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 (156) I bring to the Lord, to Our Lady, or to an Angel or Saint, material light, in order that the Lord may bestow the light of ;race, spiritual light, upon me through their prayers, that He nay lead me out from the darkness of sin into the light of the knowledge of God and virtue; I bring material fire that the fire f the grace of the Holy Ghost may be kindled in my heart, and hat it may extinguish the fire of the passions of my miserable heart I bring a light with the desire that I may become a light myself, burning and shining to all that are in the temple. These :re the reasons why I place candles before the icons; such are my thoughts when I put candles in the candlesticks. I acknow­ledge that I place these candles before the icons with the hope of receiving spiritual blessings from those holy and all-holy persons who are represented upon them; I acknowledge this spiritual love of gain. But it is the law of reciprocity to expect a gift for a gift. "With what measure ye mete," it is said, "it shall b emeasured  to you again" (St. Matthew VII. 2). I an infirm, carnal, sinful man - they are welcome to all I have; not being always able to bring to my Lord, to His most pure Mother, to an Angel of God, or to a Saint, a heart burning with faith and love, I bring, at least, as a carnal, material man, a material gift as a gift to heaven, a lighted candle. May the Lord look down from heaven upon this little gift of my zeal, and may He give me more in re­turn. He alone is rich, and enriches all, whilst I am poor and needy; He is surrounded with inaccessible light, I am in darkness; I am of little faith, may He grant me the gift of faith; I am poor in love, may He enrich my heart with this priceless heavenly trea­sure; 1 am powerless for all good, may He give me the power. On my part there is the desire for heavenly blessings, and there is a material pledge of this; may the all-endowing Lord grant to me, by prayers of His most pure Mother and those of the Angels and Saints, "all things that I ask that are profitable unto salvation."'

(157) When praying, do everything with understanding. When you pour oil into the lamp burning before an icon, represent to yourself that the Life-giver every day, every hour, every minute supports your life by His Spirit, and, as daily by means of sleep in bodily respects, through prayer and the Word of God in spiritual respects, pours into you the sacred oil of life, by means of which your soul and body burn. When you place a candle before an icon, remember that your life is like a burning candle, that it will burn out and be extinguished, or that some other reasons, such as the passions, surfeiting, wine and other plea­sures, make it burn faster than it should.

158) Do not grudge burning a wax taper before the icon of the Lord during prayer; remember that you burn it before the in­accessible Light and before Him Who enlightens you with His light. Your candle is as though a burnt offering to the Lord; let it be a OIL to God from your whole heart; let it remind you that you. yourself should also be a burning and shining light. "He was," it is said of John the Forerunner, "a burning and a shining light" (St. John V. 35).

(159) In making the sign of the cross, believe and constantly re­member that your sins are nailed to the cross. When you fall into

sin, immediately judge yourself sincerely, and make the sign of the cross over yourself, saying: "Lord, Thou Who nailest our sins to the cross, nail also my present sin to Thy cross, and `have mercy upon me after Thy great goodness;" (Psalm LI. 3) and you will be cleansed from your sin. Amen.

(160) In signing ourselves with the sign of the cross, with the three fingers we lay the upper end of the cross upon the forehead as an emblem of God the Father, Who is the uncreated Wisdom; the lower end of the cross upon the bosom as an emblem of the Son Who was begotten of the Father before all worlds, and which is in the bosom of the Father; and the transverse part upon the shoulders as an emblem of the Holy Ghost, Which is the arm or the power of God, or the hand of the Lord, as had been said: "To whom hath the arm of the Lord been revealed " (St. John XII. 38; Isaiah LIli. 1); or: "The hand of the Lord was there upon me" (Ezekiel Ill. 22); that is, the Holv Ghost. There is, besides, an image of the Holy Trinity in man himself. The thinking mind is the image of God the Father; the heart, in which wisdom dwells and expresses itself, is the image of God the Son, the Personal wisdom of God; the lips, through which that which is in the thoughts and in the heart proceeds, are the image of the Holy Ghost. "He breathed on them, and said unto them: Receive ye the Holy Ghost . . ." (St. John XX. 22). When "Out of the heart pro­ceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications ... blasphemies ..." (St. Matthew XV. 19), then it is the evil spirit nestling in man's heart which comes forth; but when "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good " (St. Luke VI. 45), then that is the image of the Holy Ghost proceeding from the Father through the Son. How great, therefore, is man! It has not been said in vain: "I have said ye are gods, and ye are all children of the most Highest" (Psalm LXXXII. 6). "If He called them gods unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot be broken (that is, if it has been said, then it must be true, immutable), say ye of Him Whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest, because I said, I am the Son of God" (St. John X. 35, 36). O, the dignity! O the greatness of man! Do not look upon any man, especially upon a Christian, otherwise than as upon the Son of God, and receive him as the Son of God, converse with him, behave with him as with the Son of God, by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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