to the edification of your neighbours: but if, notwithstanding your excuse and denial, they persist in accusing you, do not worry yourself, and do not strive to have your excuse admitted: for having satisfied truth, you must now satisfy humility. Thus will you neglect neither the care you owe to your reputation, nor will you disturb your peace of mind and your love of humility.

Complain as little as possible of any wrong that you may receive: for, in general, whoever complains, sins; as self love always makes us deem our wrongs greater than they really are. Above all things, never complain to people who are given to anger or to think ill of others. If it is needful that you should explain the matter to some one, either to set it right or to soothe your own feelings, do so to some calm and steady person who really loves God.

Many people, although sick, sad, or displeased with another, will not openly complain; for they think, and with truth, that to do so would shew great weakness and a want of generosity but by many an artifice, they shew how eager they are to be pitied, soothed, and thought not only ill-used, but patient and courageous. I do not deny that these people have some patience; but it is a false patience, which amounts to neither more nor less than a cunning ambition: "They have glory," says

the Apostle; "but not with God." A really patient man does not complain of his wrongs nor wish to be pitied; but speaks of them plainly, quietly, and truly; and if he is pitied, be bears with the pity, and is thus at rest between forbearance and truth-owning his evil, but not complaining of it.

In illness, offer up all your sorrows and sufferings to the service of our Lord, and beseech him to unite them to the torments which he bore for you. Obey your doctor; take the medicine and meats prescribed, for the love of God, remembering the gall He took for the love of you. Hope to get well, that you may live to serve Him: be willing to linger on in sickness, to obey Him: prepare to die, to praise and enjoy Him. Bring to your mind, Jesus Christ crucified, naked, blasphemed, calumniated, deserted-overcome by many sorrows, labours, and woes; and bethink you that your sufferings cannot, neither in quality nor number, be at all likened to His; and that you can never suffer any thing for Him that can be compared to what He has suffered for you.-ST. F. DE SALES.

RELIGIOUS HARMONY.

Would that mine ears were deaf to earthly sound,

That every thought might more intently dwell

On the sweet tones and notes angelical Which Love and Peace upraise the world around!

Nature is all attuned, and still is found

To breathe o'er ev'ry chord a living spell; So that concerted all together swell,

And pure eternal harmonies rebound.

But Love attunes each voice: Love rules the choir,

Beats time and gives the burden all must bear:

'Tis Love leads Nature's choir, nor leads it wrong:

Sweet and more sweet the grateful notes aspire

All nature joins in one harmonious song, And tells of love-for God has given the air. VITTORIA COLONNA.

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ORIGINAL SIN: CHAP. VI.

1. One who should have perceived the blindness and the wretchedness of man, and the extraordinary contradictions apparent in his nature, and who then, looking around and finding all material creation dumb, and man abandoned to himself and astray, as it were, in this corner of the universe, without knowing who had put him there, what was his real business here, or what would become of him at his death-one who should have thus reasoned with himself, must feel a fear come over him such as would oppress a man who should have been carried in his sleep to a desert and frightful island, and who should wake up without knowing where he was or having any means of getting out of it. And yet what must the Enquirer, we imagine, think of his fellow-men, that they appear in no way disconcerted at their miserable state? They seem to be all equally the sport of chance: and yet, when the Enquirer asks them if they are better informed than he is, they answer "no;" and then having looked around, and seen some object or another which promises pleasure, these poor wanderers betake themselves to it, and attach themselves to it. The Enquirer cannot so employ himself; he cannot so give himself up to ease in

company with people in every way like himself, as wretched as himself, as powerless as himself. He sees that they will not help him to die that he will die alone. He resolves, therefore, to act as if he were alone. Now if

he were alone, he would not amuse himself in building houses; he would not involve himself in noisy affairs; he would not seek fame: but he would seek, and he would only seek to disCover THE TRUTH.

In this search, he would soon find out that there is, most likely, something more in this life than is apparent to the eye: and he would begin to inquire whether the God, of whom all the others talk, may not have left some tokens of himself. He looks round on all sides; but still all is darkness. Nature shews him nothing which is not open to doubt and anxiety. If he could see in it no sign whatever of the existence of a divinity, he would make up his mind at once not to believe in one. If he saw signs of a creator everywhere, he would believe in him, and would be at rest. But seeing too much to deny and too little to convince, he is in a pitiable state of uncertainty, wishes a hundred times that, if all be really the work of a God, it might more clearly appear, or, if it be not so, that there were none of these tokens which raise his doubts. He cries out that the lights of nature ought to shew every thing or