towards taking away the roots and remainders of former sins, in order never more to return to them — such are, chastising the flesh to subject it to the spirit, mortification of unbridled appetites, reducing them to the rule of reason, abnegation of our own will, to make it conformable to the will of God, detestation of ourselves and of all things that nourish self-love, that God our Lord and His holy love may find an entrance into our heart.
4. These are the paths in which we are to walk in the purgative way, to make a very perfect conversion. For supposing that, according to the counsel of the Wise man, [1] in all our works we are to be very diligent and fervent, yet in none more than in the work of our justification, and in the means ordained to that, fulfilling at the least that which St. Paul gave us in charge when he said, " As you have yielded your members to serve uncleanness and iniquity unto iniquity, so now yield your members to serve justice unto sanctification." [2] And as St Augustine says, " Quales impetus habebas ad mundum, tales habeas ad artificem mundi," [3] " Carry as great vehemency of love to the framer of the world as thou didst carry to the world itself," serving the Creator with that fervent affection wherewith thou wert wont to serve the creature, bearing as entirely the image of the heavenly Adam as thou bearest that of the earthly Adam. [4] And because the holy Apostle (as St. Gregory remarks) [5] spoke this as condescending to our weakness, it is reason that such as are fervent labour to be much more diligent in good than before they were in evil, complying with the counsel of the prophet Baruch, [6] when he says that we should convert ourselves " ten times" more to God than we separated ourselves from him. So did the glorious Mag-
