Once a priest always a priest, and there is no time in life when a man's priesthood is more prominent than when he lies on his bed of death, while his parishioners going about their daily duties remember him continually in their prayers. Thus truly they are grouped around him in spirit, as the sheep around their shepherd. "I know mine and mine know Me." He has been intimate with them, has shown how he knows and sympathises with their difficulties and trials and dangers; now it is their turn to show that they also know him, perhaps better than he knows himself, which they show by the very certainty they entertain as to his final lot. It may be that the priest himself, knowing his own frailty, is tempted to despondency as he lies so helpless on his bed of suffering. He may be as the man who "revolved these things within himself, saying: 'If I did but know that I should still persevere'; and presently he heard an answer from God; 'And if thou didst know this, what wouldst thou do? Do now what thou wouldst then do, and thou shalt be very secure.' And immediately being comforted and strengthened, he committed himself to the divine will and his anxious wavering ceased." [2] What more can the sick man do, but "commit himself to the divine will"? Then in union with that divine will, surrounded by those praying around him, he goes forth from the world as a priest of God, this being the concluding act of his priestly vocation. [1] _The Priest, etc._, p. 60. [2] _Imitation_, I, xxv. 2. PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY WM. BRENDON AND SON, LTD. PLYMOUTH The Westminster Library. A Series of Manuals for Catholic Priests and Students. Edited by The Right Rev. BERNARD WARD, Bishop of Brentwood, and the Rev. HERBERT THURSTON, S.J. _Crown 8vo_. THE HOLY EUCHARIST. By the Right Rev. JOHN CUTHBERT HEDLEY, O.S.B., late Bishop of Newport. 4s. 6d. net. THE MASS: a Study of the Roman Liturgy. By the Rev. ADRIAN FORTESCUE, D.D. 7s. 6d. net. THE NEW PSALTER AND ITS USE. By the Rev. E. H. BURTON, D.D., President of St. Edmund's College, Ware, and the Rev. EDWARD MYERS, M.A. 4s. 6d. net. THE PRIEST'S STUDIES. By the Very Rev. THOMAS SCANNELL, D.D., late Canon of Southward Cathedral. 4s. 6d. net. THE TRADITION OF SCRIPTURE: its Origin, Authority and Interpretation. By the Very Rev. WILLIAM BARRY, D.D., Canon of Birmingham. 4s. 6d. net. THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS: An Introduction to Hagiography. From the French of Père H. DELEHAYE, S.J., Bollandist. Translated by Mrs. V. M. CRAWFORD. 4s. net. NON-CATHOLIC DENOMINATIONS. By the Very Rev. Monsignor ROBERT HUGH BENSON. 4s. 6d. net. THE EARLY CHURCH IN THE LIGHT OF THE MONUMENTS. A Study in Christian Archaeology. By the Very Rev. Monsignor A. S. BARNES, M.A. With Illustrations. 5s. 6d. net. THE PRIEST AND SOCIAL ACTION. By the Rev. CHARLES PLATER, S.J., M.A., Professor of Psychology at St. Mary's Hall, Stonyhurst. With an Introduction by the BISHOP OF NORTHAMPTON. 4s. 6d. net.