On Tepidity (Points I–III)

They are tepid who have a horror only of mortal sin, and think very little of venial sin; who perform the spiritual exercises negligently, out of mere custom or human respect, with an interior disgust; who pray without attention, confess without amendment, communicate without devotion and fruit; who perform their daily actions without a proper intention, without method or order; who, being intent on exterior things, seldom enter into themselves, and give their thoughts still less to God; who, content with mediocrity, neglect the pursuit of a higher virtue; who avoid those who aim at perfection, and eagerly seek the company of those who lead a life of greater laxity; who form a conscience of their own, by false principles, on the strength of which they endeavor to dull the edge of remorse; who, while frequenting the holy Sacraments, cherish interior aversions, envy, jealousy, pride, familiarities, and a spirit of murmuring and bitterness; whose tongue is virulent and contentious; who foster a hidden self-love, which, secretly pervading all their actions, infects and taints them with its venom; who, weary of self-denial and labor, seek only ease and comfort. These are the indubitable signs of tepid souls, and if they be found in you doubt not of your being tepid.

Lift then the curtain and look a little into your conscience. Perhaps with Ezechiel, who was commanded to look into the temple through that mystical aperture, you also shall see with astonishment "the wicked abominations which they commit all round about." (Ezech. viii. 9.)

For what else are the wicked habits, the unconquered impulses, the loose manners, the innumerable defects, with which, like a foul carcass, swarming with worms, your heart is infected? What more shall I say? Your unbridled affections made of you that field of the slothful man, whose ground is all covered with the thorns of countless stains and blemishes. (Prov. xxiv. 30.)

You are the fig-tree by the wayside, on which our Lord found nothing but the leaves of pretended virtue and hypocrisy. (St. Matt. xxi. 19.)

You are the earth, which drinketh in the rain that cometh upon it, viz., the showers of graces; and bringeth forth thorns and briers of vice, and is thus very near to a curse. (Hebr. vi. 8.) Conceive, therefore, a horror of the miserable state of your soul; be filled with fear and confusion.

POINT II. THE DANGERS WHICH INVARIABLY ACCOMPANY TEPIDITY.

The first danger is that of falling into mortal sin. The tepid live in a state of continual imperfection, commit venial sins without remorse, and but seldom consider the malice of sin, and the motives which should prompt them to refrain from the commission thereof. The horror of mortal sin gradually diminishes, so that conscience becomes, as it were, familiar with it; and so they play securely, as they imagine, even with impure temptations; rashly waver between approval and dissent; doubt very little of the pleasure they have taken therein; allow dangerous freedom to the senses, and form in their minds various principles, or rather subterfuges, with which to make excuses for their sins; until at last, under strong temptations, they are plunged headlong into some crime. Oh! if Hell were opened, how many voices should we not hear of the suffering inmates confirming this truth, and cursing their tepidity with unutterable anguish!

"He that contemneth small things shall fall by little and little" (Eccle. xix. 1), is the oracle of the Holy Ghost. Unless therefore, O tepid religious, you expel from your mind this languor, you are in the greatest danger of falling into mortal sin and perhaps into Hell; and if this consideration do not rouse you from your tepidity you are already on the point of sleeping quietly and perchance of dying in mortal sin.

The second danger is, that a tepid soul is on the point of being cast away, with disgust, by Almighty God. This is proved by Holy Writ: "Because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will begin to vomit thee out of my mouth." (Apoc. iii. 16.) Behold, O miserable slave of tepidity! God begins to vomit you out of His mouth. God, the same God who earnestly seeks after sinners, and receives them with tenderness, is quite estranged from you, disgusted with your sickening lukewarmness, and is on the point of vomiting you forth with horror. O unhappy mortal, you have become abominable to the Divine Heart, and you fear not, you tremble not! You read these things without feeling, without emotion. You believe what you read, yet you shake not off your coldness! Alas! you go through these very considerations tepidly. O slothful religious! What shall ever awaken you from your torpor, if these thundering words rouse you not? God wishes men to be even cold rather than tepid, and seems to prefer the state of coldness to that of tepidity. He says, "I would that thou wert cold or hot." (Apoc. iii. 15.)

We know this and yet we are tepid. O indifference! O lukewarmness, deserving of avenging flames!

The third danger is the risk of not dying a pious death.

Death is the echo of life. It would, therefore, be wonderful if they were to die in a state of fervor who have lived in a state of tepidity. It is deplorable to see how carelessly, and with what want of devotion, these persons receive the last sacraments; if, indeed, they be not deprived of them altogether, and die suddenly in punishment of their tepidity. The last Confession is made inconsiderately, holy Viaticum is received without fervor. They are unconcerned and negligently unconscious while Extreme Unction is administered to them; the pains of sickness are borne impatiently, as if the sufferings of Christ had never been heard of by these unfortunate religious. For want of previous exercise in devotion they heed not the priest who suggests pious affections; they drop into their agony in a state of stupidity as to heavenly things. At last, by a chilling death they leave those who stand around in the greatest anxiety. They appear before the terrible tribunal and are plunged if not directly into Hell, at least for an untold number of years into the flames of Purgatory. "O Lord, pierce Thou my flesh with Thy fear" (Psalm cxviii. 120), that, terrified by these dangers, I may shake off my tepidity and serve Thee henceforward more fervently.

POINT III.

It is very hard to cure tepidity.

In order that one may apply a remedy it is necessary that he should first know the evil and its malignity. Now the tepid do not believe that they are tepid, at least they do not perceive the dangers of the malady, for blindness of mind is the inseparable companion of tepidity. The knowledge of the unhealthy state of their souls would already suppose some fervor. Moreover, they who, in the performance of their daily exercises of piety, occasionally, though very imperfectly, do some good, are deluded by a false appearance of virtue, and do not see their miseries, nor provide a remedy for them, and this it is which renders the cure so very difficult.

The tepid religious may be compared to that class of sick persons to whom, on account of the disordered state of the stomach, medicines themselves become a poison. For meditations, examens of conscience, confessions, communions, masses and spiritual exercises are gone through by them without any fruit, because they are performed slothfully and without attention, and thus the only means most efficacious to expel tepidity and acquire fervor are, by them, turned to the detriment of their souls. For this reason St. Bernard in the 96th letter to the Abbot Fon-tanus says, very truly: "More readily will you find many worldlings abandoning their evil ways, and returning to God, than one tepid religious correcting his faults and becoming fervent." The greatest sinners are often awakened from their death-slumber by merely looking upon the Crucifix, by reflecting upon the Last Judgment or the eternity of Hell; while, on the contrary, a slothful religious, who is accustomed to meditate carelessly and without proper attention upon these eternal truths, is as little touched by them as those who daily assist the dying are by the sight of death.

Finally, the only remedy for this evil would be some extraordinary grace, by the overwhelming influence of which this inveterate torpor would be shaken off. But languid religious whose minds are engrossed with exterior things, owing to the tumult of their passions, far from taking advantage of the ordinary graces, turn a deaf ear to them, and render themselves unworthy of such extraordinary graces.

No wonder, then, that God gives up at last rousing them, and allows them to sleep on, in avenging darkness.

It too often happens that they perform even good works with a bad intention, and sin continually. Although, now and then, some heavenly ray illumines the blindness of their minds and melts their frozen hearts, still these momentary fits of fervor soon vanish, and the state of torpor is resumed, and hardly ever shaken off but with life. Who shall now deny that it is very difficult to cure this malady? O the dismal and destructive effect of this languor! which is the more to be feared as it is common. And this makes the state of tepidity so deplorable.

Shake off, therefore, O my soul, thy tepidity! redeem lost time. Renew thyself, and "be mindful whence thou art fallen. Do penance now" and begin to reform, or else fear that God in His anger will "come to thee and will remove thy candlestick out of its place." (Apoc. ii. 5.)

The remedies to banish this languor, are:

1st. A fervent meditation to be performed every morning.

2d. Pious and attentive spiritual reading every day.

3d. A daily examination of conscience joined with the particular examen.

4th. A short recollection, for at least half an hour every month.