Of Human Respect

Where shall we find words sufficiently strong to express how great an obstacle human respect is to the acquisition of solid virtue? The property of this monstrous vice, the offspring of hell, is to ruin virtuous actions in their source. Like another Bel, whom a superstitious people were unable to satiate with provisions, never does it weary of devouring souls. Human respect, claiming for its odious maxim, ‘What will men say of it?’ the rank of a divinity, imposes its worship on mortals who are blind enough to sacrifice to it. Behold, then, the abominable idol which Satan presents to us, and which we consent to adore. Following the example of Daniel and with equal generosity, let us tear away the mask from this vain phantom, and publicly expose the folly, tyranny, and impiety of its worship. Let us adopt the means of annihilating it in ourselves, and, above all, spurn the fear of p. 74this impotent god with whom they menace us. Like Bel, ‘it is but clay within and brass without.’¹1Dan. xiv. 6.

Article I

Of the folly of human respect

1. It causes us to prefer dross to gold

Human respect, which is a very serious obstacle to solid virtue, is an inordinate desire of pleasing creatures, and a cowardly fear of displeasing them, to the prejudice of our duties. Most frequently it is to escape their censure and secure their favour that we consent to evil and neglect good. And yet can we picture to ourselves anything more absurd than to be afraid of appearing virtuous lest we displease the wicked at the risk of grieving the good; than to blush now at a good action which merits a degree of glory for us in eternity; and, on the contrary, to pride ourselves on one which, on a future day, must cover us with everlasting infamy? than to fear the railleries of the world, whose inconsistency is so well known to us, more than the judgments of God, whose equity we adore? than to sacrifice a diamond for a worthless bauble, an endless happiness for the fleeting favour of men? than to offend God ‘who hath poised with three fingers the bulk of the earth,’²2Isaias xl. 6. for the sake of humouring man whose life is but ‘a vapour which quickly vanisheth?’³3James iv. 15. than to relinquish the care of our salvation because countless fools think fit to destroy themselves? Once more, what an infatuation!

Answer candidly, you who are the ambitious slave of a vain popularity: would you presume to despise a rich, powerful, and munificent friend, in order to win the p. 75favour of a man devoid of influence, a miserable beggar covered with rags and ulcers? would you offend a king to ingratiate yourself with his servant? Fools that we are! We forget that there is an infinitely greater disparity between God and us than between a powerful monarch and the vilest of his subjects, and yet we have the hardihood to offer an insult to this adorable Being, which we would not presume to offer to a fellow-creature! We outrage God, from whom we have received all, on whom alone we depend; God, who at the very moment that we offend Him, could annihilate us, as we destroy the insect which crawls beneath our feet: we prefer to please a man, a worm of the earth, who is of himself but impotence, poverty, and misery, and thus deliberately expose ourselves to the irreparable loss of an inestimable treasure.

2. Of two evils, it causes us to choose the greater

Were a rich merchant sure of losing a considerable profit in his trade by neglecting this good action which you omit through fear of displeasing a friend, do you imagine he would sacrifice his interests for so frivolous a motive? You believe that the least degree of grace is infinitely preferable to all that is most precious here below; you are aware that it is of incomparably more value for eternity than all the treasures of earth; that all the torments that can be endured here do not equal the pains you shall have to undergo for having neglected to labour for your spiritual advancement; and yet, through deference to a man who is but ‘dust and nothingness,’⁴4Isaias xl. 17. you cease to strive after perfection, and expose yourself to the punishment that must follow p. 76your cowardice. Great God! If we feared the sting of an insect more than the destruction of our house, the loss of a limb more than the horrors of famine, people would regard us as insane, but, madmen that we are! of what folly are we not guilty when, to escape a raillery, a word of censure, the passing humiliation of a sneer, we wound our soul by sin?—we despise grace, and accumulate coals of fire on our head. Lord, ‘I beseech Thee, take away the iniquity of Thy servant, for I have done foolishly’⁵51 Paralip. xxi. 8. when I preferred the favour of man to Thy grace.

Article II

Of the tyranny of human respect

1. It keeps us in a degrading servitude

The shame which prevents us from doing good is not only a great weakness, it is also an unworthy subjection to an unjust tyranny; for, can we imagine anything more intolerable, more degrading to a free man, than forcibly to submit his will to the exactions of another?—than for a being endowed with reason to be seduced into the path of error?—than for a child of God, bound to follow the holy inspirations of virtue, meanly to model himself on the vices of the wicked? What more repugnant to a noble or generous nature than to change his conduct at the whim of his censors, who will condemn to-morrow what they exact to-day?—than to submit to the caprices of men whose will, like the weather-cock, changes every hour?—than to abandon to them the success of the affair which is of all others the most important, the salvation of our immortal soul, despite the lights of faith, our remorse of conscience, and the menaces of the sovereign Judge?—than to consent to all their desires when there is question of the honour and glory of God, whilst we easily shake off their tyrannical yoke the moment there is danger of forfeiting the patronage and favour of some great man whose opulence and power command our respect and fear. Yes, it is the acme of degradation that man, the most perfect of created beings, the child of God, the heir of heaven, should become the slave, not of a mighty monarch, but of a man who is but his equal; that he should leave to him the disposal not of his fortune but of his soul; that, by a senseless abdication, he should resign to him his reason and his liberty, the most precious prerogatives of his condition; that he should sacrifice to the despicable malice of a pitiful buffoon the esteem which he formerly enjoyed and which his virtue had won for him; so that, ‘sold henceforward under sin, he no longer does the good that he wills but the evil which he hates.’⁶6Rom. vii. 14, 15.

2. It deprives us of innumerable heavenly gifts

History has handed down the names of tyrants so bereft of humanity as to compel innocent persons to renounce their property, to immolate their children, and to cast themselves into fiery furnaces with exterior demonstrations of joy. The fate of those unfortunate victims elicits our compassion. And yet, wretched that we are, the thought, ‘What will men say to it?’ at whose shrine we sacrifice, exercises no less cruelty upon us; with equal barbarity does it force us to renounce innumerable degrees of grace and glory; ‘to dash our p. 77own children,’ that is, our good desires and holy resolutions, ‘against the rock of scandal,’⁷7Ps. cxxxvi. 9. and finally precipitate ourselves with an insane joy into the flames of purgatory.

Sometimes, it is true, groaning under the weight of our chains, we cry out with St. Paul: ‘Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’⁸8Rom. vii. 24. who will sever the bonds of human respect which hold me captive? Enlightened by the rays of grace, we often perceive the means we should adopt ‘to deliver ourselves from the servitude of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God;’⁹9Rom. viii. 21. nevertheless, fascinated by some ill-starred spell, we remain captives beneath its oppressive thraldom. How deserving of pity are we, therefore, since human respect, like an inexorable despot, deprives us not only of our reason and our liberty, but even of the desire to break our fetters. Oh, ‘who shall pluck my feet out of the snare’¹⁰10Ps. xxiv. 15. spread before my path? who will rescue me from this galling servitude? Grant, O my God, that henceforth I may deem it ‘a very small thing to be judged by any man whatsoever.’¹¹111 Cor. iv. 2.

Article III

Of the impiousness of human respect

1. It is a sacrilegious contempt of God

Human respect renders us guilty of a monstrous impiety. Disengaging our hearts from all earthly things, let us raise our thoughts to heaven, and we shall be able duly to appreciate the baseness of regulating our conduct by the culpable desire of pleasing the world. This p. 78action which you now perform to satisfy men, through a cowardly obsequiousness to their judgment, is an iniquity which the infinite sanctity of God rejects, which His adorable justice condemns, and His infallible wisdom spurns. Such is the irrevocable decree of the three persons of the Blessed Trinity, a decree subscribed by the Blood of Jesus Christ, and whose equity the whole court of heaven adores. And yet, notwithstanding all this, a wretched, insignificant man, sprung from the slime of the earth, whose mind is the prey of error, and whose will is depraved, presumes to raise his head above the filth of his sins in order to oppose his haughty reason to the judgment of God, to vaunt, counsel, and commend the same deed as an act of virtue.

Christian soul, make your choice. Behold yourself a spectacle to angels and to men, who anxiously await your final decision. Your Angel Guardian exhorts you to follow the inspirations of grace; the saints conjure you to do so; the divine Mercy solicits your co-operation by its promises, and the divine Justice incites you to it by its threats. Meantime a man, your equal, one whom you have no reason to fear, and with whom you are perhaps on terms of familiarity, opposes your compliance with the suggestions of the Holy Spirit, and you would allow the fear of his sarcasms and railleries to cause you to infringe upon an express command of God!

Once more, for whom will you decide? Whom will you obey? What! you hesitate? . . . Will you then despise the Holy Trinity, whose adorable will you trample under foot; will you give the preference to a miserable worm?—for, what is man compared with God? ‘Yes,’ you say, ‘I will obey man.’ What a fatal delusion! Only think of it. The opinion of your perfidious friend is false and variable, and he will speedily censure the very action to which he now impels you. You yourself shall regard it as folly at the hour of death. At the last judgment the whole universe, your seducer included, shall condemn and reprove your conduct. ‘No matter about all this, I wish to gratify my friend.’ Such is your reply. Impious man! What! you will prefer the insensate caprice of a mere nothing to the most holy will of the Sovereign Master? . . . ‘Yes, I am determined to do so.’ But reflect that in doing this action to please the wicked, you attract the reproaches of the good, whose censure is more to be apprehended than the praise of sinners is to be coveted. ‘It is of little consequence,’ do you answer, ‘that I offend God, provided I do not displease this man; that I outrage Jesus Christ, draw upon me the indignation of Heaven, incur the odium of the good, provided my friends are satisfied, provided I escape the ridicule and win the favour of the wicked.’ Such is the language, not of your lips, but of your deeds. Oh, heavens! which is the more deserving of astonishment, the unheard-of insolence of the creature, or the ineffable longanimity of the Creator?

My God! to believe that you can do us more good or more detriment than all creatures, to glory publicly in adoring you as our earliest benefactor, in loving you as our Father, in hoping in you as the source of all blessings, in tending towards you as our last end, and yet at this same moment to insult, wound, and irritate you by our disobedience; to prefer to you a man who is but ‘rottenness and a worm,’¹²12Job xxv. 6. and very frequently to be guilty of this conduct through no other motive than a base human respect, through a mere malice uninfluenced p. 79by any fear or hope, without any other object than to avoid disobliging one of our fellow-creatures, a man, a worm of the earth, to whom we are under no obligations; without deriving thence any benefit for ourselves, or for our neighbour. And we observe this conduct, the baseness and injustice of which is obvious to us, at the very moment that, without any merit on our part, we are the objects of God’s special predilection, loading us, as He does, with such signal marks of His love in preference to so many others!

That the worshippers of false gods should bend the knee before the sacrilegious idol of human respect is conceivable; but that the disciples of the Gospel should dread the derision of the impious more than the martyrs have feared the rage of tyrants; that Christians, who are obliged, in defence of the faith, resolutely to brave the sword and the scaffold; that religious who, in the fervour of the cloister, burn with an ardent desire to suffer torments and death for Jesus Christ, should basely tremble at the mere word: ‘What will men say of it?’ that they should blush at virtue in presence of their peers, through a chimerical fear of incurring their contempt; that they are not ashamed to purchase human friendship at the price of the friendship of God, well does this crime deserve that the Lord should retaliate by the infliction of the tremendous chastisement with which He threatens us in His Gospel: ‘He that shall deny me before men, shall be denied before the Angels of God; and he that shall be ashamed of me, of him the Son of man shall be ashamed, when He shall come in His majesty.’¹³13Luke xii. 9. Now we in some manner deny and are ashamed of this Saviour-God every time that we un p. 80gratefully commit evil or omit good; for to dissemble our religious sentiments through fear of the derision of libertines, to conceal the horror with which vice inspires us, lest we should seem the friends of virtue, is not this to blush at the Gospel, though in our hearts we believe in Jesus Christ? Is it not to reject in practice His doctrine which we accept in theory? Is it not, in fine, to be Christians in word, but apostates in deed?

2. It is a species of idolatry

There is no crime which bears a closer affinity to the exterior worship of idols than human respect. The nations ‘have worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator,’¹⁴14Rom. i. 25. and it is in this subversion of order that the Apostle makes all the malice of idolatry to consist. But are those less culpable who, sooner than displease their friends, offend the infinite majesty of God? Do they not prefer the slime of the earth to heaven, and serve the creature rather than the Creator?¹⁵15Ibid. It matters little that this preference be but exterior, and that interiorly they render to God that honour which is His due. The apostates who burned incense before Jupiter, frequently continued to adore Jesus Christ in their hearts; and yet they were not exonerated from the greatest of crimes, because, whilst believing as Christians, they behaved as pagans. He who commits sin through human respect incurs the same reproach. By his conduct he publicly attests (without interiorly believing it, which would be a fearful blasphemy), that the friend whose gratification he seeks is more estimable than God; that he must be pleased even at the expense of displeasing God; that the pleasure of sinning to gratify his friend amply indemnifies him for the punishments and eternal loss he shall sustain. Human respect, as well as avarice, to which it bears so close a relation, may be termed a real ‘service of idols.’¹⁶16Coloss. iii. 5. Can we then conceive any malady more pernicious to our souls, or whose symptoms are more alarming?

3. It is the cause of the destruction of the human race and of the death of Jesus Christ

We have just demonstrated that human respect is a sacrilegious contempt of God and a species of idolatry, but we have not yet reached the limits of its malice. The history of the human race recalls two terrible events prepared and consummated by this fearful vice: the great catastrophe which marked the primordial days of man in the garden of delights and the bloody immolation of Calvary. What a spectacle! The first scene presents to us Adam and Eve exiled from the terrestrial Paradise, driven thence without the vestige of a hope of return, and ‘Cherubim armed with a flaming sword placed at the gate of Eden to guard its entrance.’¹⁷17Gen. iii. 24.

Let us here reflect on the fatal consequences of this proscription; the abysses of hell opened, the gates of heaven closed, the earth deluged with evils: with countless calamities which oppress men, let us inquire what enemy has thus instantaneously compassed the ruin of our happiness, robbed us of our right to the heavenly inheritance, and rendered us the slaves of hell.

It is the human respect which induced Adam to eat the forbidden fruit through the fear of displeasing his companion that has let loose all these evils upon us. Human respect is the cruel robber which has attacked p. 81the human race, figured by the traveller to Jericho, has despoiled it of divine grace, its immortality, its justice, and the empire over its passions, has ‘covered it with wounds and left it half dead,’ and which, in exchange for so many pilfered blessings, has poured forth as a torrent on the world death, sin, the rebellion of the senses and of concupiscence. But these misfortunes, awful as they are, sink into insignificance in presence of the tragic event of Calvary. Let us contemplate the only Son of the Eternal Father, fastened with three nails to an infamous gibbet, placed between two thieves, abandoned by all, basely calumniated, bruised all over His body, and expiring with a loud cry amidst excruciating tortures. Oh, heavens! what ferocious wild beast has thus devoured the Innocent? What tyrant has laid his inhuman hands upon Him?

The Angels of peace reply, ‘weeping bitterly:’ ‘Man is the enemy who hath done this,’¹⁸18Matt. xiii. 28. human respect is the ‘wild beast,’¹⁹19Gen. xxxvii. 33. which in the person of Pilate committed this deicide. The desire of conciliating the favour of the Jews, the fear of displeasing Cæsar, are the merciless ministers which delivered up this innocent Victim to the infuriated populace; they are the executioners who scourged the Saviour, preferred Barabbas to Him, and nailed Him to the cross. Oh, fearful, unheard-of, inconceivable crime! at the sight of which the sun is darkened, the rocks split, and the earth trembles and totters on its foundations. No, never was the utter malice and tyranny of human respect so palpably manifested.

Pilate himself acknowledges the innocence of this man whom the priests have brought before his tribunal; he knows that it is ‘for envy they have delivered Him;’²⁰20Matt. xxvii. 18. p. 82he declares publicly that ‘he finds no cause of death in Him.’²¹21Luke xxiii. 22. He even ‘seeks to release Him;’²²22John xix. 12. ‘but the Jews cry out: If thou release this man thou art not Cæsar’s friend.’²³23Ibid. At this cry Pilate loses his self-control, he ceases to obey the dictates of justice. ‘He brings Jesus forth, and sits down in the judgment-seat,’²⁴24John xix. 13. ‘and being willing to satisfy the people,’²⁵25Mark xv. 15. he releases to them Barabbas ‘and delivers up Jesus Christ to be crucified.’²⁶26Luke xxiii. 25.

Thus, the moment that human respect has been placed in the scale, the moment its impious voice and the decree of a maddened people have imposed it on Pilate, that moment the love of justice, the fear of the future, the lights and the remorse of his own conscience vanish. He is deaf to the warnings of his wife, and steels himself against the apprehensions she has conceived of the future chastisements to be inflicted by the Messiah: so potent and ruthless a tyrant is human respect!

Come now, therefore, pusillanimous souls, who yield to the fear of a vain ridicule; ascend the summit of Calvary, approach the foot of the Cross, and measure by the height of that infamous gibbet the malignity of this pernicious vice. Alas! you abhor it in Pilate, yet nurture it in your heart: you sacrifice your soul to the same idol to which this iniquitous judge immolated the Son of God, but with this tremendous difference, that you commit the crime, notwithstanding your faith and your conviction of its enormity. What audacity!

We cannot be astonished, therefore, when one day the Sovereign Judge, laying aside the meekness of the lamb to assume the fury of the lion, and confiding His vengeance to the care of devouring flames, shall thus insultingly address the slaves of human respect: ‘Where are p. 83now your gods in whom you trusted,’²⁷27Deut. xxxii. 37. whose favour you have preferred to my grace? ‘Let them arise and help you,’ let them rescue you from the hands of my omnipotence, which you have so frequently provoked rather than incur their displeasure. Can we be astonished, I say, if those who during life set more value on the esteem of men ‘than on the approbation of God’ shall not participate after death in the suffrages of the Church, of which they have rendered themselves unworthy? Let us thence conclude how pernicious to man is this vice and how odious to God.

‘Lord, Thou hast power of life and death and leadest down to the gates of death and bringest back again,’²⁸28Wisd. xvi. 13. before whom ‘the whole world is as the least grain of sand in the balance.’²⁹29Wisd. xi. 23. Alas! what have I done when, through fear of ridicule, or a desire of praise, I omitted good or committed evil; when, rather than grieve a friend, ‘who is but a drop of the morning dew,’ ‘I have offended Thee who couldst destroy both body and soul in hell.’³⁰30Matt. x. 28. But I resolve with all the strength of my reason, with all the power of my will, to overthrow and tread under foot the sacrilegious idol ‘What will men say of it?’ which human respect has enthroned in my heart. ‘May my right hand forget its cunning and my tongue cleave to my palate,’ rather than that I should do or say aught savouring of its worship. Henceforth my only ambition shall be to please Thee, O Lord, my only fear that of offending Thee.

Article IV

Of the remedies for human respect

Human respect consists, as we have already stated, in an over-solicitude to please and an abject fear of dis pleasing men. This vice is therefore the offspring of our pride, which inspires us to dread the contempt and to ambition the esteem of our fellow-creatures. It is a twofold weakness to which we may trace the greater number of our faults, and to which we must apply a twofold remedy: contempt for the judgments of men, and fear of those of the Almighty. Provided with this double armour we shall easily vanquish the vain phantom: ‘What will men say of it?’

1. Contempt for the judgments of men

We need but examine closely the absurdity of human opinions to imbibe a thorough conviction of their worthlessness and to appreciate them at their value. Let us but reflect who are ‘those gods of the hills,’³¹313 Kings xx. 28. those ‘sons of Titan, those tall giants,’³²32Judith xvi. 8. whose whims form the rule of our conduct. They are men like ourselves, sometimes our equals and often our inferiors; the dupes of ignorance and error, fickle in their affections, contemptible for their vices and dangerous for their bad example. Let us make a resumé.

Those men whom you fear, and for love of whom you violate the divine law, wound your soul, and exasperate your God, are mortals like yourself, formed of the same slime, subject to the same miseries, and destined like you to be the food of worms. They are your neighbours, your companions, your intimate friends; you possibly possess an indisputable superiority over them in point of wisdom, virtue, and knowledge.

What! you dread their caprices, you worship their will, you writhe beneath their words as a slave under the lash of his master, you respect their opinions, you p. 84fear their judgments! And all this, though you are aware that they regard you with pity as a man of little worth, are perfectly indifferent about your ideas of them, that they despise and disdain all that you say. To what a humiliating subjection have you debased your soul! They do not concern themselves the least as to whether their conduct please or displease you; but since they treat you with so little deference, why are you so obsequiously submissive to them?—why offend God to please them?—and why cease to be good for their sake, since they do not cease to be wicked for yours? Their rights over you do not exceed yours over them. Why, then, comply with their whims? Since you believe their capabilities inferior to yours, and in every other matter confide less in them than in yourself, why relinquish to them the regulation of your conduct?—why sacrifice your judgment to them in the most important of all affairs? Since you can without presumption esteem yourself better than they, why not believe yourself more prudent? Courage, then, a noble pride is permitted you; cast off the shameful yoke of human respect; repay the unjust contempt of your scoffers by a similar contempt; laugh in turn at those who laugh at you. Assuredly you are as good as they, and your position is not inferior to theirs.

2. You can disdain their opinion all the more freely in that not only they are not more enlightened than you, but also because falsehood and error sway their judgment. Thus it is the most virtuous that form the special object of their malevolent derision; whilst libertines and those who have cast off the restraint of duty and religion elicit their admiration and applause. Shunning the society of the fervent, they court that of the tepid; they condemn virtue and favour vice, censure what is good and commend what is evil. ‘They call evil good, and good evil! they put darkness for light, and light for darkness; they put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.’³³33Isaias v. 20. ‘Their wisdom is but foolishness with God.’³⁴341 Cor. iii. 19. Their sentiments are in opposition to those of Jesus Christ. Will you select such men as the directors of your conduct?

How you are to be pitied! What! you are not always able to preserve yourself from certain doubts against the truths of faith, and you have the folly to receive their sophisms, maxims and false decrees as so many oracles and an irrefragable rule of morality. Who has thus fascinated you for the purpose of grossly deceiving you? Do we see the learned abandon science because the ignorant despise it? Does a man consent to starve himself to death because a fool pretends that the meat has been poisoned? Does a person throw away a piece of money because one who is inexperienced assures him it is tin?

And you neglect the science of the saints, the nutriment of your soul, the practice of virtue, because worthless men choose to ridicule them.

3. But this is not all. Those severe censors are most variable in their judgments. The same man whom they laud to the stars to-day they will overwhelm with insults, and, if possible, humble to the dust to-morrow; they will censure in him what they now approve, and their hero of the eve must almost infallibly expect to be their laughing-stock next day. It is not reason but the passion of the moment that influences their decisions; they accept or reject, praise or criticise, absolve or condemn, according to their own impressions and not according to justice. In a word, temper and the movements of their spleen, which seem to obey all the changes of the atmosphere, are the arbitrators of their opinions.

4. But those judges of your choice are subject to still greater vices than inconstancy, vices which render their lives contemptible in the eyes of men. You know it. You are aware of their evil propensities and predilection for sin, since you believe you cannot succeed in pleasing them except by renouncing the practice of virtue for that of vice.

According to your own avowal you regard them as vicious, as men with whom the maxims of piety rate very low. Nevertheless, you accept their will as an inviolable law, persuade yourself that you ought to model yourself on them, and that their life is a mirror whence virtue is reflected in all its purity.

What folly! These men, your equals, are subject to error, they are volatile and vicious; you acknowledge this, and yet, instead of despising their false opinions, you have the weakness to yield to them, accept them, and glory in them. This is a subversion of reason, a depravity of heart which deserves to be expiated in avenging flames.

You say you admit the inconsistency and unworthiness of your conduct; that you are irritated by this goading servitude; but that ‘what can’t be cured must be endured;’ that you are not the only victim of this disease; that you are compelled to yield to the exigencies of custom; that unless you conform your ideas to those of others you will become the butt of their taunts and railleries.

Blind that you are! But if, pursuing a different line of behaviour, you despise the vain opinions of those slaves of vice, virtuous men will applaud you, Jesus Christ will honour you with His love in presence of the Eternal Father and the whole Court of Heaven. He will acknowledge you as His, and will verify in your favour the promise: ‘whosoever shall confess Me before men, I also will confess him before My Father who is in heaven;’³⁵35Matt. x. 32. before Him with whom neither customs, nor the depravity of the world, nor the number of the delinquents, shall avail as an excuse. You cannot please God and the world, the virtuous and the vicious. Reflect now, and decide by which party you prefer to be rejected—by virtuous men, by Jesus Christ, or by your equals, by headless, unstable, vicious friends, who will one day reverse their own judgment and condemn you for having followed it.

He who wishes to please everyone attempts an impossibility, ‘he consumes himself in useless labours.’³⁶36Exod. xviii. 18. ‘It is impossible to please all men. Though St. Paul made himself all to all, nevertheless he was unable to avoid being frequently condemned or despised’³⁷37Imit. b. iii. ch. 36. by the world.

Amongst those whom you humour there shall always be some who will be dissatisfied, and whose approbation you will fail to obtain. They are a divided kingdom whose thoughts, sentiments, and affections differ in almost everything: whatever precautions you may take you will displease some by the deference you show to others; you will annoy this one by your anxiety to gratify that other. What do I say? He whose favour you gain to-day by disobliging others will be irritated p. 87against you to-morrow for the most trifling cause. By a just retribution you shall incur not only the disgrace of the virtuous, to whom you have preferred your impious and unprincipled friends, but you shall likewise be cast off by those very friends who are as irreligious as yourself, and for love of whom you have sacrificed your innocence and peace of mind.

Be yourself the judge. Is it not absolute folly to worry yourself, to become a martyr to the devil and a slave to the caprices of others; to sully your soul, to grieve the saints, to offend the Divine Majesty for the sake of escaping the injustice of those human opinions which no one, not excepting even Jesus Christ Himself, the Just by excellence, has been able to avoid. What do you think? Is it not an absurdity to expect to escape the criticisms of men? The nobler part to follow is, therefore, generously to contemn their worthless talk, to disdain their vain censures with a holy pride, since you must necessarily submit to them.

And besides, what good or evil can result to you from the opinions of others? What advantage does the sun derive from being an object of worship to the Indians, and what injury does the moon sustain from the infuriate rage of the benighted people who set their dogs baying it? Does gold lose its value because a blind man fails to distinguish it from lead? Does the price set on a piece of glass by an ignorant person invest it with the value of a precious stone? Should a valet be mistaken for a king, is he thereby entitled to the throne? If you are wicked you continue so, how much soever men may vaunt your sanctity. If your conscience bears faithful testimony to your being virtuous, you are so notwithstanding the efforts of envy to brand you with vices. ‘What thou art, thou art; nor canst thou be said to be greater than God sees thee to be. Thou art not more holy if thou art praised, nor anything the worse if thou art dispraised.’³⁸38Imit. b. ii. ch. 6. ‘Whether they put a good or bad construction on what thou dost, thou art still what thou art.’³⁹39Ibid. b. iii. ch. 28. ‘Fear not, then, the judgment of man,’⁴⁰40Ibid. ch. 36. but generously despise this absurd phantom: ‘What will men say? What will they think of me?’ Let them say and think what they please; for your part, let it be your sole desire, your one ambition, to be such as God wishes.

Shun this dangerous esteem of the judgments of men which has held such empire over you up to this, since it is the origin of the greater number of your afflictions. When you weary of your employment, are grieved at having some charge imposed on you, complain of an insult or want of kindness, you will find that the real secret of your vexation and anxiety is the effect it may produce on the minds of others concerning you. This thought: ‘What will people say?—what idea will they form of me?’ is the sole artisan of your crosses; aided by a warped and distorted imagination, it exaggerates them and renders them most irksome and unsupportable to you. Examine your heart, trace to their source the emotions which agitate your soul, and you will find that I am right, that I have laid my finger on the wound.

Would you enjoy perfect peace, the joy of a good conscience, break, bury in a disdainful oblivion the infamous idol: ‘What will men say of it?’ and beware, lest pride, restoring it to life, succeed in reinthroning it on the altar of your heart. You will speedily experience what strength contempt for the judgment of men imparts for the conquest of human respect.

2. Fear of the judgment of God

A second and still more effectual means than contempt of the judgments of men for conquering human respect is a solid and deep-rooted fear of the tremendous judgments which the Son of man shall exercise at the end of the world, when ‘He will come in the clouds of heaven in great power and majesty.’⁴¹41Matt. xxiv. 30.

1. The Apostle of the Gentiles, in the fervour of his zeal for his own sanctification and the instruction of others, could devise no more powerful antidote against human respect than the remembrance of this awful event. ‘But to me,’ says he, ‘it is a very small thing to be judged by you, or by man’s day; but He that judgeth me is the Lord.’⁴²421 Cor. iv. 3. No, it is not a man, our equal, subject to error, weak, inconstant, vicious, who is to judge us; it is the Lord, the ‘Lord Almighty,’⁴³43Judith xvi. 20. ‘who has none like unto Him among the gods,’⁴⁴44Ps. lxxxv. 8. ‘in whose hands is all wisdom,’⁴⁵45Wisd. vii. 16. ‘who is always the self-same,’⁴⁶46Ps. ci. 28. ‘glorious in holiness,’⁴⁷47Exod. xv. 11. ‘strong in power;’⁴⁸48Eccli. xv. 19. ‘whose wrath no man can resist,’⁴⁹49Job ix. 13. ‘who can destroy and deliver.’⁵⁰50James iv. 12. This omnipotent God will rise up against those who, for the sake of human friendship, have despised His grace. ‘He will cite them alive before His tribunal; He will condemn and chastise them; He shall pour out His indignation like fire’⁵¹51Jerem. Lam. ii. 4. upon them.

‘Then the heavens shall reveal the iniquity’ and the folly of human respect, ‘and the earth shall rise up against the impious’⁵²52Job xx. 27. worshippers of this disgraceful idol.

Enlightened by the lamp of eternity, those unhappy souls shall themselves behold the vanity of human p. 89opinions. Filled with confusion and trembling in every limb, they shall recognise the senseless injustice of their conduct when they chose to offend God rather than disoblige a worm of the earth; when they displeased Him to gratify a false friend.

2. At this moment the Sovereign Judge, ‘clad with zeal as with a cloak,⁵³53Isaias lix. 17. manifesting His majesty by the voice of His thunder,’⁵⁴54Job xxxvii. 4. shall mockingly ask those base slaves of the world: ‘Where are now your gods in whom you trusted? Let them arise and help you, and protect you in your distress.’⁵⁵55Deut. xxxii. 37. Behold, now, to ‘whom you have likened me and made me equal,’⁵⁶56Isaias xlvi. 5. and beneath whom you have debased me. It is time to confess that ‘I alone am, and there is no other God beside me. If I shall whet my sword as the lightning, and my hand take hold on judgment,’ who shall resist me? ‘I will render vengeance, I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour you, and there is none that can deliver you out of my hand.’⁵⁷57Deut. xxxii. 39. ‘It is thus that God shall thunder forth His justice.’⁵⁸58Job xxxvii. 5.

Ah, hapless soul! what shall be your dismay when the divine wrath breaks forth; ‘when the Almighty’ lets loose His vengeance ‘upon you as swelling waves,’ when, abandoned by those very friends for love of whom you have so often offended the Divine Majesty, you find yourself doomed to bear alone the whole brunt of His implacable anger; when, ‘like a lion in his den,’⁵⁹59Ps. ix. 30. He seizes and destroys you without your being capable of offering the least resistance. What shall be your sentiments concerning human respect when Jesus Christ, the Sun of Justice, withdraws His light from you for ever; when Mary, the Star of Peace, and the saints, the brilliant luminaries of the heavenly kingdom, refuse to shine upon you, and the rays of grace cease to enlighten you? What esteem will you wish to have set on the opinions of men during life? Above all, when you behold those, whose errors formed the rule of your conduct, ‘troubled with terrible fear in seeing and experiencing this revenge,’ cry out, ‘we have erred from the way of truth, and the way of the Lord we have not known.’ When you see those whose sarcasms decided your actions exclaiming, amid groans of anguish: Alas! ‘these are they whom we had some time in derision’ for their modesty and virtue. ‘Fools that we were, we esteemed their life madness and their end without honour; behold how they are numbered amongst the children of God, and their lot is among the saints.’⁶⁰60Wisd. v. 2, and fol. They shall ‘shine as the brightness of the firmament and as stars for all eternity.’⁶¹61Dan. xii. 3. Oh, how great was their wisdom in despising our ridicule and contempt. What an idea shall you then form of your old idol, ‘What will men say of it?’ What desolation, what fear shall take possession of your soul? What will you desire to have done?

3. But all those horrors are but the beginning of the consternation with which your soul shall be seized when the Divine Judge executes the awful threats pronounced by Him in the Gospel: ‘He that shall deny me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven.’⁶²62Matt. x. 33. ‘He that shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He shall come in His majesty, and that of His Father, and of the holy angels.’⁶³63Luke ix. 26. Now, we have already proved that the slaves of human respect in some manner deny Jesus Christ and are ashamed of Him; consequently the Saviour in His turn will disown them, on the dreadful day of retribution, in presence of the universe, of the angels and saints, and before His Eternal Father.

What shall then be our confusion and terror on seeing ourselves insultingly disowned by Him on whom alone our salvation depends? What our desolation when He who constitutes all our glory is ashamed of us? As we involuntarily turn away our eyes from those who are a subject of dishonour to us, and reluctantly tolerate their presence, so in like manner shall Jesus Christ avert from us the eyes of His mercy, and loathingly spurn us from His Sacred Heart. ‘Can we sustain the rigour of this coldness,’⁶⁴64Ps. cxlvii. 6. this crushing contempt? particularly when knocking at the door of the heavenly espousals, it remains closed against us despite our entreaties, and the Divine Bridegroom, who so well knows and loves those who belong to Him, answers: ‘I know you not,’⁶⁵65Matt. xxv. 12. ‘I know not this man.’⁶⁶66Ibid. xxvi. 72. Would we escape so dire a misfortune let us ‘fear God,’⁶⁷67Prov. iii. 7. let us dread His judgments, for this holy fear is the most salutary remedy for human respect.

Let us now descend into the depths of our soul, and carefully scrutinise the secret springs of our actions.

1. Have we not forgotten the maxim of the wise man: ‘He that feareth man shall quickly fall;’⁶⁸68Prov. xxix. 25. and the reproach of the Prophet: ‘They trembled for fear where there was no fear.’⁶⁹69Ps. lii. 6. Have we not often done wrong for the sake of pleasing others, or omitted to do good for fear of displeasing them? If such be the case, ‘know that for all these faults God will bring thee into judgment.’⁷⁰70Eccl. xi. 9. Let us correct ourselves while we have still time, and anticipate in our particular examen the various opportunities that will occur for combating human respect.

2. Do we firmly believe that ‘no man can serve two masters,’⁷¹71Matt. vi. 24. Jesus Christ and the world? that ‘whoever will be a friend of this world becometh an enemy of God?’⁷²72James iv. 4. that ‘if I pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ?’⁷³73Gal. i. 10. ‘God shall scatter the bones of them that please men?’⁷⁴74Ps. lii. 6. Emulating the example of ambitious courtiers, have we not sought to win human favour by studied attentions, fulsome flattery, servile adulation, and worldly manners? Worthless shall our vanity prove to us, for the prize we so eagerly covet ‘is as dust which is blown away with the wind, and as a thin froth which is dispersed by the storm, and a smoke that is scattered abroad by the wind.’⁷⁵75Wisd. v. 15. Like the dog in the fable, if the comparison be permitted me, we relinquish the reality to pursue the shadow; we sacrifice eternal for perishable goods. Let us rather be wise enough to forego the favour of men.

3. Are we practically persuaded of the truth of this maxim of Jesus Christ, ‘Fear ye not them that kill the body and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear Him that can destroy both soul and body into hell.’⁷⁶76Matt. x. 28. ‘I say to you, my friends: Fear Him only who after He hath killed hath power to cast into hell, yea, I say, fear Him.’⁷⁷77Luke xii. 4, 5. Have we resolutely resolved to incur the hatred of the whole world? to become a target for the railleries, derision, and contempt of our friends? to be shunned and excluded from their society rather than offend God, were it only by a venial sin? What! do we hesitate? Let us hearken to the words of Ecclesiasticus and Jeremiah: p. 92‘Be not ashamed of what I am about to say to you, and accept no person to sin thereby;’⁷⁸78Eccli. xlii. 1. ‘for cursed be he that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm,’⁷⁹79Jerem. xvii. 5. and who under this deceitful protection offends his Creator.

4. Does not the coldness, estrangement, and aversion of others pain and distress us? Does it not irritate and chafe our self-love? But why regret that which may preserve us from illusion and numberless annoyances? Why regret being excluded from society, the privation of which will one day constitute our joy? ‘Is not God better to thee than ten,’⁸⁰801 Kings i. 8. than a thousand friends or companions addicted to error, inconstancy, and vice? Rather let us rejoice ‘if the world hate us:’ it is a sign that Jesus Christ ‘has chosen us out of the world; for if we had been of the world, the world would love its own; but because we are not of the world, therefore the world hateth us.’⁸¹81John xv. 19. Rejoice also, for the world ‘hath hated Jesus Christ before you;’⁸²82John xv. 18. ‘and the disciple is not above the master.’⁸³83Matt. xix. 24. It is a glorious thing for us to be treated in the same manner as our God was treated. Finally, let us console ourselves by the reflection that the transient contempt of tepid and irreligious men is amply compensated for by the permanent esteem of the elect both of heaven and of earth. Moreover, those who now ridicule us will learn their mistake when death arrives, but particularly on the last day, when they shall be compelled to applaud our virtue and courage.

Instead of fearing the jeers of those who mock us, let us bear their taunts confidently, and calmly for a few days, and we shall have conquered. They themselves will at length eulogise us; and whilst they had but little esteem for us, when we imitated their example, they will approve and honour our conduct when we have ceased to imitate them.

But you will say it is not merely a question of escaping the ridicule of men, we have likewise reason to apprehend their resentment, ‘for they will try to injure us if we incur their displeasure. No,’ says St. Augustine, ‘men can only injure us as far as God permits. Besides, whether we please them or not, they always have the will to injure us; the misfortune of others forms the constant theme of their cogitations. This malevolence is the characteristic of their corrupt nature. What end do you gain therefore by the attentions you lavish on them, except that of offending Him, who to avenge Himself need but abandon you to their power? Whilst God is pleased with you, they are powerless to harm you; but should you irritate Him, their malice shall have unbridled sway.’

In obedience then, to the advice of the Apostle, let us resist the world, let it ‘be crucified to us;’⁸⁴84Gal. iv. 14. let us scorn its ridicule, contemn its judgments, and fear those of God alone. Let us strive ‘to live the rest of our time in the flesh, not after the desires of men, but according to the will of God.’⁸⁵851 Pet. iv. 2. If not, woe to us! for it ‘is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God;’⁸⁶86Heb. x. 31. for ‘there is none holy as the Lord is: and there is none strong like our God.’⁸⁷871 Kings ii. 2. It is He that ‘hath power of life and death; and leadeth down to the gates of death, and bringeth back again;’⁸⁸88Wisd. xvi. 13. and there ‘is none that can escape His hand,’⁸⁹89Tobias xiii. 2. and resist His vengeance. Human respect is infinitely odious to this omnipotent God; let us then cast it far from us, and fear His judgments alone.