Summary of the Morrow's Meditation
After having excited ourselves to love purity by means of the two preceding meditations, we will meditate tomorrow upon what we must avoid in order to acquire or preserve this virtue. We must avoid: 1st, an idle, sensual life; 2nd, dangerous society and dangerous resorts. Our resolution shall be: 1st, always to be usefully occupied, not losing time in useless thoughts and day-dreams, and to embrace the manly and virile life which disdains a sensual existence; 2nd, to abstain from all social relations calculated to expose to danger and to soften the heart. Our spiritual nosegay shall be the words of St. Paul: "We have the treasure of chastity in earthen vessels" (II. Cor. iv. 7).
Meditation for the Morning
Let us adore Jesus Christ in the beautiful characteristic the Church gives Him in her litanies: "Jesus, lover of chastity." It is He who came from heaven to bring this virtue to the earth, a virtue which until then had been but little appreciated; it is He who has enabled us to understand the excellence of it, and who by His grace inspires His children with courage to embrace it. Let us unite ourselves with all the chaste souls in heaven and on earth in rendering Him homage.
FIRST POINT
In Order to be Pure we must Avoid an Idle and Sensual Life.
Our nature is so inclined to evil in consequence of our original depravity, that it cannot escape from it except by dint of not thinking of it; and the only means whereby not to think of it is to be absorbed in occupations which will distract us from it (St. Bernard). Hence the words of St. Augustine: "If the devil finds you always occupied he will not be able to do anything against you." A sensual life is as much opposed to purity as is an idle life. Nothing corrupts the heart so much as the effeminate delicacy which is always wishing to flatter the senses. The flesh is a slave which is kept in order only by weaning it from all delicacies and treating it with severity, and the more severe we are towards ourselves, the more mortified and penitent we are, the easier it is to keep ourselves pure. Satan, says St. Antony, fears nothing so much as watchings, fastings, the privations of voluntary poverty. Woe, then, to those who make of their body an idol for which they are always endeavoring to obtain all kinds of enjoyments, flattering the sense of touch by the softness of their couch and the fineness of their clothing, the sense of smell by perfumes and scented water, which the saints call the baits of voluptuousness (Clement of Alex.), the sense of hearing by profane and effeminate songs, the sense of sight by the reading of romances, theatrical pieces, and other writings of the same kind, by looking at statues and engravings which are wanting in decency, upon the features, the figure, and the dress of persons of the opposite sex, contrary to the example of Job, who said: "I have made a covenant with my eyes, that I would not do so much as think upon a virgin" (Job xxxi. 1); the sense of taste by seeking after good cheer, which St. Ambrose calls "the aliment of voluptuousness," which St. Jerome styles "the triumph of passion" (Ep. xxxiii.), which St. Ephrem declares to be "the enemy of chastity" (De Cast.), and which, lastly, St. Isidore of Seville calls "the focus of vice."
SECOND POINT
In Order to be Pure we must Abstain from Dangerous Society and Dangerous Resorts.
Solitude is the asylum of chastity, and Jesus Christ ordinarily attracts to it pure souls. The world, on the contrary, is a centre of corruption; its spectacles, its assemblies, its diversions, its fetes, and its long soirees invite the poison of impurity to enter into the soul by all the senses. All that is seen there, all that is heard, all that is done, softens and corrupts the heart, and not even the holiest of persons escape the pestilential influence (St. Jerome, Ep. xxiii.). If, then, we wish to keep ourselves pure, let us fly these assemblages as much as possible. Let us do still more: let us avoid tĂȘte-Ă -tĂȘte conversations with persons of an opposite sex; it is then that the devil makes the third in the company, and inclines us to take liberties, because no one sees us. Let us avoid laughing, joking, and playing the amiable with them, and let a holy gravity, a sweet modesty in words and manners, a restraint kept over our eyes, and gestures forbidding familiarity season our relations. To dispense with these rules given us by the saints, who were the first to observe them, not considering themselves to be able to keep their virtue intact without taking these precautions, would be a temerity which would ruin us, even as it has ruined numerous others. Let us here examine ourselves; do we really believe in the necessity of these rules, and are we disposed to conform ourselves to them?
Resolutions and spiritual nosegay as above.