Convents dedicate to the
Adoration of the Sacrament, to meditation on the Cross, convents in
which active work is eschewed are especially sought by the evil
spirits, "the larvae of monasticism," he called them. An abundance of
leisure is favourable to the hatching of these; and he drew a picture
of how the grub first appears, and then the winged moth, sometimes
brown and repellant, sometimes dressed in attractive colours like the
butterfly. The soul follows as a child follows the butterfly, from
flower to flower through the sunshine, led on out of the sunshine
into dark alleys, at the end of which are dangerous places, from
whence the soul may never return again.
"Nuns and monks of the Middle Ages, those who knew monasticism better
than it ever could be known in these modern days, dreaded these larvae
more than anything else, and they had methods of destroying them and
repelling the beguilements of evil spirits better than we have, for
the contemplative orders were more kindred to those earlier times
than to-day. Monasticism of today takes another turn. Love of God is
eternal, but we must love God in the idiom and spirit of our time."
And Father Daly believed that there was no surer method of escaping
from the danger than by active work, by teaching, which, he argued,
was not incompatible with contemplation, not carried to excess; and
there were also the poor people, and to work for them was always
pleasing to God.
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