TradCatKnight: Imitation of Christ: THE GRACE OF GOD IS NOT COMMUNICATED TO THE EARTHLY-MINDED

Thou must be sequestered from thine acquaintance and from thy dearest friends, and keep thy mind disengaged from all temporal consolation. 

So the blessed Apostle Peter beseeches the faithful of Christ to keep themselves as strangers and pilgrims in this world. 

2. Oh, what great confidence shall he have at death, who is not detained by an affection to anything in the world! 

But an infirm soul is not yet capable of having a heart thus perfectly disengaged from all things, neither doth the animal man understand the liberty of the interior man. 

But if he will be truly spiritual, he must renounce as well those that are near as those that are afar off, and beware of none more than of himself. 

If thou perfectly overcomest thyself, thou shalt more easily subdue all things else. 

The perfect victory is to triumph over one’s self. 

For whosoever keepeth himself in subjection, so that sensuality obeyeth reason, and reason in all things is obedient to Me, he is indeed a conqueror of himself, and lord of the world.

3. If thou longest to climb this eminence, thou must begin manfully, and lay the axe to the root, in order to pluck out and destroy secret and inordinate inclination to thyself and to every private and material good. 

From this vice, that man loveth self too inordinately, depends almost all whatsoever must be radically overcome; which being vanquished and brought under, a great peace and tranquillity will immediately ensue. 

But because few labor to die perfectly to themselves, or fully to aim out of themselves, therefore do they remain entangled in themselves, nor can they be elevated in spirit above themselves. 

But whoever desireth to walk freely with Me, it is necessary that he mortify all his perverse and inordinate affections, and not cleave with particular love or concupiscence to anything created. …Read more »