Chapter XIII.
The reason why they are not allowed to go to sleep
after the night service.
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And
these labours they keep up
for two reasons, besides this consideration,—that they believe
that when they are diligently exerting themselves they are offering to
God a sacrifice of the fruit of their hands. And, if we are aiming at
perfection; we also ought to observe this with the same diligence.
First, lest our envious adversary, jealous of our purity against which
he is always plotting, and ceaselessly hostile to us, should by some
illusion in a dream pollute the purity which has been gained by the
Psalms and prayers of the night: for after that satisfaction which we
have offered for our negligence and ignorance, and the absolution
implored with profuse sighs in our confession, he anxiously tries, if
he finds some time given to repose, to defile us; then above all
endeavouring to overthrow and weaken our trust in God when he sees by
the purity of our prayers that we are making most fervent efforts
towards God: so that sometimes, when he has been unable to injure some
the whole night long, he does his utmost to disgrace them in that short
hour. Secondly, because, even if no such dreaded illusion of the devil
arises, even a pure sleep in the interval produces laziness in the case
of the monk who ought soon to wake up; and, bringing on a sluggish
torpor in the mind, it dulls his vigour throughout the whole day, and
deadens that keenness
of
perception and exhausts that energy
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of heart which
would be capable of keeping us all day long more watchful against all
the snares of the enemy and more robust. Wherefore to the Canonical
Vigils there are added these private watchings, and they submit to them
with the greater care, both in order that the purity which has been
gained by Psalms and prayers may not be lost, and also that a more
intense carefulness to guard us diligently through the day may be
secured beforehand by the meditation of the night.
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Missæ
. The use of this word for the offices of
the Canonical Hours, though not common, is found also in the Thirtieth
Canon of the Council of Agde,
a.d.
506.
“At the end of the morning and evening
missœ
,
after the hymns, let the little chapters from the Psalms be
said.”
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Pinguetudo
.