examination of the heart 172 unceasing prayer. When you receive it, take care not to lose it; take care that it is not driven out from you by needless occupations. Indeed, you should remember to guard it with such diligence as people guard their bodily eyes. FIRST SUNDAY OF LENT Before Holy Communion 1. “[Jesus] was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness” (Mt 4:1). Consider that at some time Christ the Lord was prompted, or rather stirred up or driven by the Divine Spirit to withdraw into the desert. There, after a strict 40-day fast, He was tempted by the infernal evil spirit, although He had never before dealt with such a tempter while staying among the people. From this you should learn that there are many people [f.29v] in the world who do not feel temptations; for the evil spirit believes them to be already his own, and therefore he does not display his hostile force against them, does not throw his darts nor devise battle formations or lay traps. But he assaults with great intensity those who live in a religious institute, in the sacred and fortified city of God. Hence the religious, although employing a great many mortifications, fasts, and all kinds of abstinence, are harassed and subjected to uncommon temptations. Since the universal, infernal enemy perceives themas hismost implacable enemies, he employs, therefore, all cunning devices and applies all his forces in order to either drive them away from there, as if from a camp strongly fortified by divine power and protection, or else to destroy, conquer, and annihilate them in their present place and situation. Therefore, do not think that this kind of affliction and cross, the religious struggle, is something new and extraordinary, since you hear that even the God-Man was tempted; and do not despair of the help of He who led you outside of the walls of Babylon58 58 Babylon (in Mesopotamia) was for the Jews synonymous with all evil and violence; this name was used in an allegorical sense by Christians, referring to Rome and to the sinful world. Cf. Hugolin Langkammer, EK, vol. I, Towarzystwo
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