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abundantly poured forth thy Blood ; behold, my lots are in thy hands; for thou upholdest me when falling, liftest me up when fallen, protectest me when standing. Into thy hands I commend myself. Protect me under the shadow of thy wings from the face of them that afflict me and persecute me. Oh, that, nailed with thee, O Christ, to the Cross, I may stand steadfast in the faith against all temptations; that neither life nor death, nor any creature, may separate me from thy love!

{{c|VII. But deliver us from evil.

O Jesus, refuge of the afflicted ! behold one wretched, that is walking in the midst of ills and snares ; what shall he do to escape them? Where shall he seek an asylum, that he may securely hide himself? where, but in the bosom of thy most sweet Heart, to which a way has been exposed for us through thy Side opened with the lance! Thither will I fearlessly enter, and there dwell safely, like a dove in the clifts of the rock, in the hollow of the wall.[1] There is my strength hid. It will be good for me to be there, and there to fix my tent, where no scourge nor any ill can approach me. For thence flowed the Blood and the Water, to be the washing away of sins, the strength of the fragile, the cure for wretchedness, and the stay against all danger to salvation. O good Jesus, deliver me from all evil! since thou so lovingly openest to me the bosom of love, thy most sweet Heart, that is Thyself, the Fountain of all good. Amen, amen.

Third Method

OF BECITING THE LORD’S PRAYER,

Adapted to the Seven Words of Christ on the Cross.

I. Our Father who art... Hallowed be thy name.

O Lord Jesus! Holy of holies ! of one glory and majesty with thy Father in heaven ; throughout thy whole life, whilst thou wert seen on earth, and conversedst with men, and no less in death, it was thy only care always and everywhere to seek and proclaim thy Father’s glory. Thou wert heard indeed in the last agonies of death to cry, as though forsaken by thy Father, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?[2] For the influence of thy divinity and glory was suspended a

  1. Ps, xxx, 16.
  2. Matt. xxvi. 46.