"I do not devote as much time to study as I should, or as I might. I fear I shall never make anything of my studies. I do not endeavor with all my might. This study has thrown me into another sphere. I like it not. I feel apprehensive of something, of somewhat. Ten years from now will fix my destiny, if I have any."
Much good as he continued to receive from the sacrament of penance, he found a not altogether usual difficulty in preparing for it. Perhaps it was in the counsel he received there that he got courage to gird himself for his renewed attack upon the languages, for his delinquencies in this respect have the air of being the most tangible of the matters on his conscience.
"I must prepare for confession this week," he writes on November 5, 1844. "Oh! would that I could accuse myself as I should. Man is not what he should be so long as he is not an angel. Oh, dear God! give me Thy aid, and help me in my weaknesses. What sins can I accuse myself of now? First—oh, Love! give me light to accuse myself—to see my sins. This is my greatest sin; that I cannot accuse myself and am so wicked.
"Each day I omit a hundred duties that I should not. Lord, give me Thy Spirit, that I may be humble, meek, and sweet in all my walk and conversation. Fill my heart with Thy love."
In a little while he found himself able to study more diligently, and though he continually regrets the inroad this makes upon his interior life, he seems not only to have persevered, but to have taken considerable interest and an active part in the debates got up at regular intervals by the class he had joined. He notes that he has serious doubts whether it will be wise for him to express his full mind on some of the subjects brought up. His fellow-pupils were all Protestants, and some of them well-informed and talented young men. His views would be new to them, and so would many of his authorities for his statements of fact, and he thought it not unlikely that a commotion might sometimes be raised which would not at all commend itself to the teacher of the institution. He concluded, however, to throw prudence to the winds, and on controverted points to express his sentiments freely and frankly. There were some animated discussions, no doubt.
He was endeavoring at this time to retrench his hours of sleep to the narrowest dimensions compatible with health, and found it, we may note, the most difficult of his austerities. In other respects they remained severe, as this entry may witness:
"November 27, 1844.—I am sorely perplexed what to eat. Nuts, apples, and bread seem not a diet wholly suitable, and what to add I know not. Potatoes are not good; I think they were the cause of my illness last week. I do not wish to partake of anything that comes even remotely from an animal. Cooking, also, I wish, as far as possible, to dispense with. I would I could dispense with the whole digestive apparatus! Cheese, butter, eggs, milk, are for many reasons not a part of my diet."
The balance of this fourth volume of his diary, begun September 9, 1844, and ended January 2, 1845, is mainly occupied with addresses to his guardian angel. He was, as those who knew him will remember, always extremely devout to the angelic choirs. On his birthday this year he writes as follows:
"December 18, 1844.—Let me look back for a few moments and see where I stood last year this time (an incomprehensible length), and where I now stand. Then my path was dim, unfixed, unsettled. Then I was not so disentangled from the body and its desires as, I hope in God, I now am. In all I feel a consciousness that since then I have spiritually grown—been transformed. For my present I cannot speak. For my future, it seems I dare not speak.
"Dreams of the future! Exalted visions! Beautiful, unspeakable hopes! Deep, inarticulate longings that fill the conscious soul! Ah! so sweet, so harmonious, so delightful, like an angel, like the bride of the pure and bright soul adorned for the nuptials, do I see the future beckoning me with a clear, transparent smile onward to her presence. 'Ah!' my soul would say, 'we will meet, for I am in thy presence, and faithful in God may heaven grant me to be.' The beauty, the grace, the love, the sweetness that attract me, are beyond all comparison. Ah! thou eternal, ever-blooming virgin, the Future, shall I ever embrace thee? Shall I ever see thee nearer to my heart? I look at myself and I am bowed down low in grief; but when I cast my eyes up to thee, in seeing thee I am lost. The grace and beauty I see in thee passes into my soul, and I am all that thou art. I am then wedded to thee, and I would that it were an eternal union. But ah! my eyes, when turned upon myself, lose all sight of thee, and meet nothing but my own spots and blemishes. How canst thou love me? I say; and for thy pure love I am melted into thee as one."