The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1902-08-23
CONVERSATION vI-continued.

Il want the church, If the church l
am to have, not merely to enable men
| to save themselves but actually to
! save them
That is you want the state of pro-
baton or trial should be d state of re-
ward and beatitude. You want an or
der in which men can be free. do as
they please, and in which they can
not go wrong, can make no mistake,
commit no sin, and suffer no pain. You
must go out of this world to find such
an order, and seek a human nature
| different from ours. What you ask
! is impossible with mans present state.
| The church has never promised the
world anything, except on condition of
obedience. She teaches us the truth,
| tells us what is our true good, points
out the way that leads to its poses
sion, entreats us with material affec-
ton to walk in that way, and affords
US all the help we need in order to do
! so; but the act of doing it must be our
act. She does not carry us without
our concurrence, without our active
assent, in spite of ourselves, and
against our will. If she did, you would
J be the first to cry out against her,
as violating the freedom and dignity
of human nature. She does all that
| can be done with respect for our dig
nifty, or without violence to our free
will, which would not be free will if
it did or could suffer violence. This
| is all she has ever promised, and her
promise she ha Away kept. If then
| there are moral evils in Catholic ma
| tions, if men reared Catholic have
abandoned their faith or lived as
| heather, and run to fearful excess of
vice and crime, it is not owing to any
weakness or inefficiency of hers, but
to the perversity of their own wills,
| to the malice of their own hearts"
'Still l do not see, if your church
really imparts the light and strength
you pretend, what could induce men
| enlightened and strengthened by her
| to abandon her, to act against her pre-
cepts, and to become vicious and Grim
| inal. They have neither ignorance nor
| weakness to plead their excuse"
That only proves the depth of their
malice. You do not seem to have any
conception of such thing as malice,
and you imagine that no one can do
wrong against his better knowledge,
unless through weakness Hence you
have no conception of sin, and your
own mind really denies its possibility.
In your philosophy sin is an excusable
error, an amiable weakness, a pardon
able mistake, and. therefore, you revolt
at The idea of its eternal punishment
But sin is not a mere imperfection; 1t
is something involuntary, but always
free deliberate act and, in so far as
it is sin, an act of malice. The man
had both the light and the strength to
avoid it.. 1t is impossible for us to
estimate the degree of malice every
mortal sin implies, and you will never
have any adequate conception of its
turpitude till you have learned at what
cost the incarnate Son of God has made
satisfaction for it. You are very much
mistaken in supposing that men always
act as well as they are able, or know
how
But 1 suppose their knowledge and
sense of their own interest would pre-
vent their fall
You are a very young man, or you
would not say that. Men are surely
not incapable of going contrary to
what they know is for their own in
terest, both here and hereafter They
do it every day almost every hour"
But if 1 recollect Alright. your st.
Thomas teaches that the good is the
object of the will, and that the will is
aptitive only"
THE will has for its object good, and
wills an object only because it views it
as good, of some sort, l admit; but not
therefore, does ii never will that which
is never true good st. Thomas teaches
that every man naturally desires hap
piness, which is true. But he may will
that which he knows is contrary to
his happiness. not precisely because it
is contrary to it, but from aversion to
that which it is necessary to do in or
der tc gain it. A man wills evil be-
cause he hates good. and to refuse
what one hates has itself some reason
for happiness inaSmuch as it affords a
certain qualification. To contradict
that which is hateful is always a
greater or less pleasure, and nothing is
more hateful to the malicious than
genuine virtue, although they well
know it's superiority to vice, and that
they would be better and happier if
they were themselves virtuous. The
malicious call evil good, the good evil
not from mistake, but from sheer mall
ice. You yourself would say with
satan,
Better to reign in hell than serve in
heaven
1.-The perverse mind makes to itself
a sort of good in its refusal to obey
God. Did you never observe how Mann
mon works out his thought in Millions
Paradise Lost?' The fallen spirit
would dissuade his associates from fur
Their prosecution of the war against the
Almighty. as utterly vain They cam
not heavens Lord supreme oerpower,'
and thus regain their lost glory. But
Suppose he should relent
And publish grace to all on promise made
OF new subsection; with what eyes could
Stand in his presence humble and receive
Strict laws imposed, to celebrate his
throne
With warbled hymns, and to mis- Cod
Forced haileIujahs; while he lordly sits
Our envfd sovereign, and his altar
breathes
Ambrosial odors and ambrosial flowers.
Our servile offerings? This must be our
In heav'n, this our delight; how weari-
some
Eternity so spent in worship paid
10 whom we hate. Let us not then pur-
BY force impossible, by leave obtained
Unacceptable, though in heaven, our stays
OF splendid vassalage, but rather seek
Our own good from ourselves, and from
our own
Live to yourselves, though in this vast re-
cess,
Hard liberty before the easy yoke
Of servile pomp. Our greatness will ap-
Then most conspicuous, when great
things of
Useful or hurtful. prosperous or adverse
We can create; and in what place what |
Thrive under evil, and work ease out of
pain
labor and endurance"
Milton had happy knack of inter-
preting the thoughts of devils. for no |
was himself a superb rebel, and