truth we have great reason to wonder, and to tremble at the same time, when we consider that the ruin of many, who have fallen into this precipice, had its origin from small and trifling occasions. All this happens by the wile and craft of the devil, who dares not attack those that serve God, by tempting them in the beginning to omit things very essential, but begins by those that seem to be of little consequence, and always insensibly gaining some slight advantage, he succeeds better in this manner, than if he had acted otherwise. For if at first he should propose and tempt us to mortal Sin, he would be quickly discovered and repulsed; but insinuating himself by little and little, he through our slight omissions and small faults gets into our souls before we are aware it. It is for this reason St. Gregory says, "that small faults are in some manner more dangerous than great ones" (Greg. 3, past. adm. 34), because great faults, as soon as we reflect on them, carry such horror along with them, as obliges us to endeavour to arise speedily after we have fallen, and to be very circumspect in avoiding them for the future. But the less we perceive small faults, the less we avoid them, and making no account of them, we fall so often, that in time we acquire such a habit of them, as we seldom or never are able to eradicate; so that the evil which at first seemed nothing becomes, by our neglect and frequent relapses, almost incurable. St. Chrysostom confirms the same, when treating of this subject: "I dare," says he, "advance a proposition which will appear strange and unheard of. It seems to me that men ought to be less vigilant in flying from great sins, than in avoiding small faults; for the enormity of great sins naturally excites in us a horror of them, but we are easily induced to commit little faults, because we fancy them not to be considerable, and the little account we make of them, preventing us from endeavouring to correct them, they become at last so great by our negligence, that we are no longer able generously to resist and put a stop to them." (Chrys. horn. 87. sup. Mat.)
It is for this reason that the devil chiefly makes use of this means to assault religious, and those that serve God, because he knows it will be afterwards more easy for him to make them fail in greater and more essential duties. " It makes no matter," says St. Austin, u whether a ship be sent to the bottom by one great wave, or whether the water entering gradually by the chinks, and being neglected to be pumped, at length sinks the vessel." (Aug. Ep. 118. ad Seleu.) The devil, in like manner, cares not whether he enters
