The Guard Of Angels

Felices proinde fratres nostri, qui jam liberati sunt de laqueo venantium, qui de tabernaculis militantium ad atria quiescentium transierunt, malorum timore sublato, in spe singulariter constituti! Uni istorum, imo universitati dicitur: Non accedet ad te malum, et flagellum non appropinquabit tabernaculo tuo. Sane considera, non ad hominem qui secundum carnem vivit, sed ad eum qui in carne degens secundum spiritum ambulat, hanc fieri promissionem: si quidem non est distinguere inter illum, et tabernaculum suum. Confusa in eo sunt omnia, tanquam in filio Babylonis. Denique hujusmodi homo etiam caro est, nec in eo spiritus manet. Ubi autem non fuerit spiritus bonus, quando deerit malum? Porro ubi malum, flagellum quoque appropinquare necesse est. Semper enim malum poena comitatur. Non accedet ad te malum, et flagellum non appropinquabit tabernaculo tuo. Magna promissio: sed unde id sperare licet? Quomodo malum et flagellum evadam, quomodo effugiam, quomodo elongabo, ut non appropinquent mihi? Quo merito, qua sapientia, qua virtute? Quoniam angelis suis mandavit de te, ut custodiant te in omnibus viis tuis. In quibus omnibus viis? Quibus declinas a malo, quibus fugis a ventura ira. Multae sunt viae, et genera multa viarum: magnum profecto periculum viatori. Quam facile in multarum occursu errabit in via sua, qui viarum discretione caruerit! Nam neque angelis mandavit ut in omnibus viis custodiant nos, sed in omnibus viis nostris. Sunt autem a quibus, non in quibus [alias, et in quibus] oporteat custodiri. Sanctus Bernardus Clarae Vallensis, Sermones De Tempore, In Psalmum XC, Qui Habitat, Sermo XI, De versu undecimo, Quoniam angelis suis mandavit de te ut custodiant te in omnibus viis tuis. Source: Migne PL 183.225c-226a

Happy are those brothers of ours who have already been freed from the trap of the hunters, who from the tents of war have passed over to the courts of peace, drawn out from the fear of evils and singularly established in hope. I shall speak of one of these for all. 'Evil shall not befall you, and the whip shall not draw near your tent.' 1 Consider it well, that this promise is not for a man who lives according to the flesh, but it is for him who casting off the flesh walks according to the spirit, certainly it is not for him who cannot be separated from his tent. In him everything is confused like a child of Babylon. Likewise a man is indeed flesh if no spirit remains in him. When there is no good spirit, how shall one be free of evil? But where there is evil it is also necessary that the whip draws near. Sin is always accompanied by punishment. Let evil not come to you, and the whip shall not draw near your tent. Great is the promise, but how is it possible to hope for it? How shall I avoid evil and the whip, how shall I flee, how set myself far off so that it does not come near me? By what merit, what wisdom, what virtue? 'Because He has commanded His angels to guard you in all your ways.' 2 In every way? In whatever leads away from evil, by which you may flee the coming anger. Many are the ways, and many are the types of ways, and certainly the danger to the traveller is grave. How easily shall a man go on many of them and wander in his way, if he has no care to discern the ways. For He has not commanded angels to guard us in all ways, but in all our ways. And there are some from which, not on which, they should guard us. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, Sermons For The Year, On Psalm 90, He who dwells ..., from Sermon 11, On the eleventh verse, 'Because He has commanded His angels to guard you in all your ways.' 1 Ps 90.10 2 Ps 90.11