Page:TheYoungMansGuide.djvu/211

 "Meditation, as  a  part  of  mental  prayer"  says St. Francis  of  Sales,  "is  an  attentive  thought voluntarily  repeated  or  entertained  in  the  mind to  excite  the  will  to  holy  and  salutary  affections and  resolutions"  It  differs  from  mere  study  in its  object. We study  to  improve  our  minds  and to store  up  information;  we  meditate  to  move the will  to  pray  and  to  embrace  what  is  good. We study  that  we  may  know;  we  meditate  that we may  pray.

"In mental  prayer,"  says  St.  Alphonsus, "meditation is  the  needle,  which  only  passes through  that  it  may  draw  after  it  the  golden thread,  which  is  composed  of  affections,  resolutions, and  petitions."

As soon  as  you  feel  an  impulse  to  pray  while meditating, give  way  to  it  at  once  in  the  best way you  can,  by  devout  acts  and  petitions;  in other  words,  begin  your  conversation  with  God on the  subject  about  which  you  have  been thinking.

la order  to  help  the  mind  in  this  pious  exercise we  must  have  some  definite  subject  of  thought upon which  it  is  well  to  read  either  a  text  of Holy  Scripture  or  a  few  lines  out  of  some  other holy book;  for  instance,  "The  Spiritual  Exercises of  St.  Ignatius,"  "  The  Following  of  Christ," "The Spiritual  Combat";  Challoner's  "Think Well  On't";  St.  Alphonsus  Liguori's  "Devout Reflections,"  "The  Way  of  Salvation,"  "The Love  of  Christ,"  and  "The  Blessed  Eucharist"; St. Francis  of  Sales'  "  Introduction  to  a  Devout Life,"  "Meditations  for  Retreats,"  and  other works; Bishop  Hedley's  "Retreat";  Cochem's "Meditations  on  the  Four  Last  Things";  Baxter's "Meditations  for  Every  Day  in  the  Year"; any one  of  the  popular  books  of  meditation