XXXI. But let us scrutinize with the greatest exactness, the temporal
conveniences of virtue. Health, honour, and property, which essentially
contribute to temporal felicity, are of great importance in this
matter, if the whole of it does not consist in the enjoyment of
them; and considered with respect to these contingents, the virtuous
man has much the advantage of the vicious one. No one is ignorant,
that honour is the legitimate offspring of virtue; for which reason
the Romans, when they built them, joined the temples together, that
were appropriated to the adoration of those endowments, which they
worshipped as deities; so that the only way by which you could enter
the Temple of Honour, was through the Temple of Virtue. The very
people who shun the practice of virtue, esteem and reverence it; and
the blessings of health and long life, on account of the regularity
with which he lives, are more likely to be attained by the virtuous
man, than by the vicious one, who, by his debaucheries, ruins his
health, and curtails his existence. Property finds a good steward in
the œconomy of virtue, who takes care of and preserves it, by avoiding
superfluities. Solomon expressed the whole, when he said, that the
obedient to the divine mandates held long life in one hand, and in
the other honour and property: _Longitudo dierum in dextra ejus; & in
sinistra illius, divitiæ & gloria._ (Prov. 3.) Now, even supposing the
just man to enjoy no other advantages over the vicious one, is not his
condition much to be preferred?
XXXII. But it has others. The tranquillity, and sweetness, which is
administered to the soul by a good conscience, places in a very eminent
degree, the fortune of the just, superior to that of the sinner. This
is a blessing of little bulk, but of great value: a precious stone,
which, within small dimensions, contains great and rich qualities. The
conscience is the mirror of the soul, and it happens to the just man,
and to the sinner, when they look in the glass, as it happens to the
handsome, and the ugly woman, when they view themselves in the crystal;
the handsome is pleased, because she sees perfections, the other is
sad, because she observes nothing but blemishes. The condition of
the sinner is even worse than that of the ugly woman, for she, if she
pleases, may run from the glass, but the sinner cannot do this; for
although he should not present himself before the mirror, the mirror
will present itself before him, and the understanding cannot shut its
eyes, when the memory presents to it the images of a man’s evil deeds.
In that state, the sinner is filled with horror instead of delight, for
his desire forsakes him, and the blemish remains by itself. In addition
to this, the sinner at such a conjuncture, is made unhappy by the
reflection, that his infamies may be laid open to the world; at this
thought, the inevitable torture of shame, and the punishment of the
law, terrify him by turns. The just man, on the contrary, has nothing
to fear. If he hides his actions from the world, it is not from the
dread of their being observed, but to avoid the hazard of their being
applauded. He contemplates them alone, and if he is so happy as to
find that they are all good, he receives that pure pleasure, which the
sacred Chronologer, even in God himself, paints as an accidental glory:
_Vidit Deus cuncta quæ fecerat, & erant valdè bona._
XXXIII. The difference between the just and the unjust man, is not
less, when fortune in disgust sheds its reverses, or heaven is severe
by visiting him with tribulations. The sinner loses his property, his
beloved woman dies, he receives an injury from somebody, which it is
out of his power to revenge. What relief does he find? None: he raves,
he storms, he burns; he neither eats, drinks, nor rests; his symptoms
are worse than the disease, and sometimes so violent, as to oblige him
to take to his bed, and deprive him of life; and his passions often
rise to such a degree of ferocity, as to excite him to lay violent
hands on himself. On the contrary, the first thing the just man does,
under similar circumstances, is to lift his eyes to Heaven; and whether
he considers the tribulation as a just punishment for some crime he has
been guilty of, or as a visitation for the exercise of his patience,
he trusts, it will all turn out for his benefit; he knows the stroke
comes from a friendly hand, and he knows also, that for his own good
he is wounded; he not only is reconciled, but kisses the rod. Thus
you see, by an admirable metamorphose, his heaviness is converted to
satisfaction; and that what is poison to a wicked man, becomes balsam
to a just one: for, _Diligentibus Deum omnia co-operantur in bonum._
XXXIV. Who, upon a view of what we have enumerated and urged on this
head, will not be convinced, that even in this life, the lot of the
just man is incomparably better than that of the vicious one; that
tranquillity and temporal convenience, are only to be met with in
the paths of virtue, and that the field of vice, under the delusive
appearance of flowers, produces nothing but thorns?
XXXV. There now remains but one argument for me to solve, and that is
taken from the words of Christ in St. Matthew, where our great Master
assures us, the road is broad, that is, easy, which leads to perdition;
and that the path is narrow, that is, toilsome, which leads to life
immortal.
XXXVI. I say then, that before we proceed further, it will be proper
to reconcile this text with the one before quoted, where our Saviour
invites sinners to pursue the paths of virtue, and propounds to them
relief and ease, upon a supposition, that they are crippled and borne
down by the weight of sin: _Venite ad me, omnes qui laboratis_, &c.
and it is also necessary, to compound this with that sweet expression,
used in another place, when he intimates to us, that his yoke is easy,
and his burden light; and we should likewise harmonize with it, what
David teaches us also, which is, that the road of the divine precepts
is broad, and that the precepts themselves are so likewise: _Latum
mandatum tuum nimis._ In fine, this text should be understood in a
sense, that is not repugnant to reason, or experience.
XXXVII. The solution is easy, if we say, that grace reconciles and
softens, that which is hard and difficult to nature; and the same yoke,
which is heavy to be borne by mere natural powers, is made light,
when the divine aid concurs and lends its assistance. And this is the
manner, in which the fathers commonly reconcile those texts.
XXXVIII. It may also be said, by way of answer, that the Redeemer
speaks only of the first passages or entrance into the one and the
other path, so that the path of virtue, at its entrance, is toilsome
and laborious, but afterwards becomes easy; on the contrary, the path
of vice is easy at the beginning, and toilsome at the end. The context
gives reason for this construction, for Christ, when he is exciting
men to pursue the paths of virtue, describes all the difficulty as
placed at the first passages: _Intrare per angustam portam_, says St.
Matthew, which according to St. Luke, is, _Contendite intrare per
angustam portam_; which amounts to the same thing, as if he had said,
in the entrance lies all the difficulty; therefore take courage, press
forward, fight, _contendite_: to conquer the obstruction, which you
find in the narrowness of the door.
XXXIX. So it is, that this door is exceeding strait, and the newly
converted is pressed by the power of its hinges, that the ill habits
he has imbibed may be squeezed out, and not only the skin is grazed by
the pressure, but sometimes pieces of flesh also are torn off, and left
in the entrance. But the difficulty of this transit once conquered, the
way by little and little grows wider, till at last, it is extended to a
delightsome and a spacious valley;
_Largior hic campos æther, & lumine vestit,_
_Purpure, solemque suum sua sidera morunt._
XL. The path of vice is very differently formed, and may be compared to
a passage or cave, which, according to the naturalists, is fabricated
as a place of safe retreat by the Rat of India. This sagacious
animal, knowing the enmity the dragon bears him, and knowing also the
insufficiency of his own strength to resist him, not only defends
himself, but conquers his enemy by the following stratagem. He makes
two entrances to his cave, the one small and proportioned to the bulk
of his own body, the other wider at the surface, but which he draws
narrower by degrees, till towards the other end it is but just wide
enough to admit of his passing through. The use of this place is as
follows: When the little animal finds himself pursued by that voracious
beast, he flies to his cave, which he enters at the wide mouth, not
doubting but the dragon will follow him, who eager for his prey, the
large aperture being sufficiently wide to admit his whole body, plunges
in, but as it insensibly becomes narrower and narrower, the dragon,
who presses violently on, finds himself in the end so straitened, as
not to be able either to retreat, or advance; the rat, as soon as he
perceives this, sallies out of the narrow passage, and in the rear of
the dragon, entering the wide one, revenges himself upon him much at
his leisure, converting him into a regale for his appetite, and food
for his resentment.
XLI. The stratagem of this little animal exactly resembles that which
the devil practises upon men. He displays to him the road of vice, very
broad and commodious at the entrance; the unhappy man, lured by this
appearance, enters without suspicion, and in the consequence becomes
a prey to his criminal pleasures. The road, by little and little,
grows narrower; one care oppresses him on one side, and another on the
other; sickness and old age, which are very nearly allied together,
come on; his limbs begin to contract, and the use of them to forsake
him; fear, solicitude, grief and heaviness, press upon him more and
more every day, till he is put in such a strait, that even the soul
with its spiritual nature is unable to ruminate or reflect on: by this
progression, the sinner, in the end, arrives at the summit of anguish,
and at that unhappy station, from whence it is impossible to recede,
_ubi nulla est redemptio_, and where he will be eternally food for that
ravenous serpent, whose voracity and thirst of blood is never satiated:
_Mors depascet eos_; which Cardinal Hugo expounds, _Diabolus depascet
eos._
XLII. This remarkable difference and opposition between virtue and
vice, was not hid from the antients, for the light of natural reason
was sufficient to acquire this knowledge; and Virgil has painted
beautifully, the distinction between the one and the other path, in the
following verses:
_Nam via virtutis dextrum petit ardua collem_
_Difficilemque aditum primum spectantibus offert,_
_Sed requiem præbet fessis in vertice summo._
_Molle ostentat iter via lata; sed ultima meta_
_Præcipitat captos, volvitque per ardua saxa._
Exalted and Humble FORTUNE.
Those were blind themselves, who feigned Fortune to be blind; and
they were unjust, who accused her of partiality. This error is
corrected by religion, when it teaches us, that what is meant by the
word Fortune, is nothing else but the Divine Providence, which is
all eyes, and proceeds in every thing from the justest motives. But
although the error is corrected in the essential, the deception is not
so effectually dispelled, but there is still left remaining, a faint
appearance of the principle. The complainers of fortune, compute the
inequality of men’s lots, according to the greater or less parade and
figure which they make among their fellow creatures; and seeing that in
a great measure, this inequality is not proportioned to men’s merits,
the wicked attribute it to the chimerical force of accident, the
idolators to the caprice of a blind deity, and the true believers to
the disposing will of a Supreme Providence.
II. These last conclude well, but they suppose ill, for thus it is; the
circling wheel of Fortune, and all its movements, are directed by a
divine hand; and the raising up some, and casting down others, is so
ordered and regulated, with the most wise design. It is also certain
(and this reflection is of infinite importance) that with respect to
many, we see but one half of the wheel’s turning, the remainder of its
circuit being reserved for completion in the other world. We observe,
that Fortune raises some, and never lowers them, and that it casts down
others, without ever raising them. What is this? Nothing more, than
that Providence in this mortal life, gives the wheel but half a turn;
the round is concluded in the other hemisphere; so that those who rise
here, go down there, and those who descend here, are there mounted up.
This is the most ordinary course, although there is no rule without an
exception.