of God either to restore him to health or to take him out of the world altogether. God sent an angel to say to him that he might choose whether he would suffer the pains of purgatory for three days or those of his sickness for another year. The sick man thought to himself that the three days would soon be over, while a whole year of illness meant a long trial of one’s patience. He therefore chose the three days in purgatory. According to his wish he died and went to purgatory, but was hardly an hour there when he imagined the three days and even more had expired; he grew exceedingly anxious, sighed, suffered, and wept; “ah,” he said, “I must be more than a month here, and yet the door is not opened to let me out! I am afraid that he who gave me that choice was not an angel in reality, but one disguised as an angel who has shamefully deceived me.” While busied with these thoughts the angel came to comfort him and to congratulate him on having accomplished the third part of his atonement. “What!” exclaimed the suffering soul; “the third part! No more than that?” “Yes, you have been here but one day; your body is not yet buried; they are now on the point of carrying it to the grave.” “Ah, dearest guardian angel!” cried out the poor soul; “ah, help me to return to my body and my former suffering; I would rather endure them patiently for ten years than stand these pains for two days more!” Ah, my God! how we deceive ourselves when we think little of venial sins and make nothing of them almost! when we do not true and heartfelt penance for our mortal sins! when we blindly look on them as altogether remitted, and forget all about the terrors of purgatory!
Examples showing that even the holiest suffer it.
I tremble when I read in the Lives of the Saints how severely even the holiest and most faithful servants of God had to suffer for the smallest sins and imperfections. In the Chronicles of the Friars Minor we read of one of their number who died at Paris, and who on account of his angelic purity and holiness was looked on as more angel than man. In the same convent there was at the time a very learned theologian, who was also most enlightened in spiritual matters. He deliberately omitted to say Mass for his deceased brother because he thought it unnecessary to help one who, as he certainly believed, was already high in glory, so great was the fame for sanctity that the deceased had gained during life. But in a few days’ time the latter appeared to him and said in a mournful voice: “Dear master,