Today is the feast of St. Roberto Bellarmino, Doctor of the Church.
Now, the reason why there are seven [sacraments] is that God customarily proceeds, in the way in which spiritual life is given, in an incorporeal manner. In as much as He considers the corporeal life: 1) it is necessary to be born; 2) to grow; 3) to be nourished; 4) whenever one must fight, he must be armed; 6) it is necessary that there be some head that rules all men after they are born and increased; 7) that there would be some to whom the duty to propagate the human race would fall, otherwise, if others were not born to succeed the dead the human race would forthwith go out of existence.In the same way, God also constituted this arrangement in the spiritual life. 1) It is necessary for us to be born in the grace of God through Baptism; 2) Confirmation makes it so that grace will grow and be fortified; 3) the Most Holy Eucharist is given so that grace might be nourished and sustained; 4) that whenever the medicine of Penance is received, the grace lost to the soul will be recovered; 5) that when a man is at the point of death he arms itself against the infernal enemy who attacks us more at that time than in any other time, which is done with Extreme Unction; 6) that there would be someone in the Church that rules and governs us in the spiritual life, which is done by one in Orders; 7) that there would be some in the Church who look to the spiritual propagation of the human race, whereby the number of faithful could be increased in this way, which duty is carried out in the Sacrament of Matrimony.
[St. Robert Bellarmine, Doctrina Christiana: The Timeless Catechism of St. Robert Bellarmine, Grant, tr. Mediatrix Press (pp. 153-154).]
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It is also the feast of St. Hildegard von Bingen, Doctor of the Church.
For as good works follow upon a good will, in the same way, because they exist within the knowledge of God, the virtues bend toward the knowledge of God and lead humankind equally to all justice and to the rightness of heaven. For all of the virtues run swiftly alongside the salvation of humankind, although they may not all appear equally in any individual human being. For God's judgment both terrifies humans and examines them, and no human deed remains unscrutinized by God's judgment, for the just judgment of God adjudicates all things justly. Prudence, moreover, unleashes its powers upon humans with providence, so that, as they prudently cast aside the lust of the world, they might embrace chastity. Patience, meanwhile, touches them with gentleness, patiently to endure too the temptations of the flesh; for in both the male and the female sex, the ardor of carnal desire must be stilled by these virtues without any neglectful delay. For this reason, none of the faithful should regard these virtues dismissively, lest the virtues leave them parched in aridity or choked by lustful desires. Rather, they should imitate them with good works, so that the virtues might preserve them in all holiness.
[St. Hildegard of Bingen, The Book of Divine Works, Campbell, tr., The Catholic University of America Press (Washington, DC: 2018) pp. 76-77.]