Wherever we feel a special attraction to one or another of these aspects of our Lord's life, there, in all probability, we shall find an indication of our vocation. For a vocation is in truth nothing else but a vision of Jesus. If once we see Him, the beauty of the vision is so great, so compelling, that we must desire to follow Him and be made like to Him in that which we see in Him. We could not have a true vision of Him and not desire to be made like to Him. Our lower nature may indeed shrink from the vision and all that it involves. For the natural heart the vision of Jesus has no beauty that we should desire it. But if God has illuminated our minds by His Holy Spirit, and touched our hearts with the unction of His grace, then we cannot help desiring, in our higher selves, to follow where the vision calls us, however awful and mysterious it may appear. How else are we to account for those vocations to lives of great penance and strange austerities, of unbroken solitude and perpetual prayer, that we find amongst the saints?

But short of these great and strange vocations, there is something, we may be sure, in our Lord that will appeal to every one who tries faithfully and devoutly to meditate upon His life. And in times of retreat we ought to be especially watchful to find out what this is, in order that we may know in what kind or state of life our Lord wants us to serve Him, or what step onward He wants us to take in that life to which He has already called us.

Therefore, in all the Exercises of the Second Week, and especially from the fourth day onwards, we should have an eye to the Election, i.e. the resolution we ought to make, whether it be the determination of our vocation, or of any other important matter in which we have to make a decision; or, as will more often be the case if we are in the habit of making an annual retreat, the resolution to take some step onward towards greater perfection in the vocation which we have already accepted.

And the disposition we must seek to cherish in all these Exercises is that which has just been set before us in the meditation on the Kingdom of Christ, viz. a generous desire and resolution to follow our Lord as perfectly as possible. As the Directory expresses it (chapter xix. 2), 'so far as depends on himself' the exercitant should tend towards that which is more perfect, if God should give him grace and strength.' In order to help us to do this S. Ignatius inserts among the contemplations of

this Week the very important meditations on the Two Standards and the Three Classes, and also that most searching consideration on the three Modes of Humility, the third of which is the most favourable of all dispositions for making a good Election, and at the same time the highest point of perfection to which the Exercises lead.

Three further remarks may be added. First, the Exercises of this Week fall into two divisions, between which S. Ignatius inserts the Preamble to the Consideration of States of Life. The contemplations of the first two days on the Incarnation, the Nativity, the Presentation in the Temple, and the Flight into Egypt, are intended to confirm our resolution made in the meditation on the Kingdom of Christ, to follow our Lord in whatever degree of nearness to Himself He may call us to serve Him. Then on the third day we contemplate the example which our Lord gives us of the two states of life, the first or common state, in His home life of subjection to His parents at Nazareth; and the second, which is that of evangelical perfection, when, leaving S. Joseph and His Blessed Mother, He remained behind in the Temple at Jerusalem. Immediately after this comes the Preamble to the Consideration of States of Life to which I have just referred; and this is followed on the fourth day by the meditations on Two Standards and Three Classes, both of which are especially intended to prepare us for making a good Election. The work of the Election itself begins on the fifth day, and is to be carried on as long as may be needful, during the whole of which time we are to continue our meditations on the Mysteries of our Lord's life, beginning with His departure from Nazareth to be baptized in the river Jordan. This Preamble, therefore, marks a division between the Exercises which may be given to all, or at any rate to a large number of persons, and those, on the other hand, which are intended primarily for such as show themselves fit to go on to the Election of a state of life; and it is for the director to determine who shall pass onward.

If after the meditation on Christ remaining in the Temple the exercitant shows no desire or fitness to go on to higher things, S. Ignatius wishes him to end his retreat here, or in some cases the director may add a few more of the simpler Exercises on the life of our Lord which may help him to live a good life in the world, and then dismiss him. If, on the other hand, he proves

to be one of those who desire to show greater affection and to distinguish themselves in the service of Christ, and from whom, therefore, much fruit may be looked for to the glory of God and the good of the Church, then he may be permitted to go on to the Election and to all the other Exercises of this and the following Weeks.

Secondly, this Week, like the others, may be prolonged or shortened according as the retreatant requires more or less time to reach the desired result. If it is prolonged the additional meditations are to be taken from the Mysteries of our Lord's Life, which are placed by S. Ignatius towards the end of the book. If it is shortened, fewer Mysteries must be taken, but all, or at least as many as possible of what are sometimes called the capital or cardinal Exercises, viz. the Kingdom of Christ, the Two Standards, the Three Classes, and the three Modes of Humility, should find a place.

Lastly, in all our contemplations on the Mysteries of our Lord's Life, we must constantly bear in mind that He is not only outside us as an example in the history of the remote past, but alive and at work in us at the present moment, moulding us, if we will let Him, into His own likeness. For His Spirit

is our Spirit; His life is poured into ours. We look at Him in history to know what we must become; we draw upon His present Spirit in order to its realization.' i

NOTE L

ON TWO STANDARDS

This Exercise, as has already been pointed out (Note 45, p. 98), is not proposed to us in order that we may choose under which Standard we will serve, Christ's or Lucifer's. That choice has been made during the Exercises of the First Week, and renewed in the meditation on the Kingdom of Christ, in which we have answered to His call, and professed our desire and resolution to follow Him in whatever degree of nearness to Himself He may call us, whether in the common way of the command

1 Gore, Bampton Lectures, Lect. viii. 223-4. It was, perhaps, with this same thought in his mind that the late Fr. Coleridge, when arranging a harmony of the gospels for meditation, entitled his work Vita Vitae Nostrae meditantibus proposita.

ments, or in the stricter and more perfect way of the evangelical counsels.

Now, in this meditation on Two Standards, S. Ignatius begins to turn our thoughts to the consideration of the question in which of these two states of life does our Lord call us to serve Him; or, if our state of life is already fixed, in what way is He calling us to press onwards towards greater perfection in that state.

And the difficulty of hearing and obeying the call is not now the deafness and unwillingness of the human heart, from which we prayed to be delivered in the second prelude of the meditation on the Kingdom of Christ, but the snares and deceits of the devil, who comes to us in the guise of an angel of light, sometimes even simulating the voice of Christ Himself, and allures us to things which appear good, or at least not evil, but which will in reality, if we listen to him, lead us unawares and little by little away from Christ and into sin; first into little sins and unfaithfulnesses, then into greater ones, till at last he gets us wholly into his power. This is the danger, and a very real and constant danger it is. For, whereas on the one hand the devil is constantly trying to entice us by things which appear good, or at least are not manifestly evil, while at the same time they are pleasing to nature; and on the other our Lord calls us to that which is indeed good, even the highest and most perfect of all goods, but yet is often painful and repugnant to the natural heart and will, there is always a danger lest the bias of our fallen nature should lead us to choose the easier and pleasanter path, and to persuade ourselves that we are obeying the voice of conscience and of sound reason, when in reality we are allowing ourselves to be beguiled by the deceits of Satan.

To guard against this danger S. Ignatius unmasks the deceits of the evil one, and at the same time begins to unfold to us the sacred doctrine of Christ and the true life which is in Him.

The chief thing to be considered on the side of Satan is the deceitfulness and subtlety of his working. This is set before us in the third point of the first part of the meditation, in which S. Ignatius shows us Satan giving his orders to the evil spirits whom he sends throughout the world to do his work. We are to consider, he says, the harangue which he makes to them, and how he admonishes them to ensnare men in nets and bind them with chains nets by means of which he may take them captive

unawares, and chains by which, after they have been ensnared, he may bind them and hold them fast. What these nets and chains are he goes on to explain in the following words: tempting them first with the lust of riches (as he is wont to do in most cases) in order that thereby they may more easily come to the vain honour of the world, and afterwards to unbounded pride; so that the first step is that of riches, the second of honour, the third of pride; and from these three steps he leads on to all other vices.

It should be noted, however, that S. Ignatius does not say that the lust of riches is always the first step by which Satan seeks to get a hold on men, but only that in most cases it is so. And if we give a wide meaning to riches, so as to include not only outward wealth, but everything that is opposed to the inward spirit of poverty, this is no doubt true. Of course there are very many with whom Satan begins his temptation in quite other ways, especially through the lusts of the flesh. But in this meditation we are not thinking of manifest and gross temptations which are easily recognized, but only of those more subtle ones which come to us through things which are in themselves indifferent, or even in appearance good. It is the subtlety of Satan, his deceits and snares, that we have to consider, not his manifest and palpable temptations. At the same time there is no reason why we should not interpret these nets and chains to mean any other inordinate affection or attachment which may seem to suit our own case better: the love of power, for instance, or of consideration, or popularity; undue attachment to persons, places, things, offices and employments; little indulgences of the flesh, love of ease and bodily comfort; eagerness about outward things, and carelessness as to spiritual duties and prayer-any one of these or countless other things may be the net by which Satan will seek to entangle us and draw us away from our allegiance to Christ. But in any case the thing to notice is the deceitfulness and subtlety of his temptations, and how truly they may be compared to snares or nets. For just as birds or fishes, when once within the net, are assuredly taken captive, though they may not know it till they try to escape, so the man who yields to the lust of riches, or to any other inordinate affection, quickly becomes enslaved to his passion, though he may not discover it till he tries to free himself from it. Then he finds out what a hold it has upon him, and how hard it is to regain his liberty. If he does not at once exert