Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/77

vation, if God does not aid him. In effect, God thus speaks in the gospel of St. John, xv. 4, 5: "Manete in me et ego in vobis. Sicut palmes non potest ferre fructum à semetipso, nisi manserit in vite; sic nec vos, nisi in me manseritis. Ego sum vitis: vos palmites; qui manet in me, et ego in eo, hic fert fructum multum: quia sine me nihil potestis facere." The Apostle, in the second epistle to the Corinthians, iii. 4, 5, says: "Fiduciam autem talem habemus per Christum ad Deum, non quod sufficientes simus cogitare aliquid à nobis quasi ex nobis: sed sufficientia nostra ex Deo est." Holy Job confessed the same radical impotency of man in the affair of salvation, when he said, (ch. xiv.): "Who can make him clean, that is conceived of unclean seed? Is it not Thou who only art?" Moses says, (Exodus, ch. xxxiv.): "No man of himself is innocent before Thee." St. Augustin, in the inimitable book of his Confessions, addressing God, says: "Lord, give me grace to do what thou directest, and direct what seems best unto thee." So that in the same manner that God declares to me what I must believe, and gives me strength to believe it, he declares to me what I must do, and gives me grace to perform what he has ordained.

What mind can comprehend, what tongue declare, what pen describe, the manner in which God performs these wonderful prodigies in man; and how he leads him in the way of salvation with mercy and justice, sweetness and power? Who can define the boundaries of this spiritual empire, between the divine will and the free will of man? Who can explain how they co-operate without confusion, and without impairing each other? Only one thing do I know, O Lord, that poor and humble as I am, and great and powerful as thou art, thou