Epistle.
1 Corinthians xiii. 1-13.
Brethren:
If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity. I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy, and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely, is not puffed up, is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh no evil, rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth with the truth: beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect shall come, that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child. I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I put away the things of a child. We see now through a glass in an obscure manner: but then face to face. Now I know in part: but then I shall know even as I am known. And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.

Gospel.
St. Luke xviii. 31-43.
At that time:
Jesus took unto him the twelve, and said to them: Behold we go up to Jerusalem, and all things shall be accomplished which were written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man. For he shall be delivered to the Gentiles, and shall be mocked, and scourged, and spit upon: and after they have scourged him, they will put him to death, and the third day he shall rise again. And they understood none of these things, and this word was hid from them, and they understood not the things that were said. Now it came to pass that when he drew nigh to Jericho, a certain blind man sat by the wayside, begging. And when he heard the multitude passing by, he asked what this meant. And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. And he cried out, saying: Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me. And they that went before, rebuked him, that he should hold his peace. But he cried out much more: Son of David, have mercy on me. And Jesus stood and commanded him to be brought to him. And when he was come near, he asked him, saying: What wilt thou that I do to thee? But he said: Lord that I may see. And Jesus said to him: Receive thy sight: thy faith hath made thee whole. And immediately he saw, and followed him, glorifying God. And all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God.

Sermon XLI.
The Qualities Of Christian Charity.

What a beautiful description it is, my dear brethren, which St. Paul gives us of the virtue of charity in the Epistle of to-day! If you have never read it or do not remember it, I would advise you to read it at once; and, indeed, nothing could be better than to commit it to memory.

Let us look just now at a part of it. "Charity," says the Apostle, "is patient, is kind; charity envieth not; dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up; is not ambitious; seeketh not her own; is not provoked to anger; thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things."

Now, I say this is very beautiful, is it not? And perhaps it seems all the more beautiful because the picture which it gives us is not a very familiar one. I know we are apt to think about as well of ourselves as of almost any one of our acquaintance; but can we say to ourselves, on reading or hearing this description of charity, "That's me; that's just my character to a hair"? No; somehow or other, though we would like to put on the coat, it does not seem to fit.

"Charity is patient, is kind." That is rather out of the way, to begin with, when we think how impatient and cross we are if anything goes wrong, if anybody stands in our way or interferes with us, or even ventures to differ from us in opinion.

"Charity envieth not." Worse yet. Why, some people cannot even see their neighbor have a new dress or hat without at once making up their minds to take the shine out of that conceited thing. And if they hear it said that Miss So-and-So is good-looking they will take some opportunity to remark: "For the life of me, I can't make out what any one sees to admire in her." Probably they might manage to see it if they would make a great effort; but how can they make the effort when no one seems to have any eye for their own good points, which ought to be so evident to all? And it is not the ladies only who have this weakness. You will hear something like this: "Oh! I consider him to be a much overrated man. I knew him when he was young, and he was nothing above the common. But some people certainly have luck." Or, if you do not hear it out loud, the grumbling is there all the same in the heart. Perhaps some praise has to be given, but it is very sparing; given with great appearance of careful judgment and a desire to keep closely to the truth.

"Charity dealeth not perversely." How is this? Why, you will find Christians who would, as the saying goes, "cut off their nose to spite their face." They will even suffer themselves, if some one else can only be made to suffer too.

But I shall not have time to make all the applications. As I said, you had better read the Epistle, then you can make them for yourselves.

I wish, however, to call your attention before closing to one unpleasant circumstance. Is this charity, which St. Paul so highly praises and so beautifully describes, a sort of fancy and ornamental virtue, which is certainly very commendable, but which we can get along well enough without? Listen to a few other words which come a little before those I have read: "If I should have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing." Notice, he does not say, "I am not much, or these things are not much good, without charity": no, without it "I am nothing"; a cipher, and a sham. Take this home and meditate on it.

Sermon XLII.
Delay Of Repentance.

Be not deceived, God is not mocked;
for what things a man shall sow,
those also shall he reap.
—Galatians vi. 7, 8.

"Never mind, I will repent some day and confess it all to the priest; then it will be as if it never happened." Sometimes, my dear brethren, when men have made up their minds to commit sin, or to go on in a course of sin, they are tempted to say some such words as these; or if they are not fallen so low as to talk in this way, yet, if we may form a judgment of their thoughts by their actions, such are the thoughts of not a few. I propose, therefore, to say a few words this morning on the great folly of this way of speaking, thinking, and acting, and to show you what a false notion it rests upon.

I will not stop to point out how uncertain that really is which is assumed as perfectly certain—namely, that an opportunity of going to confession will be granted to every one who acts in this way. A man who sins can never be sure that he will not be cut off in his sin. But I will take it for granted that the opportunity of making a confession is given; more than that, I will take it for granted that he makes a good confession and receives absolution as he promised himself. In such a case as this is it true that even then all will be just as if the sin had never been committed?

My dear brethren, to imagine this to be the case would be indeed a very great mistake. In order that you may see this I must recall to your recollection some well-known truths. In the beginning, God, having made man, placed him in a state of great happiness. He was without pain, sickness, anxiety, or death. How is it, then, that man finds himself in his actual condition? Why is it that man is subjected to so many hardships and miseries, obliged to toil for his daily bread, and, in the end, through anguish and suffering, give up that life which it has cost so much labor to preserve? Think, my dear brethren, of all the pains of mind and body which you have ever experienced, or which you have seen others experience; think of all the sufferings of which you have ever read, and ask yourselves the reason for all this vast mass of agony and anguish. That reason is given in one word. Of all the suffering that has ever been and that ever will be, sin is the cause. Directly or indirectly, mediately or immediately, every suffering finds in sin its origin.

Now, I do not say that when we come to particular cases we can always point out precisely how and why this suffering is connected with that sin. God in his providence permits suffering to attend upon sin for many different reasons. Sometimes it is permitted as a warning not to sin in order that men of sense and understanding, seeing what sin costs, may avoid it. Sometimes suffering in this world is, I am afraid we must say, but a foretaste of eternal suffering in the next. In some cases sufferings are sent to make us more like our Lord. But—and this is the special point I wish you to notice—suffering is very frequently sent by Almighty God as a punishment in this life for those sins the eternal punishment of which he has forgiven. This brings me back to the special point of this instruction. A man may go to confession, may even make a good confession and receive a good absolution—that is to say, he may receive through the merits of Christ the remission of the eternal punishment due to his sins, and yet things may be very far from being, as he promised himself, just as they were before. On the contrary, he may have a vast amount of punishment to undergo in time in consequence of that sin, which he would not have had if he had not committed that sin. This thought is very suitable for this season. Lent will begin next Wednesday. Its fasting and abstinence are enjoined by the church, among other reasons as a means of satisfying for the temporal punishment due to past sins. But, in order that this fasting and abstinence may be useful for this purpose, those who fast and abstain must be in the state of grace, because all their value as works of satisfaction is due to the indwelling grace of God. In order, then, that your fasting and abstinence may be profitable to your own souls, let me advise you to act like our wise forefathers acted, to come to confession at once in the beginning of Lent, and not to put it off with your Easter duty to the last moment.

Sermon XLIII.
Lenten Obligations.

Next Wednesday, my brethren, we enter, as of course you know, on the great and holy season of Lent. On that day, no doubt, as many of you as can will come to the church and receive on your foreheads the ashes which remind us of the penance to which these coming weeks are specially devoted.

The church is generally full on Ash-Wednesday, and one would think, on seeing the crowds pressing forward to receive the ashes, that they were all determined to enter into the spirit of the church, and to keep Lent as it should be kept. Yet how many there are who go through this outward form, and make a great deal of it, and yet neglect all that is signified by it; who give a show indeed of penance, but bring forth none of its fruits! Some, perhaps, of the Ash-Wednesday penitents will not be seen again in the church till they come forward again on Good Friday to kiss the cross.

Yet it is better to come to church, if only on Ash-Wednesday and Good Friday, than not at all; better to do some penance and show some love of God than to neglect these virtues altogether. But how much better still it would be to now thoroughly understand and seriously take to heart what God requires of us, especially in this holy time, and to make it the means, as it may be more than anything else, of our final salvation!

First, then, to thoroughly understand what we are now to do. Everything must be well understood before it can be well done, and the keeping of Lent is no exception to this general rule. Many people break the rules of Lent because they do not clearly understand them.

Lent, then, my brethren, is not a time to be spent in penance altogether according to one's own devotion. Far from it; the duties to be performed in it are clearly and precisely laid down, and should be attended to very strictly. They are not many; they make no great demand on our time or strength; but the Christian who discharges them properly will make his Lent far better than one would who should neglect them and take any other practices, no matter how hard, in their place. It is better to keep the real rules or laws of Lent faithfully than to hear three Masses every day, and come to all the extra services, and give half one's goods to the poor, and yet neglect our regular duties.

What, then, are these laws? The first is the Easter duty, which should be made before Easter, if possible, though the church indulgently extends the time several weeks after that festival. Make, then, this great duty, far the greatest of all the duties of a Christian, at once; it will be very easy for all of you who have just made the mission to do it now, and the longer you put it off the harder it will be. Make it, then, if possible, the first day it can be made—that is, next Sunday—and get it, if I may say so, off your mind. Do not fancy that, as you have so lately made the mission, the Easter duty is of little consequence. If you had made twenty missions during the past year, and any number of jubilees, the law of the Easter duty would bind you exactly as much as if you had neglected them all. It is like hearing Mass on Sunday; nobody is excused at all from Mass on Sunday because they have been to it through the week. So this time, the great Sunday of the year, is set apart by the church for the precept of Holy Communion; it must be fulfilled at this time, no matter how often one has received outside of it.

The second and only other real law of Lent is that relating to fasting and abstinence. If you attend carefully to the rules that have been read you will understand this well enough. But do not confuse fasting with abstinence; that is the most common mistake. People often say: "Oh! I have to work hard; I can eat meat if I like." That is a great error, and a very foolish one. Many are excused from fasting on one meal and a collation; few from abstinence on the days appointed. If you want to have a safe conscience in eating meat you should consult a confessor, unless seriously ill.

Attend to these two things, then, and you will make your Lent as a Christian should. But, of course, you will also try to follow, to the best of your ability, the other devotional practices recommended by the church at this time. Come to daily Mass, and to the occasional services, and give alms according to your means. These practices, especially now, are of the greatest spiritual profit, and can not generally be neglected without spiritual danger. But remember that Easter duty and fasting, with abstinence, are the real laws. Obey these, at any rate, and then, so far as you are able, add the others beside.