Charity cannot be practiced right unless, first, we exercise it the moment God gives the occasion; and, secondly, retire the instant after to offer it to God by humble thanksgiving. And this for three reasons: first, to render him what we have received from him; the second, to avoid the dangerous temptation which springs from the very goodness of these works; and the third, to unite ourselves to God, in whom the soul expands itself in prayer, with all the graces we have received and the good works we have done, to draw from him new strength against the bad effects which these very works may produce in us if we do not make use of the antidotes which God has ordained against these poisons. The true means to be filled anew with the riches of grace is thus to strip ourselves of it; and without this it is extremely difficult not to grow faint in the practice of good works.