Feast of the Naming & Circumcision of Jesus Why does He make our hearts so strangely still, Why stands read more

Feast of the Naming & Circumcision of Jesus Why does He make our hearts so strangely still, Why stands He forth so stately and so tall? Because He has no self to serve, no will That does not seek the welfare of the All.

Commemoration of John Donne, Priest, Poet, 1631 Though natural men, who have induced secondary and figurative consideration, have found read more

Commemoration of John Donne, Priest, Poet, 1631 Though natural men, who have induced secondary and figurative consideration, have found out this... emblematical use of sleep, that it should be a representation of death, God, who wrought and perfected his work, before Nature began, (for Nature was but his Apprentice, to learn in the first seven days, and now is his foreman, and works next under him) God, I say, intended sleep only for the refreshing of man by bodily rest, and not for a figure of death, for he intended not death itself then. But Man having induced death upon himself, God hath taken Man's Creature, death, into his hand, and mended it, and whereas it hath in itself a fearfull form and aspect, so that Man is afraid of his own Creature, God presents it to him, in a familiar, in an assiduous, in an agreeable and acceptable form, in sleep, that so when he awakes from sleep and says to himself, shall I be no otherwise when I am dead, than I was even now, when I was asleep, he may be ashamed of his waking dreams, and of his Melancholique fancying out a horrid and an affrightful figure of that death which is so like sleep. As then we need sleep to live out our threescore and ten years, so we need death, to live that life which we cannot out-live.

Feast of George Herbert, Priest, Poet, 1633 If I be bound to pray for all that be in distress, read more

Feast of George Herbert, Priest, Poet, 1633 If I be bound to pray for all that be in distress, surely I am bound, so far as it is in my power, to practice what I pray for.

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 It is not in the gifts He received but in the read more

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 It is not in the gifts He received but in the virtues He practiced that Christ is our model. That which is asked of you, so that you may resemble Him, is to make the same use as He did of the gifts of God, according to the measure in which you have received them.

Feast of Hugh, Carthusian Monk, Bishop of Lincoln, 1200 It is of great importance that you endeavour, at all read more

Feast of Hugh, Carthusian Monk, Bishop of Lincoln, 1200 It is of great importance that you endeavour, at all times, to keep your hearts in peace; that you may keep pure that temple of God. The way to keep it in peace is to enter into it by means of inward silence. When you see yourself more sharply assaulted, retreat into that region of peace; and you will find a fortress that will enable you to triumph over all your enemies, visible and invisible, and over all their snares and temptations. Within your own soul resides divine aid, and sovereign succour. Retreat within it, and all will be quiet, secure, peaceable, and calm. Thus, by means of mental silence, which can only be attained with divine help, you may look for tranquility in tumult: for solitude in company; for light in darkness; for forgetfulness in pressures: for vigour in despondency; for courage in fear; for resistance in temptation; and for quiet in tribulation.

God could, if I may say so, more easily have made a new world of innocent creatures, and have governed read more

God could, if I may say so, more easily have made a new world of innocent creatures, and have governed them by the old covenant, than have established this new one for the salvation of poor sinners; but then, where had been the glory of forgiveness? It could not have been known that there was forgiveness with Him. The old covenant could not have been preserved and sinners pardoned. Wherefore, God choose to leave the covenant than sinners unrelieved, than grace unexalted and pardon unexercised... Will we continue on the old bottom of the first covenant? All we can do therein is to set thorns and briars in the way of God, to secure ourselves from His coming against us and upon us with His indignation and fury. Our sins are so, and our righteousness is no better. And what will be the issue? Both they and we shall be trodden down, consumed, and burnt up. What way, then, what remedy is left unto us? Only this of laying hold on the arm and strength of God in that covenant wherein forgiveness of sin is provided.

A virtuous and a Christianlike conclusion--
To pray for them that have done scathe to us.

A virtuous and a Christianlike conclusion--
To pray for them that have done scathe to us.

Feast of John Vianney, Curè d'Ars, 1859 I am, indeed, far from agreeing with those who think all read more

Feast of John Vianney, Curè d'Ars, 1859 I am, indeed, far from agreeing with those who think all religious fear barbarous and degrading and demand that it should be banished from the spiritual life. Perfect love, we know, casteth out fear. But so do several other things--ignorance, alcohol, passion presumption, and stupidity. It is very desirable that we should all advance to that perfection of love in which we shall fear no longer; but it is very undesirable, until we have reached that stage, that we should allow any inferior agent to cast out our fear.

Feast of the Venerable Bede, Priest, Monk of Jarrow, Historian 735 Commemoration of Aldhelm, Abbot of Mamsbury, Bishop of Sherborne, read more

Feast of the Venerable Bede, Priest, Monk of Jarrow, Historian 735 Commemoration of Aldhelm, Abbot of Mamsbury, Bishop of Sherborne, 709 If you here stop and ask yourselves why you are not as pious as the primitive Christians were, your own heart will tell you that it is neither through ignorance nor through inability, but purely because you never thoroughly intended it.