Page:PracticalCommentaryOnHolyScripture.djvu/661

 Self-love  is,  as  we  have  just  seen,  part  of  our  human  nature;  but our nature  having  been  corrupted  by  the  Fall,  our  self-love  easily  degenerates into  a sinful  love  of  self,  if  it  is  not  limited  and  regulated  by the  love  of  God  and  of  our  neighbour.

Do you  love  God  with  all  your  heart? You will very  likely  answer:  “I  do  indeed  love  God! Who could  help loving so  good  a God!”  But  I ask  you:  Could  you  not  love  Him still more? If you  do  not  love  Him  with  every  power  that  you possess, you  do  not  love  Him  enough. And how  do  you  show your love  for  God? Have you  a horror  and  hatred  of  sin? Would you rather  die  than  commit  a mortal  sin?

ESUS, filled  with  indignation  at  the  hard-heartedness  and  hypocrisy of  the  Pharisees,  once  more,  on  the  eve  of  His  Passion and Death,  warned  the  people  against  them  and  pronounced  divers woes upon  their  head. “But woe  to  you  Scribes  and  Pharisees, hypocrites, because  you  shut  the  kingdom  of  heaven  against  men, for you  yourselves  do  not  enter  in,  and  those  that  are  going  in, you suffer  not  to  enter. Woe to  you,  because  you  go  round  about the sea  and  the  land  to  make  one  proselyte,  and  when  he  is made,  you  make  him  the  child  of  hell  twofold  more  than  yourselves. Woe to  you,  because  you  tithe  mint and  anise  and  cummin  and have left  the  weightier  things  of  the  law,  judgment  and  mercy and faith. Blind guides,  who  strain  out  a gnat  and  swallow  a camel! You make  clean  the  outside  of  the  cup  and  of  the  dish, but within  you  are  full  of  rapine  and  uncleanness. You are  like to whited  sepulchres  which  outwardly  appear  to  men  beautiful,