Exterior mortification: its necessity and advantages

There is no alternative: we poor children of Adam must till death live in continual warfare; For, says the Apostle, the flesh lusteth against the spirit. (Gal. v. 17). The flesh desires what the spirit dislikes; and the spirit pants for what the flesh abhors. Now, since it is peculiar to irrational creatures to place all their happiness in sensual enjoyment, and to the Angels to seek only the accomplishment of God's will, surely if we attend to the observance of the Divine commands, we shall, as a learned author justly says, be transformed into Angels; but if we fix our affections on the gratifications of sense, we shall sink to the level of the brute creation.

If the soul do not subdue the body, the flesh will conquer the spirit. To maintain his seat on a furious steed, and to escape danger, the horseman must hold a tight rein; and to avoid the corruption of the flesh, we must keep the body in perpetual restraint. We must treat it as the physician treats a patient, to whom he prescribes nauseous medicine, and to whom he refuses palatable food. Cruel indeed must be the physician who gives to a sick man noxious draughts because they are pleasing to the taste, and who does not administer useful remedies because they are bitter and disgusting. And great is the cruelty of the sensual, when, to escape some trifling corporal pain in this life, they expose their souls and bodies to eternal torments in the next. "Such charity," says St. Bernard, "is destructive of charity: such mercy is full of cruelty; because it so serves the body as to destroy the soul." The false love of the flesh destroys the true charity which we owe to ourselves: inordinate compassion towards the body is full of cruelty, because by indulging the flesh it kills the soul. Speaking of sensualists who deride the mortifications of the Saints, the same Father says: "If we are cruel in crucifying the flesh, you, by sparing it, are more cruel." Yes, for by the pleasures of the body in this life you will merit for soul and body inexpressible torments forever in the next. Father Rodriguez tells us of a solitary who had emaciated his body by very rigorous austerities. Being asked why he treated his body so badly, he replied: "I only chastise what chastises me." I torment the enemy who persecutes my soul, and who seeks my destruction. The Abbot Moses being once censured for severity towards his body, replied: "Let the passions cease, and I will also cease to mortify my flesh." When the flesh ceases to molest me, I shall cease to crucify its appetites.

If, then, we wish to be saved, and to please God, we must take pleasure in what the flesh refuses, and must reject what the flesh demands. Our Lord once said to St. Francis of Assisi: "If you desire my love, accept the things that are bitter as if they were sweet, and the things that are sweet as if they were bitter."

Some will say that perfection does not consist in the mortification of the body, but in the abnegation of the will. To them I answer with Father Pinamonti, that the fruit of the vineyard does not consist in the surrounding hedge; but still if the hedge be taken away, you will seek in vain for the produce of the vine. Where there is no hedge, says the Holy Ghost, the possession shall be spoiled. (Ecclus. xxxvi. 27). So ardent was the desire of St. Aloysius to crucify his flesh, that, although weak in health, he sought nothing but mortifications and penitential rigours; and, to a person who once said that sanctity does not consist in corporal works of penance, but in the denial of self-will, he wisely answered in the words of the Redeemer: These things you ought to have done, and not to leave those undone. (Matt. xxiii. 23). He meant to say that, to keep the flesh in subjection to reason, the mortification of the body is necessary, as well as the denial of the will. I chastise my body, says St. Paul, and bring it into subjection. (1 Cor. ix. 27). The flesh, when indulged, will be brought with difficulty to obey the Divine law. Hence St. John of the Cross, speaking of certain spiritual directors who despise and discourage external penance, says that "he who inculcates loose doctrines regarding the mortification of the flesh, should not be believed though he confirmed his preaching by miracles."