The Miracles of our Lord, as illustrating the Doctrine of Purgatory.

XIV. THE STILLING OF THE TEMPEST.

St. Matt. viii. 23-27; St. Mark iv. 36-40; St. Luke viii. 22-25.

I. THE most striking of our Lord's miracles to those who witnessed them must perhaps have been those in which He displayed His power over the forces of nature, which are usually so far above all human control. For diseases are to a certain extent, and in certain cases, within the reach of science and experience, at least as to some alleviation of their evils, and even when He gave sight to the blind or speech to the dumb, the organs of sight or speech were there in the first instance to make their miraculous use less startling when it was bestowed. In the case even of the demoniacs, there was obviously present a personal power at work, different from that of the possessed themselves, which power was quelled and reduced to obedience by the command of our Lord. In the case of which we are about to speak there was nothing of this kind. For the powers of nature, as we call them, seem to us so entirely subject to the unchangeable laws which govern them, as to admit of no interference—at least any interference with them seems to appal and even alarm us, as if the most stable and certain things in all the world in which we move were being shaken. Thus it seems to be predicted by our Lord that, in His good Providence, some most marvellous alterations in the aspect and condition of the physical universe will be given by God as the last sign to arouse the wicked world from its sleep before the Day of Judgment. Again, there is nothing

in all our experience before which we feel so utterly helpless and prostrate as some of the more violent demonstrations of physical power in the elements, which seem sometimes to unchain themselves, as if for the purpose of showing man how weak and insignificant he is, as in great storms, earthquakes, hurricanes, the eruption of volcanoes, and the like. What must be the power that can tame them? Thus it seems to have been like a new revelation of our Lord's Divine authority, when the disciples and others could say to themselves, "Who is this, that even the winds and the sea obey Him?"

2. The miracle is related by the three historical Evangelists, and the circumstances are placed by them all in the same order, except in one particular. Our Lord is asleep in the stern of the ship, when a violent storm falls on the lake, and there appears to be imminent danger for His boat and for the others which were in company with it. The disciples come in haste and alarm to wake Him up, and, as St. Mark tells us, with a kind of complaint, as if His sleeping at such a time was a sign of some carelessness as to their fate: "Master, doth it not matter to Thee that we are perishing?" Our Lord in the first place rises up and rebukes the waves and the winds, bidding them be still. Then a great calm comes on as suddenly as the storm which had preceded it, and our Lord turns to the disciples and asks them why they were afraid, calls them men of little faith, and the like. Then follows the exclamation of the whole company, "Who is this, that even the winds

and sea obey Him?"

3. The circumstance in this miracle on which we may fasten in our meditations concerning Purgatory is that of the great calm which came over the lake after our Lord had spoken. This calm was more than natural, because after so great a commotion it is not usual for the sea to become smooth and tranquil all at once. The sudden change seems to have struck the witnesses, as it is specially recorded by the Evangelists. But we may certainly say,

without fear of exaggeration, that no sudden calm that ever fell on sea or lake, even when the storm had been most violent and the change most instantaneous, could compare with the wonderful change to peace and perfect tranquillity which takes place at the moment of death in the case of those who die in the grace of God. This calm and peace is not, in the case of the Holy Souls, a passing, but a permanent state, it lasts as long as they remain. in the holy prison of Purgatory; in some respects it becomes more intense as their period of purification draws towards its close, and then it merges itself in the ineffable repose of the Beatific Vision. This peace of the holy state of Purgatory is as true and real an element in the condition of those souls of whom we are thinking in these chapters, as is the pain which they suffer and the length of time for which it may last. It should be our endeavour to gain a complete view, as far as may be, of their condition, and for this purpose it is necessary to dwell as much on one side of it, so to speak, as on the other. We may therefore devote this chapter to some considerations which may serve to illustrate the peace and calm of which the tranquillity of the lake of Galilee, after our Lord had stilled the tempest, may be taken as an image.

4. In the first place, then, it is certain that at the moment of death those who die in the grace of God are confirmed in that grace. Here at once is something stable and fixed, free from disturbance and fluctuation, as when the everrestless waves of a lake are formed by the action of freezing into solid ice, over which the winds, which have before lashed them at will into perpetual sleepless motion and agitation, sweep without the least power to disturb their repose. Nothing on earth so nearly approaches the peace of Heaven as a soul which is practically and morally, if not literally and actually, confirmed in grace, as we believe the soul of our Blessed Lady and the souls of the Apostles after the Day of Pentecost to have been. Again, the Holy Souls are not simply confirmed in grace, but they love

God intensely, according to the degree of that love which He intends them to have throughout all eternity, and here again is another element in their state which enables us to understand how it is a state of the greatest peace. They love God according to their knowledge of Him and of His attributes and character, and among other things in Him which they know and love, is the infinite justice and holiness which places them where they are in His kingdom-that is, in a condition of suffering, which is due to His justice and to their deserts. The love of God is the true peace of the soul, and in proportion as the fire of Purgatory does away with the impediments which their imperfections have placed in the way of His perfect reign in their hearts, so does their love of God grow and become more intense, because it is no longer kept out of the soul by those impediments. We know how the love of God has preserved the saints in tranquillity and peace amid all the greatest troubles and anxieties and persecutions of this world, the most violent sufferings of mind and body, and thus we are able to understand that the same love of God may be the source of ineffable peace to the departed, even amid the severe sufferings which are inflicted in Purgatory.

5. Again, the Psalmist says, Pax multa diligentibus legem tuam-" There is great peace to those who love Thy law." And the Holy Souls are altogether in love with the law of God, and would not have it violated one atom in their own case, even if it were to lead to their own immediate deliverance from their punishments. And as to that special law of God which is His will in every particular matter, they are most perfectly and absolutely conformed to it, and would rather suffer for ever as they do according to His will than be raised at once to the highest glories and enjoyments in Heaven against or without His will. In this again we see how deep their peace must be. No one, moreover, can be said to be without peace, who is perfectly content with his lot and extremely thankful for it, but the holy sufferers.

in Purgatory know that their present condition is the very one condition which suits them best, and is most for their good. They know that God has used towards them infinite mercy in not exacting from them a far greater amount of suffering, that they have deserved far more, and even Hell itself, and on this account they are overflowing with gratitude that their case is not harder than it is.

6. Besides these elements of peace in the Holy Souls there are others which consist in or result from their condition in itself. We all know what are the dangers to peace in this life-dangers so many and so great that it seems almost impossible to be at perfect peace as long as we are as we are. What a blessing we should account it to be free from all external temptation, from all molestation of the evil one, from all provocations to sin from objects external to ourselves, whether they attack us on the side of the irascible part of our nature, or whether their seductions are addressed to our concupiscence! But in the case of the Holy Souls there are no disturbances to their peace from the things which cause us pain or pleasure, which appeal to ambition, or pride, or anger, or envy, or jealousy. All the beauty in the world cannot be a danger to them, all the riches or honours of the world cannot even seem to them desirable, much less be the occasion of serious temptation. But there is a more interior cause of unrest in us in our present condition, without which the external allurement to sin would not have any power to molest us. This is the interior division in ourselves, the struggle of the spirit against the flesh, of reason and conscience against passion and concupiscence, of the lower part of our nature, as we call it, against the higher, the struggle which makes us feel that we have traitors in our own camp, and produces a sense of insecurity which is destructive of all perfect peace. It is in this internal conflict and division that our great danger to sin consists, and so our great cause for perpetual anxiety and watchfulness. But all this is at an end for the Holy Souls. They have no