CHAPTER IX.
THE PASTORAL OFFICE A SOURCE OF CONFIDENCE.
Beyond all doubt, the priest's helps are greater than the priest's dangers. But fear and anxiety can feel: they do not reason. The foresight of years of responsibility, the consciousness of our own weakness, the subtilty and strength of sin, the thought of our death-bed—all these weigh heavily at times upon us. The daily sight of sin; the wreck of many close around us, who began well and persevered long; the fall of priests who were our fellow-students and fellow-workers, or near friends; the memory how often we were near to the precipice, and our own feet had well-nigh slipped—these things keep alive a sense of fear in a priest's mind, and that fear is from the Holy Ghost. Confige carnes meas timore tuo ought to be our daily prayer. We have already seen many motives of confidence. We will dwell on one more and that is the pastoral office itself.
S. Peter three times denied his Master; three times Jesus asked him whether he loved Him;
