Catherine lays down admirable political principles, for the fourteenth or
for the twentieth century. Yet times have changed, and we can hardly
imagine a modern city council giving serious welcome to such a letter as
this. It is a fair specimen of the letters which she was in the habit of
sending to the governments of the Italian towns--direct, simple, high-
minded presentations of the fundamental virtues on which the true
prosperity of a State must rest. She was capable, as she showed during the
Schism, of detailed political sagacity: but she never lost the womanly
conviction that moral generalizations would convict men of sin and point
them to the path of holiness. Nor was she wholly wrong. Her letters seem
to have been received with respect, and not to have failed in
effectiveness. On the present occasion, the authorities of Bologna have
evidently sent asking her prayers. These she promises gladly, but adds
that the Bolognese must not expect "the servants of God" to do all their
work for them.
In the Name of Jesus Christ crucified and of sweet Mary:
Dearest brothers in Christ sweet Jesus: I Catherine, servant and slave of
the servants of Jesus Christ, write to you in His precious Blood: with
desire to see you divested of the old man and clothed with the new--
divested, that is, of the world and the fleshly self-love which is the old
sin of Adam, and clothed with the new Christ sweet Jesus, and His tender
charity. When this charity is in the soul, it seeks not its own, but is
liberal and generous to render His due to God: to love Him above
everything else, and to hate its own lower nature; and to love itself for
God, rendering praise and glory to His Name: to render its neighbour
benevolence, with fraternal charity and well-ordered love. For charity
ought to be regulated: that is, a man must not wrong himself by sinning,
in order to rescue one soul--nay more, in order, were it possible, to save
the whole world; since it is not lawful to commit the least fault to
achieve a great virtue. And our body should not be sacrificed to rescue
the body of our neighbour; but we ought surely to sacrifice our bodily
life for the salvation of souls, and temporal possessions for the welfare
and life of our neighbour. So you see that this charity should be and is
regulated in the soul.
But those who are deprived of charity and full of self-love do just the
opposite; and as they are extravagant in their affections, so they are in
all their works. Thus we see that men of the world serve and love their
neighbour without virtue, and in sin; and to serve and please them, they
do not mind disserving and displeasing God, and injuring their own souls.
This is that perverted love which often kills soul and body--robs us of
light and casts us into darkness, robs us of life and condemns us to
death, deprives us of the conversation of the Blessed and leads us to that
of Hell. And if a man does not correct himself while he has time, he
destroys the shining pearls of holy justice, and loses the warmth of true
charity and obedience.
Now on whatever side we turn, we see every kind of rational creature
lacking in all virtue, and arrayed in this evil fleshly self-love. If we
turn to the prelates, they devote themselves so much to their own affairs
and live so luxuriously, that they do not seem to care when they see their
subjects in the hands of demons. As to the subjects, it is just the same,
they do not care to obey either the civil law or the divine, nor do they
care to serve one another unless for their own profit. And yet this kind
of love, and the union of those who are united by natural love and not by
true charity, does not suffice; such friendship suffices and lasts only so
long as pleasure and enjoyment lasts, and the personal profit derived from
it.
So, when a man is lord, he fails in holy justice. And this is the reason:
that he fears to lose his dignity, and, so as not to excite annoyance, he
goes about cloaking and hiding men's faults, spreading ointment over a
wound at the time when it ought to be cauterized. Oh, miserable my soul!
When the man ought to apply the flame of divine charity, and burn out the
fault with holy punishment and correction inflicted by holy justice, he
flatters and pretends that he does not see. He behaves thus toward those
who he sees might impair his dignity; but as to the poor, who count for
little and whom he does not fear, he shows very great zeal for justice,
and without any mercy or pity imposes most severe punishment for a little
fault. What causes such injustice? Self-love. But the wretched men of the
world, because they are deprived of truth, do not recognize truth, either
as regards their salvation or as regards the true preservation of their
lordship. For did they know the truth, they would see that only living in
the fear of God preserves their state and the city in peace: they would
preserve holy justice, rendering his due to every subject, they would show
mercy on whoso deserved mercy, not by passionate impulse, but by regard
for truth; and justice they would show on whoso deserved it, built upon
mercy, and not on passionate wrath. Nor would they judge by hearsay, but
by holy and true justice; and they would heed the common good, and not any
private good, and would appoint officials and those who are to rule the
city, not by party or prejudice, not for flatteries or bribery, but with
virtue and reason alone; and they would choose men mature and excellent,
and not mere children--such as fear God and love the Commonwealth and not
their own particular advantage. Now in this way, their state and the city
is preserved in peace and unity. But unjust deeds, and living in cliques,
and the appointment to rule and government of men who do not know how to
rule themselves or their families--unjust and violent, passionate lovers
of themselves--these are the methods that make them lose both the state of
spiritual grace and their temporal state. To such as these it may be said:
"In vain thou dost labour to guard thy city if God guard it not: if thou
fear not God, and hold Him not before thee in thy works."
So you see, dearest brothers and lords, that self-love ruins the city of
the soul, and ruins and overturns the cities of earth. I will that you
know that nothing has so divided the world into every kind of people as
self-love, from which injustice is for ever born.
Apparently, dearest brothers, you have a desire to increase and preserve
the welfare of your city; and this desire moved you to write to me, poor
wretch that I am, full of faults. I heard and saw that letter with tender
love, and with wish to satisfy your desires, and to exert me, with what
grace God shall give me, to offer you and your city before God with
continual prayer. If you shall be just men, and carry on your government
as I said above, not in passion nor for self-love or your private good,
but for the universal good founded on the Rock Christ sweet Jesus, and if
you do all your works in His fear, then by means of prayer you shall
preserve the state, the peace and unity of your city. Therefore I beg you
by the love of Christ crucified--for there is no other way--that since you
have the help of the prayers of the servants of God, you should not fail
on your side in what is needful. For did you fail you might to be sure be
helped a little by the prayers, but not so much that it would not soon
come to nothing; because you ought to help, on your part, to bear this
weight.
So, considering that if you were clothed in fleshly and personal love, you
could not help the servants of God, and that he who does not help himself
with virtue and holy zeal for justice, cannot help his brothers' city, I
say that it is needful for you to be clothed with the New Man, Christ
sweet Jesus, and His immeasurable charity. But we cannot be clothed
therein unless first we divest us--nor could I divest me unless I see how
harmful it is to me to hold my old sin, and how useful the new garment of
divine charity. For when man has seen his sin, he hates it, and strips it
off; and loves, and in love arrays him in the garment of virtue woven with
the love of the New Man. Now this is the Way. Therefore I said to you that
I desired to see you divested of the old man and clothed with the New Man,
Christ crucified; and in this way you shall win and keep the state of
grace and the state of your city, and you will never fail in the reverence
due to Holy Church, but with pleasing manner will render your due and keep
your state. I say no more. Remain in the holy and sweet grace of God.
Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.