Self-Knowledge and Self-Discipline Kindle Edition

Basil William Maturin (1847 – 1915) was an Irish priest and writer. He began his ministry as an Anglican, but later converted to Catholicism, and was appointed Catholic chaplain to the University of Oxford."The knowledge of self is as necessary for the spiritual life as is the knowledge of God," writes Maturin. "It is at once a condition and an effect of this knowledge. The more we grow in the knowledge of God the deeper our knowledge of self, and if we would attain to any knowledge of God there must be some knowledge of self. When Isaias saw the Lord’s Glory in the Temple there was at once a deepening sense of his own sinfulness, “Woe is me, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I have seen with my eyes the King, the Lord of hosts”. For the soul is created in the Image of God, and it cannot approach His Presence without perceiving how unlike it is to Him in whose Image it was made. To know God is to know self. To have no knowledge of God is to walk in darkness, to have no absolute standard by which to gauge and measure oneself. Those who shut God altogether out of their lives are able to live in stupid if not happy ignorance of what a failure their lives are."This classic work contains the following chapters:Self-KnowledgeThe Principle of Self-DisciplineThe Seat of the ConflictThe Discipline of the WillThe Discipline of the MindThe Discipline of the AffectionsThe Discipline of the BodyMortification and the Supernatural LifeThe Preparation for the Revelation of Love Read more