The practice of the love of Jesus Christ - 057

“CHARITY IS NOT AMBITIOUS.”

XX.–HE THAT LOVES JESUS CHRIST DESIRES NOTHING BUT JESUS CHRIST.

I. He that loves God does not desire to be esteemed and loved by his fellow-men: the single desire of his heart is to enjoy the favour of Almighty God, Who alone forms the object of his love. St. Hilary writes that all honour paid by the world is the business of the devil. And so it is; for the enemy traffics for hell when he infects the soul with the desire of esteem; because, by thus laying aside humility, she runs great risks of plunging into every vice. St. James writes that, as God confers His graces with open hands upon the humble, so does He close them against the proud, whom He resists. God resists the proud, and gives his grace to the humble-(James iv. 6). He says, He resists the proud, signifying that He does not even listen to their prayers. And certainly, among the acts of pride we may reckon, the desire to be honoured by men, and self-exaltation at receiving honours from them.

II. We have a frightful example of this in the history of Brother Justin the Franciscan, who had even risen to a lofty state of contemplation; but because, perhaps-and indeed without a perhaps-he nourished within himself a desire of human esteem, behold what befell him. One day Pope Eugenius IV sent for him; and on account of the great opinion he had of his sanctity, showed him peculiar marks of honour, embraced him, and made him sit by his side. Such high honours filled Brother Justin with self-conceit; on which St. John Capistran said to him, “Alas, Brother Justin, thou didst leave us an angel, and thou returnest a devil!” And, in fact, the hapless Brother becoming daily more and more puffed up with arrogance, and insisting on being treated according to his own estimate of himself, he at last committed murder. Afterwards, becoming apostate, he fled into the kingdom of Naples, where he perpetrated other atrocities, and there he died in prison, an apostate to the last. Hence it is that a certain great servant of God wisely said that when we hear or read of the fall of some towering cedars of Libanus, of a Solomon, a Tertullian, an Osius, who had all the reputation of saints, it is a sign that they were not wholly given to God, but nourished inwardly some spirit of pride, and so fell away. Let us therefore tremble when we feel arise within us an ambition to appear in public, and to be esteemed by the world; and when the world pays us some tribute of honour, let us beware of taking complacency in it, which might prove the cause of our utter ruin.