deeply sad to think how many souls are by this means soiled and ruined. This danger is a very great one for you, my dear young friend. Do not imitate those who say: "We are no longer children! It is quite allowable for us to see certain things, we have reached an age when we ought to be acquainted with such subjects 1" Young people who talk in this fashion are, alas! no longer children of God, or at least are not to be counted among His innocent children.
6. Remark in conclusion that those young men who boldly fix their gaze upon persons of the opposite sex, doing this, not from mere curiosity, but with some measure of sensual desire, are either already unchaste, or will become so before very long. St. Bernard tells us that if persons of different sexes take deliberate satisfaction in gazing at one another and yet no sinful desires arise within them, ii is a more wonderful thing than if a dead man were to return to life.
O Youth, preserve an undimmed eye
And keep thy heart without a stain:
The undimmed eye can look on high,
The unstained heart will peace attain.
The enemy in human form
1. "Company-keeping" is the occasion in which the enemy of chastity appears most frequently in human form. Upon this subject I will speak more
