Spiritual writers tell us that the growth of the spirit in the love of God is in one sense like the growth of the body, which passes from infancy through childhood to manhood. Likewise, there are three ages in the spiritual life: that of beginners, whose principal concern is with the eradication of vice; that of the proficient, those who are progressing, and whose concern is mainly with the growth of the virtues, the strengthening of charity; that of the perfect, those who have reached spiritual manhood, who desire "to be dissolved," as St. Paul says, "and to be with Christ," who, though they continue to progress in the virtues, do not make this progress their principal care, but in complete disinterestedness strive simply to cleave to God.

Many of us never get out of the infant stage in the spiritual life. This is the real calamity because each one of us has been called by God to be perfect. Our Lord says to us: "Be ye perfect, as also your Heavenly Father is perfect." We should certainly strive for something higher than merely to avoid venial sin or merely to rise immediately from mortal sin.

If we are going to advance in the love of God, we can do so only by practicing the virtues more intensely and being more docile to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit. It is certainly true that to advance in the love of God is ordinarily a slow process, but it should be steady. The author of THE FOLLOWING OF CHRIST tells us that if we would eradicate but one fault a year, we would soon be saints. It is certainly true, also, that there is no GET RICH QUICK formula in the spiritual life as there is in the business world. More and more people are coming to realize, I believe, that the policy of GETTING RICH QUICK and the fierce desire for efficiency in material things is ruining our world. St. Dominic had no desire to get rich quick when he prayed simply and intensely that he might become a stone blocking the mouth of hell. As we analyze the dispositions of St. Dominic's soul, we see that he had a very great love of God and a very great love of neighbor.

Today we begin a long series of talks on the cardinal virtues. You have often heard sermons on the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity but not too many on the various moral virtues. The theological virtues are concerned with our last end, with God, and they lead us to believe in God, to hope in Him, and to love Him above all. But the moral virtues are extremely important, too, because they are concerned with the means to be used in order to attain our last end.

Are we aware of the four cardinal virtues, Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance and what they mean in our daily lives? Have we ever given much thought to the following virtues and realized that they should be put into practice: confidence - confidence in God and confidence in our fellow man, politeness, loyalty, honesty, nobility, courage, mercy, mildness, zeal, liberality, affability, sense of humor, studiousness, peaceableness, cleanliness, light heartedness - and there are many more?

Have we ever thought about the means we can use to develop any and all of these virtues, such as: daily Mass and Communion, prayer, confession, kindness to all, helpfulness, co-operation, clean speech, self-sacrifice, moderation, school spirit, parish spirit, Catholic spirit, good citizenship, becoming attire, graciousness, friendliness, abstinence, fasting, sobriety, total abstinence, consideration of others, good manners, fraternal correction, almsgiving, Christian leadership, protecting and working for the poor, speaking well of others, spirit of recollection, and the corporal and spiritual works of mercy.

So many of us, I say, never get beyond the beginners' stage, and that is to our shame. We seem to reach a certain state and then we level off. But we can't level off. We are kidding ourselves if we think that we can level off. All spiritual writers are unanimous on this point: we can't stay in one place in the spiritual life. Either we become a little better each day or we become a little worse. And all of us can advance easily and steadily in the love of God if we would only keep in mind St. Paul's suggestion to "Do all for the glory of God." Whether you eat or whether you sleep, of whatsoever else you do, do all for the glory of God. To speak personally, I know that I have to check myself frequently in this matter and ask myself: "Am I doing this to please John, or to please God?"

Anyway, it is certain that if we are going to cease being babes in the spiritual life and simply have as our goal freedom from mortal sin and deliberate venial sin, we have to first know the virtues, know what they are and then put them into daily practice. Then by an earnest desire to improve and through the repetition of these good acts we shall acquire facility and ease in the practice of them; and as we go from victory to victory we shall be very happy at our progress, and faith and reason tell us that God is pleased.

If we fail in the practice of virtue we shall have one great regret when we come to die, the sorrow that we did not become saints.