rangest
part of it is that the friar made the invocation after suffering the
consequences of the punishment above mentioned; so that, in other
words, he condescended to allow the devils to have some fun for a
while at his expense.

An Economical Diversion

The same friar "at other times while going to church in prayer,
was caught by the devils and was taken; and they threw him up in the
air so high that, passing above the roofs of the capitular hall which
divides the first cloister from the next, he fell in the latter. There
other devils were awaiting him and receiving him they threw him
anew in the same manner so that he landed again in the principal
cloister without hearing from him a word of protest or suffering until
invoking the sacred names of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, they left him
(p. 15). Who on reading this would not envy a friar having a diversion
so entertaining and so sane and economical? How can one help being
grateful to the demons who received him in the other hall instead
of letting him fall on the floor? With reference to these prodigies
mentioned one reads in the same Novena the following considerations:
"What trouble is there for us to habituate ourselves in repeating in
our invocations the sweetest names of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph? (p. 27).

The Infernal Power

At every step this infernal power is amplified and magnified in these
Novenas. Not only is the devil deemed among the enemies of the soul,
together with our body and the entire humanity, but at every moment
we tremble at his snares, we consider ourselves weak to resist him
and even at times seemingly fearing that the self same God will not
know how to defend Himself from the devil because at every step it is
sought to awaken God and place him as a sort of guard against this
infernal power. "Help us Lord from heaven, our strong liberator in
this struggle with the powers of darkness; and as other times thou
hast freed thy son, Jesus, from imminent peril of life, so now defend
the Holy Church of God from the snares of their enemies and from all
adversity, and keep each one of us under thy eternal protection." (Page
54, Ofrecimiento al Santisimo Rosario, Manila, 1905.)

Another Miracle

The following miracle shows clearly the work of the devil and shows at
the same time that souls cannot be condemned so easily when a mortal
beseeches the protection of a powerful patron. "A certain man,"
it is said in the Novena of San Vicente (