Page:Sermons for all the Sundays in the year.djvu/387

 to man, and makes him worse than a senseless brute. What would you say if you saw a man who would, of his own accord, live in a stable with horses, feed with them on hay and oats, and sleep, as they do, on dung? The man who submits to the tyranny of any passion, does what is far worse in the eyes of God. 5. It was thus the Gentiles lived, who, because the darkness of their understanding prevented them from discerning between good and evil, went wherever their sensual appetite led them. ” That you walk not," says St. Paul, ” as also the Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind, having their understanding darkened." (Ephes. iv. 17, 18.) Hence they were abandoned to their vices to impurity and avarice, and blindly obeyed the commands of their passions. ” Who, despairing, have given themselves up to lasciviousness, unto the working of all uncleanness, unto covetousness." (verse 19.) To this miserable state are reduced all Christians who, despising reason and God, follow the dictates of passion. In punishment of their sins God abandons them, as he abandoned the Gentiles, to their own wicked desires. ” Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their own heart." (Rom. i. 24.) This is the greatest of all chastisements. 6. St. Augustine writes, that two cities may be built up in the heart of a Christian; one by the love of God, the other by self-love. ” Cœlestem (civitatem) ædificat amor Dei usque ad contemptum sui; terrestrem ædificat amor sui usque ad contemptum Dei." (Lib. li, de Civ., cap. xxviii.) Thus, if the love of God reign within us, we will despise ourselves: if self-love reign, we will despise God. But, in conquering self-love consists the victory to which shall be given a crown of eternal glory. This was the great maxim which St. Francis Xavier always inculcated to his disciples: ” Conquer yourself; conquer yourself." All the thoughts and feelings of man, says the Scripture, are inclined to evil from his boyhood. ” The imagination and thought of man‟s heart are prone to evil from his youth." (Gen. viii. 21.) Hence we must, during our whole life, zealously combat and conquer the evil inclinations which continually rise within us, as noxious weeds