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 meditation — inexhaustible source of comfort to the humble.

'Even so every good tree yieldeth good fruit, and the bad tree yieldeth bad fruit.’ Hence, a good repentance must be distinguished from a bad one.

Strange state of a rational being: — that, failing to bring forth good fruit, he should be fit only to be burnt!

'By their fruits you shall know them’ — the good trees — and not by their leaves: that is, by their deeds, not their words. The fig-tree that Our Lord cursed had leaves; but because it bore no fruit Christ made it wither up: — ' May no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever.’ As a punishment for being barren, it is made yet more so. If we bring not forth fruit in due season, and when the Master looks for it, a time comes when we are unable to produce it at all.

A wise confessor should require fruit, and not merely leaves, from his penitent. He must not be satisfied either with what appears to be a good tree covered with foliage, or with blossoms wherein the fruit is beginning to set. He must obtain true, perfectly-formed fruits, or he will have reason to doubt the sincerity of the repentance.