> [[at-sl-33|← B3 Ch. IV]] | [[at-spiritual-life-toc|TOC]] | [[at-sl-35-index|Index →]] # Appendices 1\. The spirituality of the New Testament1 In order to help our readers to understand better and to systematize the spiritual treasures found in the New Testament, we shall give a short synthesis of the spirituality of the Synoptics, of St. Paul and of St. John. 1° THE SPIRITUALITY OF THE SYNOPTICS The central idea of Christ’s teaching as recorded by the Synoptics is that of the Kingdom of God. In order that we may see the spirituality implied in this idea, we shall explain the nature and the constitution of this kingdom together with the conditions of admission. A) Its nature. The kingdom of God preached by Our Lord is not an earthly one, but, contrary to the prejudices of the Jews, a spiritual kingdom opposed to that of Satan and his rebel angels, a) It is presented under a threefold form: 1) At times it is the Kingdom of Heaven or the place reserved for the Elect: “Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”2 2) At other times it is the interior kingdom as already established upon earth, that is to say, grace, friendship, sonship bestowed by God and received by men of good-will. 3) Lastly, it is the external kingdom which God establishes in order to perpetuate His work in the world.3 b) These three forms constitute but one and the same kingdom; for the visible Church was founded only to enable the interior kingdom to expand peacefully, and the latter is, so to speak, the sum-total of the conditions that open to us the kingdom of heaven. B) Its constitution. This interior kingdom has a King, Who is none other than God Himself. 4 Now, this God is the Father of His subjects, not merely collectively as in the Old Dispensation, but of each individual in particular. His goodness is so great that it embraces even evil-doers5 as long as they live upon earth; still, His justice is visited upon hardened sinners, for they shall be cast into hell.6 This kingdom was established upon earth by Jesus Christ, the Son of God and the Son of man, Who is also our King by right of birth, since He is the Son, the natural heir, the one Who alone knows the Father even as the Father knows Himself; Who is our King by right of conquest, since He came to save that which was lost, and since He shed His blood for the remission of our sins.7 He is a King utterly devoted to His subjects, a King Who loves the lowly, the poor, the forsaken; a King Who goes after the lost sheep to bring it back to the fold; a King Who upon the Cross pardons His very executioners.8 But He is also the Judge of the living and the dead. On the Last Day He will separate the good from the bad; the just He will receive into His abiding kingdom, but the wicked He will condemn to the eternal fires of hell.1 Hence, there is nothing in this world of greater value than this kingdom. This is indeed the pearl of great price, the hidden treasure to be obtained at any cost. C) Conditions of admission. Admittance to the kingdom is gained through penance,2 baptism, belief in the Gospel, and observance of the commandments.3 But the ideal proposed to the members of the kingdom is the imitation, as far as this is possible, of God’s Own perfection. Since we have been made His children, we must strive to live up to our dignity and to model our conduct on the divine perfections: “Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect.”4 In order to reach so high an ideal, two essential conditions must be fulfilled. We must renounce self and creatures and thus detach ourselves from whatever constitutes an obstacle to union with God. Moreover, we must love God and give ourselves entirely to Him by imitating Our Lord: “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ”5 a) Renunciation has its degrees. In every case it must exclude that disordered love of self and of creatures which constitutes sin, and it must above all rule out grievous sin, which is an absolute obstacle to the attainment of our destiny. So true is this, that should our right eye be a source of scandal to us, we must not hesitate to pluck it out: “And if thy right eye scandalize thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee.”6 For those who would become perfect, renouncement must be still more absolute. It must embrace the practice of the evangelical counsels, real poverty, the giving up of family ties, and perfect chastity or continence.7 Those who are unwilling or unable to carry their renouncement so far as this will content themselves with an interior renunciation of family ties and of worldly goods; they will live in the spirit of poverty and of interior detachment from whatever militates against the reign of God in their soul. They can even thus attain to a high degree of holiness.8 These manifold degrees of renunciation are grounded in the distinction between precepts and counsels: to enter into life it suffices for us to keep the commandments; but to be perfect one must sell one’s goods and bestow them on the poor: “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments… if thou wilt be perfect, go sell what thou hast and give to the poor.”9 Perfect renunciation goes as far as the love of the Cross: “Let him take up his cross.” One comes to love the cross, not indeed in and for itself, but because of the Crucified Christ Whom one would follow unto the end: “And follow me.” Nay more, one finally finds joy in the Cross: “Blessed are the poor in spirit… Blessed are the meek… Blessed are those who suffer persecution… Blessed are ye when they shall revile you.”10 b) However, renunciation is only a means of attaining to the love of God and the love of the neighbor for God’s sake. In truth, love sums up the whole law: “In these two commandments dependeth the whole law and the prophets.”1 It is love that makes us yield ourselves to God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with thy whole mind… And the second is like to this: thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”2 This is the greatest of all the commandments, the one which embodies all perfection. 1\) This love must be a filial love. It moves us to glorify first of all our Heavenly Father: “Our Father… hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come.”3 And in order that we give Him glory in a more perfect way, it prompts us to keep His commandments: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven… Not everyone that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he that doth the will of my Father.”4 2\) It must be a confiding love for the Heavenly Father cares for His children far more than He does for the birds of the air and the lilies of the field: “Are not you of much more value than they? For your Father knoweth that you have need of all these things.”5 This confidence is shown by prayer, which, according to the promises of the Divine Mediator, obtains all that is properly asked for: “Ask, and it shall be given you: seek, and you shall find: knock, and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asketh, receiveth: and he that seeketh, findeth: and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”6 3\) This love begets love of the neigh. Since we are all children of the same Heavenly Father, we are all brethren: “For one is your master: and all you are brethren.”7 In order to impart to this virtue the greatest possible motivating power, Our Lord declares that on the day of judgment He shall consider as done unto Himself every service rendered to the least of His brethren.8 He identifies Himself with His members, and so in loving the neighbor, it is Christ Himself Whom we love. This love includes even our enemies, with whom we must patiently bear, for whom we must pray, and to whom we must do good.9 It must therefore be accompanied by meekness and humility, even as was the love of Our Divine Model: “Learn of me because I am meek and humble of heart.”10 Renunciation and love, then, are the two essential conditions of admittance into the Kingdom of God and of attaining to perfection. We have seen elsewhere (n. 309 and foll.) how they include all the virtues. 2° THE SPIRITUALITY OF ST. PAUL11 By a different procedure St. Paul arrives at the same conclusions as the Synoptics. The central idea with him is not indeed the Kingdom, but the saving plan of God Who desires to save and to sanctity all men, Jews and Gentiles, through His Son, Jesus Christ, made the Head of the human race and into Whom we must all be incorporated: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with spiritual blessings in heavenly places, in Christ… in Whom we have redemption through his blood… and he hath subjected all things under his feet and hath made him head over all the church. ”1 Thus, from all eternity God wills to sanctify us and to adopt us as His children. But an obstacle stands in the way—sin, original sin, committed by Adam, the first head of the human race and transmitted to his descendants together with concupiscence, that law of the flesh that holds us captive under the law of sin. God however takes pity on man. He sends him a Redeemer, a Savior, Who will be the new Head of the race and Who will reclaim us through His obedience unto death, even the death of the Cross. Jesus then will be the center of our lives; “For to me, to live is Christ.”2 His merits and His satisfactions are applied to us especially through Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. Baptism regenerates us, incorporates us into Christ and makes us new men, who under the guidance of the Holy Ghost must fight relentlessly against the flesh, the Old Adam.3 The Holy Eucharist makes us share more abundantly in the death and in the life of Our Lord, in His inner sentiments and in His virtues.4 But in order to receive these Sacraments with profit, in order to foster the Divine Life which they impart, we must live a life of faith: “The just man liveth by faith.”5 We must place all our confidence in God and in Our Lord, and we must above all practise that most excellent of all virtues, charity, which will indeed be one of our joys in heaven,6 but which now in this valley of tears exacts the crucifixion of nature.7 All these ascetical practices are summed up in a formula recurring again and again in the writings of the Apostle: we must incorporate ourselves more and more into Christ Jesus and therefore put off the Old Man with all his tendencies to evil, and put on the New Man with all His virtues: “Stripping yourselves of the old man with his deeds, and putting on the new, him who is renewed unto knowledge, according to the image of him that created him.”8 A) First of all, we must put off the Old Adam, a) This Old Adam, which is also called the flesh, is our nature, not indeed as it is in itself, but as vitiated by the threefold concupiscence. Consequently, the works of the flesh are the sins man commits, not only those of sensuality and lust, but those also of pride in its various forms.9 b) We are under a strict obligation of mortifying or crucifying the flesh, an obligation based on two chief reasons: 1) The danger of consenting to sin and of being damned; for the flesh, or concupiscence which has not been destroyed by Baptism, urges us on with violence to sin, and it will enslave us under the law of sin if we do not combat it relentlessly with the help of God’s grace: “Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ our Lord.”10 The second reason for mortification of the flesh is to be found in our baptismal promises. We are dead to sin and have been buried with Jesus Christ through Baptism, and in order to live with Him of a new life, we promised to avoid sin and thereby to carry on a vigorous campaing against the flesh and the devil.1 Life then, must be a combat, a struggle, the victor’s reward being the crown of glory reserved unto us by the God of all justice and love.2 c) What sustains us in this struggle and what renders the victory relatively easy despite our weakness and our helplessness, is the grace of God merited by Jesus Christ. If we co-operate with it, we are sure of victory: “And God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able: but will make also with temptation issue.3 I can do all things in him who strengtheneth me.” d) This mortification has two degrees: 1) There is the mortification necessary for the avoidance of mortal sin and reprobation: “I chastise my body and bring it into subjection: lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a castaway.”4 2) But there is also the mortification, which is profitable unto perfection, such as virginity, perfect humility, absolute disinterestedness.5 From another point of view St. Paul distinguishes three degrees of mortification: crucifixion of the still recalcitrant flesh, then a species of spiritual death, and lastly, burial.6 B) By putting off the Old Adam we incorporate ourselves into Jesus Christ, we put on the New Man. This New Man is the Christian regenerated through Baptism, united to the Holy Ghost and incorporated into Christ, transforming himself under the influence of grace into Christ Jesus. In order to understand this doctrine thoroughly, it is necessary to explain the role of the Holy Ghost, of Christ, and of the soul itself in this new supernatural life. a) The Holy Ghost, that is to say, the Most Blessed Trinity, dwells in the soul of the just and transforms it into a holy temple: “For the temple of God is holy, which you are.”7 b) He operates in the soul, moves it by actual grace, gives it a filial trust in God the Father, and enables it to pray with singular efficacy: “God who worketh in you both to will and to accomplish… Whereby we cry: Abba (Father). The Spirit also helpeth our infirmity… Himself asketh for us with unspeakable groanings.”8 c) Christ is the Head of a mystical body whose members we are, and He imparts to us motion, direction and life. By Baptism we are incorporated into Him, and in Holy Communion we are associated with Him in His passion, which we commemorate, in His sacrifice, and in His risen life in which He makes us share while we await our entrance into heaven where we already dwell to some extent through hope: “For we are saved by hope.”9 This communion is prolonged by a sort of spiritual communion whereby all through the day we make our own the thoughts and the affections of Our Lord: “For let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus… And I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me.”1 Thus, nothing can separate us from Him Who is our All: “Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ?”2 d) From this arises the duty of remaining closely united to Jesus, our Head, our Source of life, the perfect Model, whom we must constantly imitate until we be transformed into Him. 1) We must first of all imitate His inner dispositions, His humility and His obedience: “For let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God… emptied himself… becoming obedient unto death.”3 We must imitate His charity which prompted Him to sacrifice Himself for us: “Christ also hath loved us and hath delivered himself for us.”4 We must imitate His exterior conduct by practising modesty, bodily mortification, mortification of our vices and passions, in order thus to submit ourselves more completely to Jesus and His Holy Spirit: “Let your modesty be known to all men.”5 This imitation of Christ admits of many degress. At first we are like children, thinking, speaking and acting as such. Then we begin to grow to perfect manhood, “unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ,”6 until we are completely transformed into Christ: “For to me, to live is Christ… But Christ liveth in me.”7 It is then that we can say to the faithful: “Be ye followers of me, as I also am of Christ.”8 There is therefore no essential difference between the spirituality of St. Paul and that of the Synoptics. To put off the Old Adam is to practise renunciation, and to put on the New Man, the New Adam, is to unite oneself to Jesus Christ and through Him to God; it is to love God and the neighbor. 3° THE SPIRITUALITY OF ST. JOHN In the writings of St. John, the dominant idea is not that of the Kingdom, nor that of God’s plan of sanctification for man. It is the spiritual life. He acquaints us with the interior life of God, of the Incarnate Word, of the Christian soul. A) God is life, that is to say, light and love. He is a Father, and from all eternity He begets a Son, Who is none other than His Word.9 Together with His Son, He is the source whence proceeds the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of truth and of love, Who completes the mission of the Incarnate Word by abiding with Christians until the end of time in order to enlighten and to strengthen them.10 B) God wills to communicate this life to men. Hence, He sends into the world His Own Son, Who by taking flesh becomes man, and by imparting to us His life makes us the adopted children of God.11 “Equal to the Father by nature, He openly proclaims His inferiority to Him as man and His utter dependence upon Him. He judges not, He speaks not, He acts not of Himself, but He conforms His judgments, His words and His actions to the good pleasure of the Father and thus manifests His love for Him.12 He is obedient unto death in order to glorify His Father and to procure the salvation of men.13 With regard to us, He is: 1) the light that enlightens us and leads us unto life;1 2) the Good Shepherd Who feeds His sheep, protects them from the hungry wolf and lays down His life for them;2 3) the indispensable Mediator without Whom no one can go to the Father;3 4) the Vine whose branches we are, receiving from Him as we do our supernatural life.4 C) From Him, then, must flow our interior life, which consists in an intimate, affectionate union with Him, and through Him with God;5 for He is the Way that leads to the Father.6 a) This union begins with Baptism, which gives us new birth, spiritual life,7 which incorporates us into Christ, and enables us to bring forth fruit unto salvation.8 b) This union is strengthened by the reception of Holy Communion, which nourishes our soul with the Body and Blood of Christ, with His Divinity, with His whole Person, so that we live His very life, and live for Him even as He lives for His Father.9 c) This union is made abiding by a kind of spiritual communion, which causes Jesus to dwell in us and us in Him.10 So close is this union, that Our Lord compares it with that existing between Himself and the Father: “I in them, and thou in me.”11 D) This union enables us to share in the virtues of the Divine Master, above all in His love for God and for men carried to the point of self-immolation. a) God loves us as His children. We love Him as Our Father. And because we love Him, we keep His commandments.12 Thus, the Three Divine Persons come to dwell in our soul: “We will come to him and make our abode with him.”13 We must therefore love God because He is love — God is charity — and because He has loved us first, sacrificing even His Own Son for us.14 b) Fraternal love flows from the love of God. We must love our brethren not only as we love ourselves, but as Jesus has loved them. We must therefore be ready to sacrifice ourselves for them: “A new commandment I give unto you: That you love one another as I have loved you15… Because he hath laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.”16 In truth, we are all but one spiritual family whose father is God and whose savior is Jesus Christ. So close must our union be that it is likened to that existing between the Three Divine Persons: “That they may be one, as we also are one.”17 This virtue of the love of the neighbor is so necessary that to pretend to love God without loving the neighbor is a lie,18 whereas fraternal charity is the surest guarantee of eternal life.19 St. John then, is the Apostle of love, the love he practised so well himself. But this love has its foundation in faith, particularly in belief in Christ, belief in His Divinity as well as in His Humanity. It presupposes the struggle against the threefold concupiscence, and hence, mortification. In this St. John agrees with the Synoptics and St. Paul, though he emphasizes divine charity more than they do. According to the Synoptics, then, perfection consists in renunciation; according to St. Paul, in incorporation into Christ, which implies the putting off of the Old Adam and the putting on of the New; according to St. John, in love carried to the point of sacrifice. We have here fundamentally one and the same doctrine, but expressed in various terms and under different aspects, so that it can be easily adapted to the character and the training of each individual soul. II\. The study of characters.1 When speaking of self-knowledge, (n. 452) we said that a study of temperaments and characters would contribute greatly to our knowledge of self. Frequently the two terms, temperament and character, are taken as synonymous. The distinction between them lies in this, that the former is the sum-total of those fundamental tendencies which flow from the physiological constitution of individuals, and the latter the sum-total of the psychological dispositions, based on temperament as modified by education and will-power, and made lasting by habit. It will therefore prove more profitable to study characters than temperaments, for the important thing from the spiritual point of view is not so much physical temperament as the character of the soul. This fact was well understood in olden times, for in the description of various temperaments, the psychological rather than the physiological differences were stessed. We shall limit ourselves here to the question of characters, and shall make use mainly of the admirable work of Father Malapert, Les Eléments du Caractère, simplifying, and at times correcting, his classifications. We shall give a brief explanation of the basis of our classification, and of the various characters that may be distinguished in relation to the three great activities of man. 1° BASIS OF OUR CLASSIFICATION OF CHARACTERS A) When we wish to specify the principal tendencies which differentiate characters, the most reliable means is to study characters in relation to man’s different activities. We shall not touch on the question of the purely vegetative activities of man, since they are of little importance from our point of view, and shall study the main characters in relation to feeling, to the spiritual activities of mind and will, and to external activities. A brief synoptic table will make clear our purpose. ![[at-sl-img-17.jpeg]] B) Before we explain this classification, a few preliminary remarks are necessary: a) The characters we are about to describe do not exist as so many pure types; rather, they possess characteristics of several types, and this in varying degrees. Thus, cold-blooded persons have not only the traits common to this type, but they experience also a certain amount of emotional activity. They are classified as cold-blooded, because this is their characteristic or predominant trait. The same is to be said of every other type; it is the predominance of one certain element which marks off the type from all others. Moreover, this predominant element admits of many degrees. b) Again, each individual must be studied from the threefold point of view outlined above in the schematic chart. For instance, a cold-blooded person may be intellectual or volitional, just as an intellectual may be interested or disinterested in his pursuit of knowledge. One must therefore learn to take these different points of view into consideration before attempting to place a man in this or that category. c) The characters we describe are not rigidly fixed types, but rather indications which may enable the spiritual director to observe and to understand better the peculiarities of each of his penitents. Final judgment must not be passed on a man’s character after but a few conversations with him. Such snap judgments are generally faulty and must be revised. The process by which we really come to know a person’s character must necessarily be slow, for it must be one of careful and studied observation of unnumbered actions and reactions. d) Lastly, we must not forget to beg humbly, frequently and perseveringly for the lights of the Holy Ghost, for we need them in order to acquire a true knowledge of self and of others. 2° DIFFERENT TYPES OF CHARACTER IN RELATION TO FEELING. Feeling is of course common to all human beings, but some persons have so little of it that they are called cold-blooded, while others, on the contrary, are called hot-blooded, precisely because in them feeling is so highly developed. A) Cold-blooded persons have an abnormally low sensibility and little emotionalism. They have few desires, show little enthusiasm for anything, and are seldom aroused to passion. We can divide them into two classes: the phlegmatic and the determined. a) The phlegmatic are slow and awkward in action. They are selfish, but not malicious, and so indifferent as to hardly feel the need of loving or of being loved. As a general rule, their judgment is sound, precisely because their passions lack intensity. They have little taste for active work, but when they must get down to it, they succeed best in those undertakings which demand patience rather than imagination and feeling. As regards the spiritual life, they are not attracted to a high degree of virtue, but neither are they held back by violent passions. They are virtuous when not forced to contend against great temptations, but hardly know how to resist when dangerous occasions present themselves, or how to amend their lives when once they have fallen into habits of sin. They readily accept the spiritual advice given them, provided they are not asked to aim at a high degree of perfection, or urged onward too fast. It is not among these that vocations to the priesthood or the religious life are to be sought. Such persons are fitted only for quiet professions which are not too exacting and which are compatible with the enjoyment of legitimate and moderate pleasure. b) Persons who are cold-blooded but determined are indeed slow to action, but steady and methodical in their efforts. By dint of patient work they obtain notable results. From the point of view of intellect, these persons possess little imagination or brilliancy, but they succeed in serious work which demands reflection, patience and methodical investigation. From the moral point of view, they entertain no grand dreams, but they act from conviction, with steadiness of purpose, and are therefore capable of attaining to a high degree of virtue. Hence, they offer excellent material for the priesthood or the religious life once they have been imbued with profound convictions, love of duty for God’s sake, and of the need of making constant and methodical efforts towards perfection. They proceed slowly, but surely: “Persistent labor overcomes all things.” B) Hot-blooded natures, on the other hand, are characterized by a predominance of feeling. They sense keenly the need of loving and of being loved. In them it is the heart that rules. We may divide them into two classes: the emotional and the passionate. a) Emotional persons are quick of movement; they have an engaging smile and a sprightly appearance. They love art in most of its forms. They are light-hearted and extremely changeable, giving themselves over readily to the most contrary emotions, and acting on the spur of the moment. Gifted with a lively imagination and an ardent heart, they attain success in literary work, speak with great facility, and charm all with whom they come in contact. From the moral point of view, they are easily drawn to sensual pleasure, to gluttony and to voluptuousness; but they quickly and sincerely repent of their faults, and just as quickly fall back into these same sins at the first opportunity. They have a good heart; they are quick to love and become very much attached to those who love them. They are frank and open in confession and spiritual direction, are readily convinced, and form good resolutions which they soon forget. It is by appealing to their heart that they are to be conquered and brought to God. If one succeeds in implanting in them an ardent love of Our Lord, one can turn them to good account. Through love they will make many sacrifices which at first seemed repugnant to their nature; through love they will pray, frequently receive Holy Communion, visit the Blessed Sacrament and practise works of zeal. But they must be taught to love God in dryness of soul and in suffering as well as in times of consolation. Little by little, under the influence of divine grace and of their own reflection, their emotions will yield to convictions, and while preserving all their former spirit, they will bring to their endeavors greater perseverance and constancy. If they can not acquire this energy and steadiness of purpose, they must not be encouraged to choose a state of life such as that of the priesthood, which requires a well-grounded and tried virtue. b) Passionate natures are those in which deep and ardent passions hold sway. They may be reduced to three different types: the melancholic, the sanguine and the choleric. 1\) Melancholic persons have a natural tendency to see the dark side of things, to dwell particularly on the difficulties and the unpleasant features of situations, and to exaggerate them. Hence, they are prone to sadness, to diffidence, to a kind of misanthropy. They suffer very much, and without intending it, make others suffer also. Unless they seek consolation in God, Who alone can console them, and unless they dispel their gloomy thoughts, they fall an easy prey to weariness, discouragement and scrupulosity. St. Teresa1 maintained that persons who are highly predisposed to melancholy are not fit subjects for the religious life. Indeed, since melancholy implies a rather marked predominance of the imagination and the emotions over reason, it may after a time devolve into a sort of madness. At all events, in order to weaken such an unwholesome disposition, one must know how to treat such persons with great sympathy, but always with authority and firmness, not allowing them to follow their whims or act upon their suspicions. Since their judgment is not sufficiently clear, they must submit to the decisions of a spiritual director or some prudent friend. 2\) Sanguine or impulsive persons are the ready prey of the first vivid impression that makes itself felt. They are expansive, volatile and spasmodic, passing quickly from gaiety to sadnees, from hope to anxiety, from enthusiasm to discouragement. If contradicted or humiliated, they fly into a fit of passion and give vent to their spleen in violent words and gestures. In brief, they frequently lose their self-control and use harshly those about them. In order to combat this defect, one must make constant and energetic use of the power of inhibition, check from the outset the first inordinate impulses, and reflect before acting; in a word, one must regain, little by little, control over self. Unless a man succeeds in attaining mastery over nerves and emotions, he must not think of entering the priesthood, since violent anger; as St. Paul remarks, constitutes an insuperable impediment: “For a bishop must be without crime… not subject to anger… no striker.”2 3\) Choleric persons are those in whom passion is not only violent, as in sanguine natures, but also enduring. They are energetic, long-suffering and tenacious. Generally they are ambitious, and seek leadership and glory. They are destined to work a great deal of good or a great deal of harm. It all depends on whether they use their passions for their own selfish ends or for the glory of God and the good of souls. It is from their ranks that great conquerors and apostles come. Richly endowed as they are, one can make them render great service by keeping their eyes fixed on the glory of God and the conquest of souls, as was done for St. Francis Xavier by St. Ignatius of Loyola. 3° DIFFERENT TYPES OF CHARACTERS IN RELATION TO THE SPIRITUAL FACULTIES OF MIND AND WILL Those in whom the higher faculties of intellect and will predominate are naturally divided into two classes: the intellectual and the wilful, accordingly as it is the intellect or the will that has control. A) The intellectual are those who are absorbed in the pursuit of knowledge. Among these however there are some of a purely speculative turn of mind, and others who are less disinterested and who are goaded on by active hopes and practical ambitions. a) Those of the purely speculative type spend their lives in the construction of systems of thought. Such were, for example, Kant, Cuvier and Ampere. Some of them engage in thought for the sheer pleasure of thinking — art for art’s sake — and thus fall into a dangerous form of dilettantism which may end in scepticism, as it did with Montaigne and Bayle. b) The more practical and ambitious among the intellectuals are motivated by some ardent passion. There are those who while engaged in stirring up ideas within themselves also wish to stir up men, and consequently become passionately intent upon the triumph of some idea or some system of thought. With either of these types, the purely speculative and disinterested, or the more practical and ambitious, we are dealing with men of great resources. The former however are liable to become too systematic, too abstract, and thus neglect the ordinary duties of life. The latter have need to place their knowledge and their activity at the service of God and truth, otherwise they may fall and cause others to fall into fearful excesses. B) Wilful natures are endowed with a firm, tenacious, unbending will to which they subordinate all things. They divide into two groups: those who are masters of self and those who, being men of action, are masters of others. a) The former bend their efforts especially on mastering themselves, and with this in view, on overcoming their passions. Hence, they strive with relentless energy to bring their feelings under control, and no one with a little power of observation can fail to notice the efforts they are making to hold themselves in check. This preoccupation creates in them a certain reserve, and at times even a certain rigidness accompanied by distrust of whatever might tend to make them lose their control over self. But once they have by dint of constant work gained complete victory, they become wonderfully even-tempered, and know how to harmonize firmness with gentleness. From the spiritual point of view, their one great aim is to subject that strong and disciplined will to the will of God. Thus they acquire something of that perfect poise, that perfect subordination of faculties which man possessed in the state of original justice. b) There is the other type of wilful characters which aims rather at dominating others than at mastering self. Persons of this type want to force their will on others and to rule over their equals. They keep their eyes constantly fixed on their objective; they do not allow obstacles to discourage them, and they never give up until they have had their way. Such persons are evidently energetic and persevering and can be made to render great service. But they must master themselves before they attempt to master others; they must devote their energies to the service of God and the good of souls, and learn how to unite mildness with firmness in the exercise of their authority. 4° DIFFERENT TYPES OF CHARACTERS IN RELATION TO EXTERNAL ACTIVITIES Here we meet with two types: the timid or reserved, and the active. A) The timid are over-diffident, have little initiative, and seem paralyzed in their undertakings by the fear of failure. They succeed well only when given proper direction and when supported and encouraged by superiors or friends who can inspire them with confidence and help them to acquire a certain amount of assurance. From the supernatural point of view, they must be drilled in the virtue of trust in God and reminded constantly that God makes use of even the poorest instruments, provided only that, conscious of their insufficiency, they seek support in Him Who alone can strengthen them: “The weak things of the world hath God chosen, that He may confound the strong1… I can do all things in him who strengtheneth me.”2 B) The active have a natural penchant for action. They are enterprising, bold, courageous and energetic, and must of necessity find an outlet for their surplus energy. Among these latter, the restless expend their forces in feverish activity, the men of action in well-planned efforts. a) The restless are so strongly attracted to activity in some form or other that they cannot remain quiet. They want to act at all costs, even before they have formulated or matured a plan of action. Forever in quest of new projects, they lack the time to accomplish any one of them. They rush about here and there, and never really settle down anywhere. They make a good deal of noise and accomplish rather little. They are at the service of everybody, but soon forget the promises they have made. In order that they may benefit by their tremendous store of energy and their desire for activity, they must learn to reflect before acting, to allow their plans to ripen before putting them into execution, to seek competent counsel from those wiser and more experienced than themselves. Once the stage has been set, they must apply themselves to their task, and until this has been accomplished, to no other enterprise. Reflection and constancy are for them the essential conditions of success. b) Men of action meditate a long time on their projects before putting them into execution. They weigh carefully the reasons for and against; they think not only of the means to be used, but also of the obstacles to be encountered; they organize everything in the light of the end to be attained, no matter what may be the difficulties. Such a disposition is a priceless asset to social workers and to priests, and should be cultivated by them. But in order that their well-planned undertakings be productive of good results, they must make sure, through prayer and the practice of the interior life, that they have God on their side. To be Christian men of action, they must become men of prayer. God and man, grace and human endeavor, will thus unite harmoniously in them unto the accomplishment of excellent results: “For we are God’s coadjutors.”1 In concluding, let us bear in mind that in reality most characters are the product of the combination of many different types, and that it is by striving to acquire those qualities which one has not received as a heritage that one succeeds in overcoming natural defects, in acquiring proper balance and in producing the best results. The cold-blooded, for instance, should force themselves to acquire a little more of feeling; the intellectual should cultivate will-power and action; the wilful should reflect before acting, and employ gentleness in the exercise of their power. Through effort and the grace of God we can do much to perfect our temperament and develop a well-balanced character. This will become clear from the study of the Spiritual Ways. [[at-sl-fn-34|Fn: Appendices]] --- ![[maps/bibliography#^biblio-tan]] > [[at-sl-33|← B3 Ch. IV]] | [[at-spiritual-life-toc|TOC]] | [[at-sl-35-index|Index →]]