vi. The sixth and last degree of chastity is purity in all the thoughts of the heart, and in the motions and pruriency of the flesh — keeping it low and subjected to reason, not only in waking, but as much as in us lies even in our sleeping— endeavouring to give no occasion that the devil should therein delude us with filthy representations or perturbations. [1]
And these are the six pure white leaves of this celestial " lily," which, although it grows among the " thorns" [2] of many temptations and tribulations which the continent man suffers before he comes to be perfectly chaste, yet, if I trust in God's omnipotence and mercy, I may obtain it, [3] in which I shall be furthered by a profound consideration of the six favours and rewards of which we shall now discourse.
2. The favours and rewards of 'perfect chastity. — i. The first favour that God our Lord will do me, if with a generous mind I resolve to fight against the rebellions of the flesh and to embrace perfect chastity, is to send angels to assist and aid me in this war, that I may overcome and get the victory. For the purer a man is, says St Ambrose, [4] the more he is guarded and encompassed with angels, who delight to converse with virgins and chaste men, on account of the likeness that is between them. And as when the three chaste young men were in the fiery furnace of Babylon, "the angel went down" among them who divided the flame, and with a dewy wind assuaged "the furnace," [5] so to those who are in the midst of the furnace of sensual temptations, with a purpose to give no consent to them, do angels favourably repair, so that these flames may not burn them nor touch them in the superior
