the crucified orator 736 Him back so that we do not descend from the cross of penance either, for only the straight path leads to Heaven. The mellifluous Doctor106 says: “It [i.e., the road] does not provide an excuse for shirking off our perseverance, which alone receives a crown.”107 That is perseverance in penance, in mourning, in tears, in austerities, in fasting, in alms, in various mortifications and finally in the constant carrying of the cross. For only that penance is perfect in the highest degree, which is completed with the end of one’s life. Thus, the penitent king108 washed away his sins as he sang: “My eye wastes away because of grief, it grows weak because of all my foes” (Ps 6:7). Thus Mary, the sinner from Egypt,109 living among wild beasts in the desert for 46 years, washed away all stains of sin which she had contracted while living for a short time among men. Thus Augustine, who transformed into a fervent Catholic from aManichaean, from a very worldly man into a person full of purity and entirely heavenly, did not neglect to piously recite the seven psalms, which we call the penitential psalms, even when he was already about to depart from this world into blessed immortality. Thus, so many others completed their praiseworthy practice of austere penance no earlier than the end of their life. Who could count examples of so many saints who acted with cruelty against their own bodies for the sake of penance? Who would not be dumbfounded at the holy and salutary cruelty to himself of Dominic Loricatus110 alone, who is said to have inflicted upon himself three million lashes [with the discipline] during Lent only? A certain recent author asserts that the distinguished Servant of God, Kasper Drużbicki, SJ,111 a Pole, followed in the footsteps 106 This is the title given to Bernard of Clairvaux. Cf. Third word, footnote 58 (p. 711). 107 Idem, ibid. 108 King David. 109 St. Mary of Egypt. 110 St. Dominic the Ironclad († 1060), a Camaldolese monk. 111 Kasper Drużbicki (1590-1662), a Jesuit.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjI2Mw==