Page:The Eternal Priesthood (4th ed).djvu/270

258 consent of fathers and doctors, who with one month demand it.' No degree, therefore, of sanctity is judged to be proportionate to sacerdotal perfection by the Church of God, and by God, the author of the priesthood, but that which bears some likeness of the great High Priest Jesus Christ our Lord. For the priest is set in the sight of the world, to be a living image of the life of Jesus toiling in solitude and in the straits of poverty, and suffering also the contradictions of men."

This teaches us three things: first, that interior perfection is required before ordination and as a prerequisite condition to sacred Orders; secondly, that the state of the priesthood is the state of perfection; thirdly, that a priest is bound to sustain himself in that state and to persevere in it to the end of life.

The perfection of man is defined by S. Bernard in these words: Hæc hominis est perfectio similitudo Dei. But God is charity. Therefore, perfection consists essentially in this gemina Dei et proximi dilectione. The essential perfection is a quality of the person. The state in which a person is placed is the instrumental perfection.