Page:Withgodbookofpra00las.djvu/128

 prove 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.

In 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,"  or  "  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;  "  or  any  one of  the  popular  books  of  meditation  used  by  Religious, such  as  Hamon's,  De  Brandt's,  Segneri's,  Vercruysse's, and  Ilg's  "  Meditations  on  the  Life  and  Passion  of  Our Lord." Father  Gallwey's  "  Watches  of  the  Passion," and  Da  Bergamo's  "  Thoughts  and  Affections  on  the Passion" are  worthy  of  the  highest  commendation.

St. Alphonsus  says:  "It  is  good  to  meditate  upon the  last  things  —  death,  judgment,  eternity  —  but  let