won an immortal crown. Do you imitate him, and thus avoid the unhappy lot of lamenting not only the delay of your conversion, but even the loss of your crown.
CHAPTER XVI.
THE FIFTH PRIVILEGE OF VIRTUE: THE PEACE OF A GOOD CONSCIENCE.
GOD, Who gives His creatures all that is necessary for their perfection, has planted the seed of virtue in the soul of man, and has endowed him with a natural inclination for good and an instinctive hatred of evil. This inclination may be weakened and perverted by a habit of vice, but it can never be totally destroyed. We find a figure of this truth in Job, where we see that, in the calamities which befell the holy man, one servant always escaped to announce the misfortune which had overtaken his master. So the faithful servant, conscience, always remains with the sinner in the midst of his disorders to show him what he has lost and the state to which his sins have reduced him.
This is still another striking proof of that providence we have been considering, and of the value God attaches to virtue. He has placed in the centre of our souls a guardian that never sleeps, a monitor that is never silent, a master that never ceases to guide and sustain us. Epictetus, the Stoic philosopher, was deeply
