The Imitation of Christ

Thomas a Kempis

The First Chapter

Imitating Christ and Despising All Vanities on Earth

HE WHO follows Me, walks not in darkness,” says the Lord (John 8:12). By these words of Christ we are advised to imitate His life and habits, if we wish to be truly enlightened and free from all blindness of heart. Let our chief effort, therefore, be to study the life of Jesus Christ.

The teaching of Christ is more excellent than all the advice of the saints, and he who has His spirit will find in it a hidden manna. Now, there are many who hear the Gospel often but care little for it because they have not the spirit of Christ. Yet whoever wishes to under­stand fully the words of Christ must try to pattern his whole life on that of Christ.

What good does it do to speak learnedly about the Trinity if, lacking humility, you displease the Trinity? Indeed it is not learning that makes a man holy and just, but a virtuous life makes him pleasing to God. I would rather feel contrition than know how to define it. For what would it profit us to know the whole Bible by heart and the principles of all the philosophers if we live without grace and the love of God? Vanity of vanities and all is vanity, except to love God and serve Him alone.

This is the greatest wisdom—to seek the kingdom of heaven through contempt of the world. It is vanity, therefore, to seek and trust in riches that perish. It is vanity also to court honor and to be puffed up with pride. It is vanity to follow the lusts of the body and to desire things for which severe punishment later must come. It is vanity to wish for long life and to care little about a well-spent life. It is vanity to be concerned with the present only and not to make provision for things to come. It is vanity to love what passes quickly and not to look ahead where eternal joy abides.


Pagina de descarga

Book eBook The Imitation of Christ


Thomas a Kempis

6 febrero, 2017

update 16 agosto, 2021

Go to the Download page


More eBooks in English


Confession

Confession

Adrienne von Speyr FOREWORD Some years ago I had an experience with the sacrament of penance that I will never forget. It was a Saturday ...
Rome Sweet Home

Rome Sweet Home

Scott and Kimberly Hahn Foreword One of the beautiful and bright-shining stars in the firmament of hope for our desperate days is this couple, Scott ...
An Exorcist Tells His Story

An Exorcist Tells His Story

Gabriele Amorth AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION When the Pope’s Vicar for the Diocese of Rome, Cardinal Ugo Poletti, unexpectedly granted me the faculty of exorcist, I did ...
Theology of the Liturgy

Theology of the Liturgy

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger On the Inaugural Volume of My Collected Works The Second Vatican Council began its work with deliberation on the “Schema on the ...
Return to the Baltic

Return to the Baltic

Hilaire Belloc Return to the Baltic When I was a lad—I had not yet left school—I was taken to see at the Savoy Gilbert and ...
The Wisdom of the Poor One of Assisi

The Wisdom of the Poor One of Assisi

Eloi Leclerc Preface The most awesome sentence which has been pronounced against our times may well be this: We have lost our innocence. To say ...
The Great Heresies

The Great Heresies

Hilaire Belloc INTRODUCTION: HERESY What is a heresy, and what is the historical importance of such a thing? Like most modern words, "Heresy" is used ...
The Path to Rome

The Path to Rome

Hilaire Belloc The Path to Rome When that first Proverb-Maker who has imposed upon all peoples by his epigrams and his fallacious half-truths, his empiricism ...
Images of Hope

Images of Hope

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger Foreword In the course of my years in Rome, I was invited again and again by Bavarian Radio to give meditations on ...
Tolkien: Man and Myth

Tolkien: Man and Myth

Joseph Pearce PREFACE When Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings was voted the ‘greatest book of the century’ in a nationwide poll at the beginning ...
Lord of the World By Robert Hugh Benson

Lord of the World By Robert Hugh Benson

Robert Hugh Benson PREFACE I am perfectly aware that this is a terribly sensational book, and open to innumerable criticisms on that account, as well ...
Treatise on Purgatory

Treatise on Purgatory

Saint Catherine of Genoa INTRODUCTION Saint Catherine of Genoa was born in the Vicolo del Filo in that city, in 1447. She was of the ...
Three to Get Married

Three to Get Married

Fulton J. Sheen 1. The Differences Between Sex and Love Love is primarily in the will, not in the emotions or the glands. The will ...
Via Crucis: A Romance of the Second Crusade

Via Crucis: A Romance of the Second Crusade

F. Marion Crawford CHAPTER I The sun was setting on the fifth day of May, in the year of our Lord's grace eleven hundred and ...
The Confessions of St. Augustine

The Confessions of St. Augustine

Biography of St. Augustine BOOK ONE IN GOD’S searching presence, Augustine undertakes to plumb the depths of his memory to trace the mysterious pilgrimage of ...
Read Me or Rue it

Read Me or Rue it

Fr. Paul O'Sullivan FOREWARD "READ ME OR RUE IT" This title is somewhat startling. Yet, Dear Reader, if you peruse this little book, you will ...
The Brown Scapular, the Most Powerful Sacramental

The Brown Scapular, the Most Powerful Sacramental

Wearing the Scapular, a Form of Consecration WEARING MARY'S Scapular is a way to consecrate ourselves to Her service. Consecration sets apart a person or ...
Those Who Serve God Should Not Follow The Fashions

Those Who Serve God Should Not Follow The Fashions

1. The Mind of the Catholic Church on Modesty in Dress Often today we hear sensible people complaining about the immodesty in dress that is ...
Mary, Motherhood, and the Home

Mary, Motherhood, and the Home

Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen The perfection of all motherhood is Mary, the Mother of Jesus, because she is the only mother in all the world ...
How to Avoid Purgatory

How to Avoid Purgatory

Fr. Paul O’Sullivan Foreword Our Lord came on earth expressly to give us a perfect Redemption. He gave us a Law of Love, a Religion ...
The Story of Annette

The Story of Annette

Robert T. Hart INTRODUCTION What is related in these pages is of the greatest importance. Though the events in question took place in Germany, what ...
The Friendship of Christ

The Friendship of Christ

Robert Hugh Benson It is not good for man to be alone. -- GEN. ii: 18. THE emotion of friendship is amongst the most mighty ...
The Sinner's Guide

The Sinner’s Guide

Venerable Louis of Granada CHAPTER 1 The First Motive which obliges us to practice Virtue and to serve God: His Being in itself, and the ...
A Letter to the Friends of the Cross

A Letter to the Friends of the Cross

Saint Louis Mary Grignon de Montfort EXCELLENCE OF THE ASSOCIATION 1.  Friends of the Cross, you are like crusaders united to fight against the world; ...
On the Incarnation of the Word of God

On the Incarnation of the Word of God

St. Athanasius, Archbishop of Alexandria Chapter 1 Creation and the Fall In our former book we dealt fully enough with a few of the chief ...
Introduction to the Devout Life

Introduction to the Devout Life

Saint Francis de Sales Preface Dear reader, I request you to read this Preface for your own satisfaction as well as mine. The flower-girl Glycera ...
Holy Bible

Holy Bible

Holy Bible The 1983 Code of Canon Law entrusts to the Apostolic See and the episcopal conferences the authority to approve translations of the Sacred ...
The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesuchrist

The Dolorous Passion of Our Lord Jesuchrist

Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich Introduction The following meditations will probably rank high among many similar works which the contemplative love of Jesus has produced; but ...
Time for God

Time for God

Jacques Philippe Introduction In the Western Catholic tradition the term “prayer” covers many different activities. The following pages mainly concentrate on mental prayer: prayer that ...
The Man Who Knew Too Much

The Man Who Knew Too Much

G. K. Chesterton  I. THE FACE IN THE TARGET Harold March, the rising reviewer and social critic, was walking vigorously across a great tableland of ...
0 comentarios

Dejar un comentario

¿Quieres unirte a la conversación?
Siéntete libre de contribuir!

Deja una respuesta