"All this excusing yourself, replied our Blessed Father, is only so much self-accusing as would appear if I chose to examine your reasons in detail and weigh them in the scales of the sanctuary. But without entering into any discussion of them let it suffice that you refer the matter to my judgment. I tell you then, and in this I think that I have the Spirit of God, that all the reasons which you bring forward to dispense yourself from so profitable an exercise of piety are really those which oblige you to practise it. This holy exercise will ripen your youth, moderate your passions, weaken your temptations, strengthen your weakness, illuminate your path, and the very act of practising it will teach you to do so with greater perfection. Moreover, if the sense of your unworthiness would make you abstain from it out of humility, as happened to St. Bonaventure, and if your own unfitness makes the custom of daily celebrating productive in your soul of less fruit than it should, consider that you are a public person, and that your flock and your Church have need of your daily Mass. More than that, you ought to be stimulated and spurred on by the thought that every day on which you refrain from celebrating you deprive the exterior glory of God of increase, the Angels of their delight, and the Blessed of a most special happiness." The young Priest deferred to this counsel, saying "_Fiat, fiat_," and from that time for a space of thirty years has never failed to say Mass daily, even when on long journeys through France, Italy, Spain, Germany, and in heretical countries. He never failed, I repeat, even under conditions which seemed to make the saying of Mass impossible. Such power have remonstrances when tempered with kindness and prudence. [Footnote 1: Possibly M. Camus himself. [Ed.]] A PRIEST SAYING MASS SHOULD BE CONSIDERATE OF OTHERS. He was told that I was very lengthy in my preparation for saying Holy Mass, and that this was a cause of inconvenience to many who either wished to be present at it or to speak to me afterwards. I was accustomed, by his orders, to say daily Mass at a fixed hour, and not in the private chapel of the Bishop's house, unless I happened to be ill, but in a large chapel adjoining the Cathedral Church, where synods, ordinations, and similar pastoral functions were held. The bell rang for this Mass always at a few minutes before the appointed hour, but those who knew the length of my preparation in the sacristy did not hurry to come to it, and those who did not know lost patience, and in winter time often got chilled to the bone.