Many secretly seek themselves in what they do, and are not sensible of it.
They seem also to continue in good peace, when things are done according to their will and judgment: but if it fall out contrary to their desires, they are soon moved and become sad.
Difference of thoughts and opinions is too frequently the source of dissensions amongst friends and neighbours, amongst religious and devout persons.
3. An old custom is with difficulty relinquished: and no man is led willingly farther than himself sees or likes.
If thou reliest more upon thine own reason or industry than upon the virtue that subjects to Jesus Christ, thou wilt seldom and hardly be an enlightened man: for God will have us perfectly subject to himself, and to transcend all reason by inflamed love.
Chap. XV.
Of works done out of charity.
1. Evil ought not to be done, either for any thing in the world, or for the love of any man: but for the profit of one that stands in need, a good work is sometimes freely to be omitted, or rather to be changed for a better.
For, by doing thus, a good work is not lost, but is changed into a better.