Journal in France in 1845 and 1848 with Letters from Italy in 1847

1. General and Particular Rule. – How far do I keep my engagements? What are the points in which I feel most difficulty or repugnance? What have I done to establish myself in the virtues of obedience and self-denial?

2. Prayer. – What preparation do I make for it? What method have I followed in this exercise? What are my resolutions? Have I put them in practice? What fruit have I hitherto derived from my prayers, and what is my desire to profit by them? What difficulties do I meet with?

3. Virtues. – What progress have I made in thoughtfulness, humility, and purity of intention? and what conquests have I gained over heedlessness, vanity, self-love, and my ruling passion?

4. He will not fail to communicate to his director his pains, temptations, dryness and hardness of mind; as, likewise, the books he has, what he has read, those with whom he has intercourse, the visits which he makes and receives.

5. He never goes out from direction without taking a practical resolution in concert with his director.

"A faithful friend is a strong defence, and he that hath found such an one hath found a treasure." Eccles. vi. 14.

XI. Monthly Retreat

"I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably to her." Hos. ii. 14.

The object of the monthly retreat is: 1. More deeply to examine the conscience; 2. To make firmer resolutions for the correction of faults; 3. To choose the most effective means to advance in virtues, and specially to be confirmed in the life of faith, and in contempt of the world, by a serious preparation for death.

In order to profit by this exercise, the seminarist sets before him the following considerations:

1. To learn his ruling and oftenest recurring fault; for instance, love of the world and its pleasures; sloth and want of application to his duties; fear of humiliations; inclination to slander and unfavourable judgment of his neighbour; liking for his own will and opposition to obedience.

2. To search into the causes of lukewarmness and slackness; habitual heedlessness; little preparation for prayer and attendance on Sacraments; frivolous reading and conversation; indisposition for and want of openness in direction; irresolution in complete surrender to God, in avoiding slight faults, and in seeking the society of the most earnest.

3. To examine the most necessary virtue, and pursue the practices fitted to acquire it; to meditate seriously on the necessity of obedience, humility, self-denial, charity, good example, in the holy ministry.

4. To write down his feelings and resolutions, communicate them to his director, and read them over frequently.

XII. Ordinations

"Which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth not down first and counteth the cost, whether he have sufficient to finish it?" Luke, xiv. 28.

One of the principal duties of the seminarist is to prepare himself with the greatest care for receiving holy orders, considering that, in proportion to the preparation, is the abundance of the grace which they confer.

1. He will read attentively the Pontifical, and works treating of ordination, to learn the excellence of holy orders, their office, their obligations, the virtues they require, the disposition to be brought to them.

2. He will prepare himself for ordination by practices of piety; by deeper examinations of conscience; by more frequent communications with his director; by uniting in prayer with those who receive the same orders.

3. After ordination he will take pains to preserve the grace which he has received, by fulfilling the resolutions he has written down and the advice of his director.

"Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift." 2 Cor. ix. 13.

4. He will mark the anniversaries of his different ordinations, to stir himself up at those times in the practice of ecclesiastical virtues, and especially of a hearty religion; a continual modesty; a holy and exemplary life; an ardent zeal for the salvation of souls.

"I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God which is in thee, by the putting on of my hands." 2 Tim. i. 6.

"And this day shall be unto you for a memorial, and ye shall keep it a feast to the Lord throughout your generations." Exod. xii. 14.

notes

1

Arist. Rhet., lib. 2. 4.

2

The observations between inverted commas, and ended with the letter M., are taken, by permission, from the journal of my fellow-traveller, the Rev. C. Marriott.

3

It should be mentioned that the two brothers Labbé set up this school some twenty years ago, without any resources, and have maintained it ever since, living upon Providence, gradually building accommodations for their scholars, a chapel, &c.

4

"La monition consiste à faire connaître à celui, qui nous a chargés de lui rendre cet office de charité, ses imperfections et ses défauts extérieurs contraires aux vertus Chrétiennes et ecclésiastiques."