that we should be strong enough to resist the attacks of such a monster? Even now, although we are somewhat humiliated, the breath of human praise and the hope of honor or a high position are capable of so blinding our mind’s eye that contrary to the law of Christ we become puffed up with filthy pride and show it in our dress and outward demeanor. How could we then be true to the humility of Our Saviour, if we were exalted by the whole world? Even now, although we learn by daily experience the transitory nature of earthly things, and how soon and easily we can lose them, we are sometimes so beset by the passion of avarice that we sell our souls and our salvation for a miserable coin, we try to make our profit out of public calamities, and when our conscience or the thought of losing our souls troubles us, we dispatch such thoughts by saying to ourselves: what matter how the money is made as long as I succeed in making it! How then could we hope to be able to trample riches under foot if they were offered to us in abundance? Even now, when we have such frequent occasion to bewail and deplore our weakness, with the Christian law painting to us the abomination and deformity of impure love and carnal pleasure, we allow ourselves to be so infatuated and befooled by a friendly look, a laugh, a joking word, a caress, that we forget our God, indulge our lust, and sacrifice recklessly our modesty, purity, honor, and fidelity. What should we do if such pleasures were held out to us as lawful and praiseworthy? Oh, may God grant that such a terrible time may never come for us!
By his false miracles.
It is easy to say that we should laugh at hyprocrisy, false doctrine, and pretended miracles. Even now, while we have at hand countless opportunities of doing good, invited as we are to be zealous in the service of God by so many public devotions, having it in our power to frequent the sacraments almost daily, to cleanse our souls from sin in the sacred tribunal, to feed them with the body and blood of Jesus Christ; having our ignorance enlightened by so many sermons which encourage us to good, warn us against evil, exhort us to avoid the occasions of sin and the evil customs and usages of the world; with all this we still remain so tepid and cold in the divine service, so obstinate in the habits we have once acquired, that sometimes we even attach but little credence to the word of God, or at all events believe no more of it than suits our fancies. What the corrupt world preaches, what we learn from the example of others, what idle people say to us,