ways in my mouth." (Ps. xxxiii. 1.) "You were born for heaven; take care that you do not degenerate from the lofty thoughts of the sons of God" (Father Azevedo), "take care that you do not carry in an upright and straight body a crooked soul;" that is, a soul unnaturally inclined to the fleeting objects of this world.
The End of Man. II.
I. Since the object of your existence is to praise and serve God alone, and since the means relating to any end are good or bad only, inasmuch as they help us to attain that end or withdraw us from it; so it is evident that you ought to make use of creatures only inasmuch as they further the attainment of that object, and to avoid them when they withdraw you from it. Therefore you are not to desire riches, honor, nor the conveniences of this life, nor even health, unless they help you to praise and serve God. Wherefore the devout author of the Imitation of Christ says well: "Better is the humble peasant, that serves God, than the proud philosopher, who neglecting himself, meditates on the course of the heavens."
II. Examine if you possess any disordered affections for the objects mentioned above. Examine whether you be willing to suffer poverty, reproach, sickness, and even death itself, if God's glory could be increased by it. Offer yourself to your Creator, with perfect indifference to all things. Say with the prophet, "My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready" (Ps. cvii. 28); and with Christ, "Not as I will, but as Thou wilt." (Matt. xxvi. 39)
III. How irrationally those men live who in their actions pursue any other object than God, who misspend
