A certain person of my acquaintance[1] having learnt on good authority that
Blessed Francis had in his early youth made a vow to say his rosary every
day, wished to imitate him in this work of piety, and yet did not like to
make the vow without first consulting him.
He received the answer: "Beware of doing so." My friend replying: "Why do
you refuse to others the advice which you took for yourself in your youth?"
Blessed Francis continued: "The very word _youth_ decides the question,
because I made the vow at that time with less reflection, but now that I am
older I say to you, Do not do it. I do not tell you not to say your rosary;
on the contrary, I advise you as earnestly as I can, and even conjure you
not to allow a single day to pass without reciting that prayer, which is
most pleasing to God, and to the Blessed Virgin. But do it from a firm and
fixed purpose, rather than from a vow, so that if you should happen to omit
it either from weariness or forgetfulness, or any other circumstance, you
may not be perplexed by scruples, and run the risk of offending God. For it
is not enough to vow, we must also pay our vow, and that under pain of
sin, which is no small matter. I assure you that this vow has often been a
hindrance to me, and many a time I have been on the point of asking to be
dispensed, and set free from it, or at least of having it changed into some
other work of equal worth, which might interfere less with the discharge of
my duties."
"But," rejoined this person, "is not what is done by vow more meritorious
than what is done only from a firm and settled purpose?" "I suspected that
was it," replied Blessed Francis; "in that case who do you wish should
profit by what you do?" "A fine question," cried the other, "my neighbour,
do you think? No, certainly, I want to gain it for myself." "Then there
is nothing more to be said," replied Blessed Francis. "I see I have been
making a mistake, I imagined, of course, that you wished to make your vow
to God, for God, and for His sake, and so by your vow to merit or gain
something for God. What! Are we to talk of our merits and graces as if He
needed them, and were not Himself absolute merit and infinite goodness and
perfection?"
Our Blessed Father loved to see this bird beating its wings against the
bars of its cage. At last to let him fly, he said: 'But what then is merit,
but a work pleasing to God, and a work done in His grace, and by His help,
and for His love--a work which He rewards with increase of grace and
glory?' "Certainly," said the other, "that is how I, too, understood it."
"Well, then," replied he, "if you understand it thus, why do you contend
against your understanding and your conscience? Are we not meriting for
God, when we do a good work in a state of grace and for the love of God?
And ought not the love of God which seeks nothing but His interests,
that is to say, His glory, to be the chief end and final aim of all our
good works, rather than the reward we thereby merit, which is merely an
accessory?"
"And of what use to God are the merits and good works of men?" continued
the other. "For one thing," replied he, "God thereby saves you from taking
a false step. You are standing on the brink of a precipice, and you have
your eyes shut. Let me give you a helping hand."
"In very truth, no good works of ours, though done in a state of grace and
for the love of God, can increase His interior and essential glory. The
reason is that this glory, being God Himself and consequently infinite,
can neither be increased by our good actions nor diminished by our sins;
and it is in this sense that David says that God is God and has no need of
our goods.[2] It is not thus, however, with the exterior glory which is
rendered to Him by creatures, and for the obtaining of which He drew them
forth out of nothingness into existence. This is finite, by reason of its
subject, God's creature, and therefore can be increased by our good works
done in and for the love of God, or, on the other hand, diminished by our
evil actions, by which we dishonour God, and rob Him of His glory, though
only of glory which is exterior and outside of the divine nature.
"Now that we do increase the exterior glory of God by our good works, done
as I have said, is evident from the testimony of the Apostle, when he calls
the man who is purified from sin by justifying grace: _A vessel unto honour
sanctified and profitable to the Lord prepared unto every good work._[3]
"Indeed, it is the very fact that a work done in grace increases the
exterior glory of God, which makes it meritorious, His goodness being
pledged by His promise to glorify those who glorify Him, and to give the
crown of justice to those who fight the good fight, and who do, or endure,
anything for the glory of His name. This is why I said that we must merit
for God, that is to say, we should refer our actions to the glory of God,
and act out of love for Him. So we shall merit eternal life, provided
always we be free from mortal sin, since God is not pledged to give the
glories of heaven to any but those who shall labour in His grace.
"If, on the other hand, we wish to merit for ourselves, that is to say,
if we positively intend that the whole aim of our labour be the reward of
grace, or glory, which we hope for: and if we do not, in performing our
good works seek first and chiefly the glory of God; then we really merit
nothing for ourselves, since we do nothing for God. The reason of this is
that there is so close a relationship between merit and reward (the two
Latin names for them, _meritum_ and _merces_, having the same root and
meaning), that one cannot exist without the other any more than a mountain
without a valley, or paternity without sonship.
"You see now that in the theory you have unwittingly adopted you entirely
destroy the nature of true merit, and are in danger of being shipwrecked
on the same rock as those heretics of our day who hold that good works are
unprofitable for salvation. I am convinced, as you may well believe, that
you are as far from wishing to run the risk with them as you are from
sharing their belief.
"Remember this, that in order to do a good work in true charity you must
not make your own interest your ultimate aim, but God's interest, which is
nothing else but His exterior glory. The more, too, that you think of God's
interest the more He will think of yours, and the less you trouble yourself
about reward, the greater will your reward be in heaven, because pure love,
never mercenary, looks only to the good of the beloved one, not to its own.
This is the end and aim of the sacred teaching that we must seek first the
_Kingdom of God_, that is to say, His glory, knowing assuredly that in
seeking this all good things will be added unto us.
"He who only wishes to merit for himself does nothing for God and merits
nothing for himself: but, on the other hand, he who does everything for God
and for His honour merits much for himself.
"In this game he who loses, wins; and he who thinks only of winning for
himself, plays a losing game. His good works are, as it were, hollow, and
weigh too lightly in the divine balance. He falls asleep on his pile; of
imaginary spiritual wealth, and awakening finds he has nothing in his
hands. He has laboured for himself, not for God, and therefore receives
his reward from himself and not from God. Like a moth, he singes his wings
in the flame of a merit which is truly imaginary, no work being really
meritorious except that which is done in a state of grace, and with God for
its last end."
"All this," replied the person, "does not at all satisfy me on the point
which I brought forward, namely, as to whether work done by vow is not more
meritorious than that which is done without it, seeing that to the action
of the particular virtue which is vowed is added that of the virtue of
religion which is the vow."
"Certainly," replied our Blessed Father, "as regards the question whether
it is more meritorious to say the Rosary by vow rather than of one's free
choice, it is undoubtedly, as you say, adding one act of virtue to another
to do so in discharge of one's vow, for is not prayer the highest of all
religious actions? Again, if I pray with devotion and fervour, am I not
adding to prayer another religious action, which is devotion? If I offer to
God this prayer, as incense, or a spiritual sacrifice, or as an oblation,
are not sacrifice and oblation two religious actions? Moreover, if by this
prayer I desire to praise God, is not divine praise a religious act? If in
praying I adore God, is not adoration one also?
"And if I pray thus with devotion, adoration, sacrifice, oblation, and
praise, have we not here five acts of the virtue of religion added by me to
the sixth, which is prayer?"
"But," rejoined the other, "the vow is more than all that." "If," replied
Blessed Francis, "you say that the act of making a vow is in itself more
than all these six together, you must really bring me some proof of its
being so."
"I mean," said the other, "than each of these acts taken separately,"
"That," returned our Blessed Father, "is not the opinion of the Angelical
Doctor,[4] who, when enumerating the eleven acts of religion, places the
making a vow only in the eighth rank, with seven preceding it, namely,
prayer, devotion, adoration, sacrifice, oblation, the paying of tithes, and
first-fruits; and three after it: the praise of God, the taking of lawful
oaths, and the adjuring of creatures in God.
"It is not that the act of making a vow is not an excellent thing; but we
have no right to set it above other virtues which surpass it in excellence,
and other good works of greater worth. We must leave everything in its
place, going neither against the order of reason nor against that of divine
charity. A man who boasts too much of his noble birth provokes scrutiny
into the genuineness of his claim and risks its being disallowed."
"All the same," persisted this person, "I maintain that a good work done by
vow is more meritorious than one done without it, charity, of course, being
taken for granted." "It is not enough," replied Francis, "to take charity
for granted. We must also suppose it to be greater in the man who does the
action with a vow than in the one who does it without; for if he who says
some particular prayer, because bound by vow, has less charity than he who
says the same without being so bound, he, doubtless, has, and you will not
deny it, less merit than the other, because merit is not in proportion to
the vow made, but to the charity which accompanies it, and without which it
has neither life nor value."
"And supposing equal charity, vow, or no vow," resumed the person, "will
not the action done by vow have greater merit than the other?" "It will
only have the same eternal glory for its reward," replied our Blessed
Father, "in so far as it has the same amount of charity, and thus each will
receive the same reward of eternal life.
"But as regards accidental glory, supposing that there were a special halo
for the vow which would add a fourth to the three of which schoolmen treat,
or, if you wish, that there should be as many special and accidental halos
of glory as there are kinds of virtue, they will be unequal in accidental
glory.
"But then we should have to prove that this multiplicity of halos, or
accidental glories, exists, in addition to the three of which the schoolmen
speak. This I would ask you now to do, though I am doubtful as to the
result."
"Of what then does it avail you," said the other, "to have made that vow
about which I have been consulting you?"
"It renders me," replied our Blessed Father, "more careful, diligent, and
attentive in keeping my word to God, in binding myself closer to Him,
in strengthening me to keep my promise (for I do not deny that there is
something more stable in the vow than in mere purpose and resolution), in
keeping myself from the sin I might incur, if I should fail in what I have
vowed, in stimulating me to do better, and to make use of this means to
further my progress in the love of God," "You do not then pretend to merit
more on account of it?" said the other. "I leave all that to God," replied
Francis, "He knows the measure of grace which He gives, or wishes to give
me. I desire no more, and only as much as it may please Him to bestow on me
for His glory. Love is not eager to serve its own interests, it leaves the
care of them to its Beloved, who will know how to reward those who love Him
with a pure and disinterested love."
I close this subject with two extracts from the writings of our Blessed
Father. In the first he says: "I do not like to hear people say, We must do
_this_, or _that_, because there is more merit in it. There is more merit
in saying, 'We must do all for the glory of God.' If we could serve God
without merit--which cannot be done--we ought to wish to do so. It is to be
feared that by always trying to discover what is most meritorious we may
miss our way, like hounds, which when the scent is crossed, easily lose it
altogether."
[Footnote 1: Undoubtedly M. Camus himself. Note.--It is considered by
critics that M. Camus puts much of his own into the month of St. Francis
in this section.--[Ed.]]
[Footnote 2: Psal. xv. 2.]
[Footnote 3: 2 Tim. ii. 21.]
[Footnote 4: S. Thom. 2a, 2ae, Quaest, xxiii. art. vii.]