tative quotations and texts,
but it may interest them to know that Saints Basil, Chrysostom,
Gregory Nazianzen, Cyprian, Augustine and other Fathers all speak in a
similar strain, holding that, as a vocation is a free gift or counsel,
it may be declined without sin. [1] The great Theologians, St. Thomas,
Suarez, Bellarmine and Cornelius a Lapide also agree on this point.

But putting aside the question of sin, we must admit that one who
clearly realizes that the religious life is best for him and
consequently more pleasing to God, would, by neglecting to avail
himself of this grace, betray a certain ungenerosity of soul and a
lack of appreciation of spiritual things, in depriving himself of a
gift which would be the source of so many graces and spiritual
advantages.

Do not, then, dear reader, embrace the higher life merely from motives
of fear--which were unworthy an ingenuous child of God--but rather to
please the Divine Majesty. You are dear to Him, dearer than the
treasures of all the world. He loves you so much that He died for you,
and now He asks you in return to nestle close to His heart, where He
may ever enfold His arms about you, and lavish his blandishments upon
your soul. Will you come to Him, your fresh young heart still sweet
with the dew of innocence, and become His own forevermore? Will you
say farewell to creatures, and rest upon that Bosom whose love and
tenderness for you is high as the stars, wide as the universe, and
deep as the sea? Come to the tender embraces of your heavenly spouse,
and heaven will have begun for you on earth.

[1] The hypothetical case, sometimes mentioned by casuists, of one who
is convinced that for him salvation outside of religion is impossible,
can here safely be passed over as unpractical for young readers.

CHAPTER X

I AM TOO YOUNG

Many a young person, when confronted with the thought of his vocation,
puts it out of mind, with the off-hand remark, "Oh, there is plenty of
time to consider that; I am too young, and have had no experience of
the world." This method of procedure is summary, if not judicious, and
it meets with the favor of some parents, who fear, as they think, to
lose their children. It was also evidently highly acceptable to
Luther, who is quoted by Bellarmine as teaching that no one should
enter religious life until he is seventy or eighty years of age.

In deciding a question of this nature, however, we should not allow
our prepossessions