Choose a topic from Part 2B:
1. Gluttony is excess in eating and drinking. It is animmoderate indulgence in the delights of the palate. Gluttony istherefore inordinate, therefore unreasonable, therefore anevil.
2. Gluttony is usually not a serious sin, but it could besuch a sin. It would be a mortal sin in a person so given to thedelights of eating and drinking that he is ready to abandon virtue,and God himself, to obtain this pleasure.
3. Gluttony is a sin of the flesh, a carnal sin.Hence, in itself, it is not so great a sin as a spiritualsin or a sin of malice.
4. Gluttony denotes inordinate desire in eatingand drinking. It shows itself in the avidity with which a personindulges his appetite; in his love of delicate and expensive foods;in the importance he attaches to the discerning of fine qualitiesin foods, vintages, cookery; in voraciousness or greediness; ineating or drinking too much. St. Isidore (De Summ. Bon.ii) says that a gluttonous person is excessive in what, when,how, and how much he eats and drinks.
5. A capital sin is a source-sin; a spring, large orsmall, from whichflow many evil streams. Now gluttony leadsreadily to other sins, for it indulges pleasure of the flesh whichis the most alluring of all pleasures. Gluttony is, therefore, acapital sin.
6. Gluttony leads to inordinate fleshly delight, to dullness ofmind, to injudiciousness of speech, to levity of conduct, and touncleanness.
"It is well to choose some one good devotion, and to stick to it, and never to abandon it."
St Philip Neri
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"God gives us some things, as the beginning of faith, even when we do not pray. Other things, such as perseverance, he has only provided for those who pray."
St Augustine
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"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?"
Thomas á Kempis
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