the affair of salvation. All other concerns are turned to account. This sum of money must be put out to interest; this held must be tilled; these lands must be let at a more considerable rent. All other losses are bewailed except the one without resource. Great expenses are incurred for the body, and nothing at all is done for the soul. From the manner in which we live, it should seem that our souls do not really belong to us, or rather that we have souls merely to destroy them.
[Make now a resolution to save your soul, let It cost you what pain it will; be of the same sentiment with a certain Pontiff, who, when a king had asked something of him. which could not be granted without sin, replied, “ If I had two souls I would give one of them to thee, O prince; but, as I have only one, I do not choose to forfeit it.”]
“ Moreover, one thing is necessary.”— Luke x.
"Where there is loss of salvation, there, surely, there can be no gain.”— St. Eucharitu .
ELEVENTH DAY. — ON THE ENORMITY OF SIN.
1. How great a loss is the loss of God. Men think themselves unfortunate when they lose all their possessions at law, or by some other cause. What is it then to lose an infinite God ! Unhappy the soul which loses its God by sin; but far more unhappy the soul that considers this loss as nothing.
2. O sin ! how common art thou among men ! but how little, at the same time, art thou known to them! Playing and amusing themselves, they become the execration of God. And what play, what amusement is this? God, who is all love, detests sin with infinite hatred: should anything, therefore, be so shocking in our eyes as this hellish monster?
3. A soul in the state of grace is beautiful beyond expression: it is a brilliant image of God himself; the Holy Ghost dwells in it. But when mortal sin
