On the Evening Exercise and Examination of Conscience: The Second Exercise.
As before your dinner you will have nourished your soul with the heavenly bread of meditation, so also before your supper you must take a little spiritual supper or collation of recollection and prayer. Therefore, take a few moments shortly before supper-time, and, prostrate before God, gathering all your faculties about Jesus crucified, Whom you will picture to yourself by a simple inward vision, strive to rekindle in your heart the fire of the morning meditation. To this end, you must make a dozen fervent aspirations and ardent outpourings of your soul, addressed to this divine Saviour, either by dwelling again on the things which you relished most in the morning, or by occupying yourself with some other subject of meditation, as you may prefer.
As for the examination of conscience, which one should always make before going to bed, everyone knows how it is to be done.
1. One gives thanks to God for the protection He has granted us throughout the whole day.
2. One examines how one has comported oneself at every hour of the day; and to do this more easily, one recalls where, with whom, and in what circumstances one has been.
3. If one finds that one has done some good, one gives thanks to God for it: if, on the contrary, one has done some evil in thought, word, or deed, one asks pardon of His divine Majesty, with the resolve to confess it at the first opportunity and to amend oneself as soon as possible.
As before your dinner you will have nourished your soul with the heavenly bread of meditation, so also before your supper you must take a little spiritual supper or collation of recollection and prayer. Therefore, take a few moments shortly before supper-time, and, prostrate before God, gathering all your faculties about Jesus crucified, Whom you will picture to yourself by a simple inward vision, strive to rekindle in your heart the fire of the morning meditation. To this end, you must make a dozen fervent aspirations and ardent outpourings of your soul, addressed to this divine Saviour, either by dwelling again on the things which you relished most in the morning, or by occupying yourself with some other subject of meditation, as you may prefer.
As for the examination of conscience, which one should always make before going to bed, everyone knows how it is to be done.
1. One gives thanks to God for the protection He has granted us throughout the whole day.
2. One examines how one has comported oneself at every hour of the day; and to do this more easily, one recalls where, with whom, and in what circumstances one has been.
3. If one finds that one has done some good, one gives thanks to God for it: if, on the contrary, one has done some evil in thought, word, or deed, one asks pardon of His divine Majesty, with the resolve to confess it at the first opportunity and to amend oneself as soon as possible.
4. After this, one commends one’s body, soul, friends, relatives, and the whole Church to divine providence: one prays the Blessed Virgin, the good angel, and the saints to watch over us and pray for us; and, with God’s blessing, one goes to take the rest which He hath willed to make necessary for us.
This exercise must no more be omitted than the morning exercise; for, if by the morning exercise you open your soul to the Sun of Justice, by that of the evening you close it against the darkness of hell.
This exercise must no more be omitted than the morning exercise; for, if by the morning exercise you open your soul to the Sun of Justice, by that of the evening you close it against the darkness of hell.