"Moreover," he continued, "it is much easier to love God perfectly in adversity than in prosperity. For tribulation having nothing in itself that is lovable, save that it is God's gift, it is much easier to go by it straight to the will of God, and to unite ourselves to His good pleasure. Easier, I say, than by prosperity, which has attractions of its own that captivate our senses, and, like Dalila, lull them to sleep, working in us a subtle change, so that we begin insensibly to love for its own sake the prosperity which God sends us, instead of bestowing all our grateful love on God Who sends it, and to Whom all thanks and praise are due!" UPON CHARITY AND CHASTITY. Feeling at one time troubled and perplexed in mind as to the bearing of these two virtues upon one another, and as to the right manner of practising each, so that one should never run counter to the other, I carried my difficulties to our Blessed Father, who settled them at once in the following words; "We must," he said, "in this matter draw a careful distinction between persons who occupy positions of dignity and authority, and have the care of others, and those private individuals who have no one to look after but themselves. The former must deliver their chastity into the keeping of their charity; and if that charity is real and true it will not fail them, but will serve as a strong wall of defence, both without and within, to their chastity. On the other hand, private individual's will do better to surrender the guardianship of their charity to their chastity, and to walk with the greatest circumspection and self-restraint. The reason of this is that those in authority are obliged by the very nature of their duties, to expose themselves to the dangers inseparable from occasions: in which, however, they are assisted by grace, seeing they are not tempting God by any rashness. "Contrariwise, those private individuals who expose themselves to danger without any legitimate excuse run great risk of tempting God and losing His grace; since it is written that _he that loveth danger_ (still more he that seeketh it) _shall perish in it_."[1] [Footnote 1: Eccles. iii. 27] UPON PURITY OF HEART. I can never express to you, or convey a right idea, of the high esteem in which he held purity of heart. He said that chastity of body was common enough even among unbelievers and among persons addicted to other vices; but that very few people could truly say, my heart is pure. I do not say that by this purity of heart he meant the never being troubled by sinful desires, for that would be making the virtue of chastity to consist in insensibility; and what do those who are not tempted know about the matter? No; he placed it in never yielding to unlawful affections. To these we should rather give the name of _infections_, since they infect the will, and interfere with the safe custody of the heart, which is the well-spring of the spiritual life. UPON CHASTITY AND HUMILITY.