ment in the pool burning with fire and brim- stone. Wherefore, my friends, do not flag in the fight.” ;
When afflictions fierce assail
Never let thy courage fail;
Hottest fire, refiners say,
Melts the gold and hardens clay
Father Claude de la Columbiere's Act of Hope and Confidence in God
MY GOD, I believe most firmly that Thou watchest over all who hope in Thee, and that we can want for nothing when we rely upon Thee in all things; therefore I am resolved for the future to have no anxieties, and to cast all my cares upon Thee. “In peace in the selfsame I will sleep and I will rest; for Thou, O Lord, singularly hast settled me in hope.”
Men may deprive me of worldly goods and of honors; sickness may take from me my strength and the means of serving Thee; I may even lose Thy grace by sin; but my trust shall never leave me. I will preserve it to the last moment of my life, and the powers of hell shall seek in vain to wrest it from me. “In peace in the selfsame I will sleep and I will rest.”
Let others seek happiness in their wealth, in their talents: let them trust to the purity of their lives, the severity of their mortifications, to the number of their good works, the fervor of their prayers; as for me, O my God, in my very confidence lies all my hope. “For Thou, O Lord, singularly hast settled me in hope.” This confidence can never be vain. “No one has hoped in the Lord and has been confounded.”
