Above all
things be on your guard against the books recommended by worldly
women, lovers of pleasure and parties; those whose light and
frivolous minds sicken at serious thoughts, who are on their guard
lest they may do too much for God, and who vainly endeavor to
reconcile, in a monstrous union, the maxims of the world with those
of the Gospel, the seductions of pleasure with the austerities of
virtue, desiring to serve God and mammon.
If, by some negligence, or even in good faith; you open one of those
books against which you have been warned, shut it the moment you feel
your imagination excited by the images it offers, or when you
perceive that the mind's curiosity becomes aroused to its agreeable
narration of incidents, for it is almost always an unfavorable sign
of a book that produces those and similar effects. Such is not the
manner in which truth and virtue affect us. Their action is milder
and calmer, and has the heart and will, rather than the imagination
for its object. Hence, be on your guard, lest by some indiscretion
you allow a poison to enter your soul, which is never more dangerous
than when it seems least to be feared.
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