she, who had known interiorly what was to happen, had hidden herself that she might escape all connection with the matter. Being found after a long search, and earnestly entreated by her superior, she at last came. Pitirus recognized her as soon as he beheld her, and instantly falling at her feet, recommended himself to her prayers. Astonished at such an action, the nuns said to him, "Father, you are mistaken; this is a fool." "You are the fools:' replied the Abbot. "Know that she is holier than myself or you!" Then they all threw themselves at her feet, confessed their error, and asked pardon for the wrong they had done her. But she could not bear to receive so much honor, so that she fled from the house a few days after, and was never again seen.

      The Empress Leonora, having discovered that her confessor, in response to many requests, had written out some of her heroic and virtuous actions that they might be published after her death, went many times to visit him in his last illness. On one of these СКАЧАТЬ