will they be! with what a furious violence shall I fall with them into the abyss of hell! If God of His goodness hold me not back, who shall be able to hold me? And what are so many sins but an iron chain of innumerable links [1] with which I am linked, bound, and chained, which is so long that it reaches to hell, and at which Satan stands pulling to drag me to him. And if the sins of the angels (as says St Peter) were "ropes" that drew them from heaven to the lower hell [2] how much stronger ropes shall my sins be, being twisted with so innumerable cords? My soul is also encompassed with this multitude of sins as with an army of "dogs" "lions," "bulls," [3] "serpents," and other savage beasts that terrify it with their roarings, tear it in pieces with their mouths, and rend it with their claws; like bees they sting, and like serpents they bite and gnaw the conscience. Finally, I am that "wicked servant" that " owed" his lord " ten thousand talents," which is so great a debt that, although they should sell " all that he hath," " both his wife, his children" and himself, yet all would not suffice to pay the least part of it [4]
Colloquy. — Then what dost thou, O my soul, with so great a burden of sins? If this army of savage beasts made Christ sweat blood with anguish, how comes it that thou dost not weep tears of blood, of sorrow and pain? O most merciful Saviour, by that sorrow and feeling that Thou hadst of my sins in the garden of Gethsemane, I beseech Thee, assist me to have such a feeling of them, that I may be acquitted and delivered of them. Amen.
2. To this I must add another circumstance that may much aggravate my sins, which is my relapse and repeated falls into the same sins, after Almighty God had pardoned me
