The Four Last Things - by St Thomas More : Pt 4

Sir Thomas More. Holbein the Younger (1527). Frick Collection.

Following recovery from a recent illness, I began reading the Four Last Things, a treatise which Thomas More (1478-1535) wrote in 1522. 

The following posts reproduce the text and notes of an edition by D. O’Connor published in 1903 which is close to the English original of 1557. 

The 1903 footnotes are indicated by [ ] and my own by [ ].  

👈While outwardly he enjoyed a life of comfort, in the privacy of his spiritual life he wore a hair shirt, attended daily Mass, and practised a strict discipline of prayer. He is believed to have become a Third Order Franciscan (and indeed his name is listed in the calendar of Franciscan saints). This may be the significance of the cord shown. 

Sancte Thoma 

Ora pro nobis.

The Four Last Things (continued)

The Last Judgement. Fra Angelico. c1435-40.
Gemäldegalerie Berlin.

Pleasure in spiritual exercise

Therefore let every man, by the labour of his mind and help of prayer, enforce himself in all tribulation and affliction, labour, pain and travail, without spot of pride or ascribing any praise to himself, to conceive a delight and pleasure in such spiritual exercise, and thereby to rise in the love of our Lord, with an hope of heaven, contempt of the world, and longing to be with God. To the attaining of which mind by the putting away of the malicious pleasures of the devil, the filthy pleasures of the flesh, and the vain pleasures of the world, which once excluded, there is place made and clean purged to receive the very sweet and pure pleasure of the spirit, there is not any one thing lightly, as I have said, more accommodate nor more effectual than this thing that I have begun with and taken in hand to entreat[1], that is, to wit, the remembrance of the four last things, which is, as the Scripture saith, so effectual that if a man remember it well he shall never sin.

Two steps to heaven. The mind never idle.

Thou wilt haply say that it is not enough that a man do none evil, but he must also do good. This is very truth that ye say. But first, if there be but these two steps to heaven, he that getteth him on the one is half-way up. And over that, whoso doth none evil, it will be very hard but he must needs do good, sith man’s mind is never idle, but occupied commonly either with good or evil.

Musing

And, therefore, when folk have few words and use much musing, likewise as among many words all be not always well and wisely set, so when the tongue lieth still, if the mind be not occupied well, it were less evil, save for worldly rebuke, to blabber on trifles somewhat sottishly, than, while they seem sage in keeping silence, secretly, peradventure, the meanwhile to fantasy with themselves filthy, sinful devices, whereof their tongues, if they were set on babbling, could not for shame utter and speak the like.

Babbling. Silence.

I say not this for that I would have folk fall to babbling, well wotting[2] that, as the Scripture saith, in many words lacketh not sin[3], but that I would have folk in their silence take good heed that their minds be occupied with good thoughts ; for unoccupied be they never. For if ever the mind were empty, it would be empty when the body sleepeth. But if it were then all empty, we should have no dreams. Then, if the fantasies leave us not sleeping, it is not likely that ever they leave us waking. Wherefore, as I say, let us keep our minds occupied with good thoughts, or else the devil will fill them with evil.

And surely everything hath its mean. There is, as scripture saith, time to speak and time to keep thy tongue[4]. Whensoever the communication is naught[5] and ungodly, it is better to hold thy tongue and think on some better thing the while, than to give ear thereto and underpin[6] the tale. And yet better were it than holding of thy tongue, properly to speak, and with some good grace and pleasant fashion to break into some better matter, by which thy speech and talking thou shalt not only profit thyself as thou shouldst have done by thy well-minded silence, but also amend the whole audience, which is a thing far better and of much more merit. 

When to keep silence

Howbeit, if thou canst find no proper mean to break the tale, then, except thy bare authority suffice to command silence, it were peradventure good rather to keep a good silence thyself, than blunt forth rudely and irrit them to anger, which shall haply therefore not let[7] to talk on, but speak much the more, lest they should seem to leave [off] at thy commandment. And better were it for the while to let one wanton word pass uncontrolled than give occasion of twain. But if the communication be good, then is it better not only to give ear thereto, but also first well and prudently to devise with thyself upon the same ; and then moderately and in good manner, if thou find aught to the purpose, speak thereto and say thy mind therein. So shall it appear to the presence[8] that your mind was well occupied the while, and your thought not wandering forty miles thence while your body was there. 

A vagrant mind

As it often happeth that the very face sheweth the mind walking a pilgrimage, in such wise that, not without some note and reproach of such vagrant mind, other folk suddenly say to them, “A penny for your thought.” Which manner of wandering mind in company may percase[9] be the more excusable sometime by some chargeable[10] business of the party, but surely it is never taken for wisdom nor good manner.

Footnotes

[1] i.e., to treat of.

[2] i.e., knowing.

[3] In the multitude of words there shall not want sin: but he that refraineth his lips is most wise. Prov. x, 19.

[4] A time to keep silence, and a time to speak: Ecclesiastes iii. 7.

[5] i.e., bad or corrupt.

[6] i.e., support.

[7] i.e., cease.

[8] i.e., those present.

[9] i.e., perchance.

[10] chargeable : burdensome, onerous; oppressive. Obsolete.

+       +        +

The Virgin of Tenderness. >12th century.

SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen. 

 

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.

He that hearkeneth to me, shall not be confounded: and they that work by me, shall not sin. They that explain me shall have life everlasting. Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) xxiv. 30-31.