HALF-HOURS
WITH THE
SAINTS AND SERVANTS OF GOD.
1. - On the Love of God.
"This only take care of with all diligence, that you love the Lord your God."
[St. Francis de Sales was born at the Castle of Sales, in the diocese of Geneva, August 21, 1567.
Leigh Hunt, the most charming of our modern essayists, has left us an interesting article in his "London Journal " (February 4, 1835) on this grand saint and doctor. He says that, " like Fenelon, he was a sort of angel of a gentleman; a species of phoenix which, we really must say, the French Church seems to have produced beyond any other."
After the death of Bishop Granier, Francis was appointed Bishop of Geneva. This was on the 8th of December 1602.
He continued to discharge all the duties of a saintly prelate till the year 1622, when he died of an apoplexy, at Lyons, December 28, aged fifty-six, leaving several religious works, collected in two volumes folio. He was canonised in 1665.
For his Life, &c, see Marsollier, Moreri, Disct. Hist., Butler, &c. &c]
Love is strong as death (Cant viii. 6): since both equally separate the soul from the body and all terrestrial things, the only difference is, that the separation is real and effectual when caused by death, whereas that occasioned by love is usually confined to the heart.
