A pastor must first acquire a solid degree of interior virtue, before he
can safely undertake to labor in procuring the salvation of others, or
employ himself in exterior functions of the ministry. He must have
mortified the deeds of the flesh by compunction, and the habitual
practice of self-denial; and the fruits of the spirit must daily more
and more perfectly subdue his passions. These fruits of the spirit are
charity and humility, which stifle all the motions of anger, envy, and
pride: holy joy, which banishes carnal sadness, sloth, and all disrelish
in spiritual exercises; peace, which crushes the seeds of discord, and
the love and relish of heavenly things, which extinguish the love of
earthly goods and sensual pleasures. One whose soul is slothful,
sensual, and earthly, deserves not to bear the name of a Christian, much
less of a minister of the gospel. There never was a saint who did not
carry his cross, and walk in the steps of Christ crucified. St.
Alexander would have thought a day lost in which he did not add
something to the sacrifice of his penance in order to continue and
complete it. By this he prepared himself to die a victim of fidelity and
charity. This is the continued martyrdom by which every true Christian
earnestly labors to render himself every day more and more pleasing to
God, making his body a pure holocaust to him by mortification, and his
soul, by the fervor of his charity and compunction.

Footnotes:
1. Eus. b. 6, c. 14. S. Hieron. in Catal.

SAINT CYRIL, CONFESSOR,

ARCHBISHOP OF JERUSALEM.

From the church historians, and his works collected by Dom Touttee in
his excellent edition of them at Paris, in 1720.

A.D. 386.

CYRIL was born at or near the city of Jerusalem, about the year 315. So
perfectly was he versed in the holy scriptures, that many of his
discourses,{608} and some of these pronounced extempore, are only
passages of the sacred writings connected and interwoven with each
other. He had read diligently both the fathers and the pagan
philosophers. Maximus, bishop of Jerusalem, ordained him priest about
the year 345, and soon after appointed him his preacher to the people,
likewise his catechist to instruct and prepare the catechumens for
baptism; thus committing to his care the two principal functions of his
own pastoral charge. St. Cyril mentions his sermons to the faithful
every Sunday.[1] Catechumens ordinarily remained two years in the course
of instruction and