Page 5 - SPIRITUAL EXERCISES 1828

However, I ended it with the firm determination to do these
Spiritual Exercises as well as I can, and to write everything
with utter sincerity, even if I didn’t feel like it.

THIRD MEDITATION during the night. On the means and
graces God has given me to be saved. Oh! How great and
lavish in graces and favours the Lord has been with me! He
has not deprived me of the least little thing that I needed to be
saved. For no merits of my own, or rather, in spite of my
unworthiness, God has given me the Christian Faith, he has
placed me in a very Christian country-town, he has provided
me with parents who are so concerned with my salvation. He
granted me the exceptional gift of a good education, and then,
how many Sacraments, sermons, instructions, warnings; how
many inspirations, stirrings of the heart, good examples and
countless other kindnesses my divine Spouse has showered
on me!
If God had given to another person a half or a third of the
graces he has granted me, she would have already been a
saint by this time, a great saint. As for me, I have misused it

all, and perhaps I have not even started to love God from my
heart! ... How ungrateful I am!

Resolutions: To be firmly determined to be a saint, cost
what it may, and no longer let the means God gives me to
become a saint come to nothing.

I did this Meditation partly on my knees and partly sitting,
for a little more than half-an-hour. I had very few distractions in

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