28. Neither must it be supposed that the solicitude
of the Church is so preoccupied with the spiritual concerns of her children as
to neglect their temporal and earthly interests. Her desire is that the poor,
for example, should rise above poverty and wretchedness, and better their
condition in life; and for this she makes a strong endeavor. By the fact that
she calls men to virtue and forms them to its practice she promotes this in no
slight degree. Christian morality, when adequately and completely practiced,
leads of itself to temporal prosperity, for it merits the blessing of that God
who is the source of all blessings; it powerfully restrains the greed of
possession and the thirst for pleasure-twin plagues, which too often make a man
who is void of self-restraint miserable in the midst of abundance;(23)
it makes men supply for the lack of means through economy, teaching them to be
content with frugal living, and further, keeping them out of the reach of those
vices which devour not small incomes merely, but large fortunes, and dissipate
many a goodly inheritance.
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