> [[jpc-abandonment-08|← Previous]] | [[jpc-abandonment-toc|TOC]] | [[jpc-abandonment-10|Next →]] # Fourth Book. The First Trials of Souls Called to the State of Abandonment. Aridities, Weaknesses and Weariness ## Letter I. *Aridity and Weakness* On the trials above-mentioned. General direction.^1^ God has indeed granted you what you told me you had asked of him, my dear Sister; for, in reading your letter I seemed to be reading your soul, and it appeared to me that I understood your spiritual state as well as if I had been your confessor and director for a long time. Oh! what consoling and instructive things I have to tell you! I hope that the Holy Spirit will enable you to understand and to enjoy them; and that God will deign by the merits of Jesus Christ, and the intercession of his most Holy Mother, of St. Joseph, St. Francis de Sales, and of all the saints of your Order who are now in Heaven, to grant them his holy blessing. 1st. Your vocation seems to me to have the marks of the seal of God; I see in it manifest signs of his divine will, proofs of his gratuitous predilection of your soul, and a solid guarantee of your eternal predestination. 2nd. The attraction you feel to give yourself entirely to him, and live a wholly interior life in spite of the dissipation of your mind, and the rebellion of nature, is a grace the value of which I would that it pleased God to show you as he has me. It is all the more real in being less accessible to the senses and more completely hidden under contrary appearances. 3rd. Why is it, then, that in spite of this attraction, and of all your pious reading, you seem to remain always at the entrance of the interior life without the power of entering? I will tell you the reason, my dear Sister, for I see it very distinctly; it is because you have misused this attraction by inordinate desires, by overeagerness, and a natural activity, thus displeasing God, and stifling the gentle action of grace. Also, because in your conduct there has been a secret and imperceptible presumption which has made you rely on your own industry, and your own efforts. God wishes to humiliate and to confound you by your own experiences, and in this way to moderate that natural ardor that carries you beyond the impressions of grace. Without noticing it you have acted as if you aspired to do all the work by your own industry, and even to do more than God desired. You who would have taken yourself to task for any worldly ambition, have, without scruple, allowed yourself to be carried away by a still more subtle ambition, and by a desire for a high position in the spiritual life. But, be comforted; thanks to the merciful severity of God's dealings with you, so far there is nothing lost; on the contrary you have gained greatly. God punishes you for these imperfections like a good father, with tenderness; and enables you to find a remedy for the evil in the chastisement he inflicts on you. To avenge these infidelities he sends you the sort of trials he is accustomed to make use of to purify and detach those chosen souls called to pure love and divine union. If you understood this fatherly conduct in your regard, and looked at your trials from the right point of view all your fears would disappear of their own accord. You would not be surprised, for example, that your aridity and interior trouble have increased since you entered religion. I am not by any means surprised, and should have been very sorry on your account had it been otherwise. Has it not been since then, in fact, that you have belonged more entirely to God, and that this Divine Spouse has labored more energetically to purify your soul, and to render it capable of being perfectly united to him? 4th. As for that state of dissipation of which you complain so much, I agree with you in thinking that it is partly the result of your natural character, of the liveliness of your imagination and, above all, of habit. However, God has only allowed this result to humble and confound you more completely; and the keen pain you suffer is not the least part of the merit of this trial. You see I am very far from believing, as you do, that there is no remedy for this evil or that it is caused by some secret sins. The fear that this dissipation of mind causes you when you go to prayer is a temptation, or else simply imagination, and God gives you a great grace in giving you courage to take no notice of it, but to approach him with confidence in spite of this misleading fear. 5th. In your distaste for your outward occupations and duties I see only another side of your trials and one which can be very meritorious in the sight of God provided that you overcome it instead of allowing yourself to be overcome by it. The acts that make in opposition to this feeling, and of sacrifice and self-abnegation are very solid and very good. The merit of these acts is much increased by the renewal of the interior rebellions by which you are crucified; this is another part of the trial. 6th. That which you add about your powerlessness and apparent idleness in prayer, is a consequence of this trial, and naturally follows it; I should have been greatly surprised had it been otherwise. Be reassured, therefore, for you will have to continue to waste your time in prayer, my dear Sister, and although you might do it more quietly, and this, please God, you will eventually achieve, you will never make any prayer that would be better, more useful, or more meritorious; because the prayer of abnegation and suffering being more crucifying is also more purifying for the soul, and makes it die to self more quickly in order to live henceforth in God and for God. Oh! how much I love such prayer during which you stand before God like a beast of burden feeling nothing and bowed down under the weight of all sorts of temptations! What could be more calculated to humble, confound and annihilate a soul before God? This is what the soul requires, and to what its apparent miseries lead. Ah! if you only knew how to remain with respect and submission in this humiliating condition, abandoning yourself so entirely to the divine will as to take pleasure in your abjection and annihilation for the love of God, you would become much more pleasing to him in your inaction and silence than by making the most explicit and energetic acts! No! there is no sacrifice more acceptable to God than a broken and humble heart, this is truly a holocaust full of sweet odors. Prayers that are full of fervor and devotion, or voluntary mortifications, bear no comparison because they cannot come near it. 7th. Your terrors about confession and Communion are to be rejected and despised as temptations and imaginations; they are another part of your trial. However, should they continue to trouble you, in spite of your resistance, take no notice, and be patient in this state as in other things. As to the wish to get rid of this trying state, it is not the direct, but the natural result of the trial, and the effect of self-love which cries out, and struggles rebelliously when it finds itself on the point of being pitilessly exterminated. You must not be daunted, nor terrified, but struggle bravely with your free will against these desires, and persevere with an unshaken constancy in choosing always to accomplish the holy will of God. This point is of the first importance, not only to gather the fruit of the trial, but also to soften its bitterness and to shorten its duration. If, in your case, it has lasted a long time, I have grounds for attributing this to the fact that you have not had sufficient courage to make the entire sacrifice that God demanded of you. Hasten then to make it, and say to him, "Yes, my God, I accept all, I submit to all without reserve, and for as long as you please." From all I have just said you will conclude without difficulty that there is but one thing for you to do, which is to let God dispose of you as he pleases, and to keep yourself quietly and interiorly tranquil as far as you can, but nevertheless without effort. Abandonment to God is for you just now the one thing necessary. To effect this thoroughly I give you the following rules: 1st. When you go to prayer you must be resigned to suffer at it, to be tormented and afflicted exactly as God pleases. When distractions, aridity, temptations and weariness overwhelm you, say, "you are welcome, Cross of my God; I embrace you with a resigned will; make me suffer until my self-love becomes crucified and dead." Then remain in God's presence like a beast of burden weighed down with its load, and almost ready to perish, but expecting succor and help from its Master. If you could but throw yourself in spirit at the foot of the Cross of Jesus Christ, humbly kiss his sacred wounds, and remain there at his divine feet steadfast and motionless, and do nothing else but wait patiently in silence and peace as a poor beggar waits for hours at a time at the gates of a great king, or of a generous and rich benefactor, hoping to receive an alms. But before all things do not dream of making any more efforts, either in prayer, or in anything else, trying to be more recollected than God wishes you to be. 2nd. Do not therefore, make any violent efforts to preserve recollection during the day, or to drive away the continual distractions that make you uneasy; be satisfied to know that this state of dissipation displeases you, and that you have a great desire to be recollected; but only when it pleases God, and as much as it pleases him, neither more nor less. 3rd. If the dissipation of mind should sometimes be so trying, and the aridity, troubles, fears and other vexatious feelings so overwhelming that you cannot make a single interior act, nor even entertain a good thought, do not be cast down. You have nothing to fear, but rather, much to gain if, in this deplorable condition you understand how to remain in the simple interior silence of respect, submission and adoration of which I have already spoken, and to bury yourself in the abyss of your own nothingness. This nothingness, accepted and loved for the love of God, is your safe refuge in the midst of these storms. It is there that you must remain, and it is from thence that you must take pleasure in beholding the fulfillment within you of the will of God. You must love to see him, in imagination, raining down from the heights of Heaven, distractions, aridity, fears, anguish and every species of trouble and humiliation on your soul; as if he would make of you the plaything of his pleasure and of his divine love; just as one sees sometimes, how great princes will amuse themselves with splashing one of their favorites with mud. 4th. As to the sacraments take good care never to omit receiving them. "But," you say to me, "how can I prepare for confession and Communion when my mind is obsessed with all sorts of fears and difficulties?" You must despise them, take no notice, and go straight to God without ever disputing or reasoning with them either for or against, and having done the little you could, or knew how to do, quietly, and without effort, remain tranquil in the perfect interior silence of faith, respect, submission and confidence often saying, but without words: "May my sovereign Lord and Master do with me whatever he pleases. Amen! Amen!" 5th. As in all that you tell me there is no sin, or at any rate, nothing voluntary although it often seems otherwise to you, keep yourself in a constant state of calmness and tranquility. I do not speak of the lower part of the soul, which is all in trouble and desolation: but of the superior part, of that profound depth of your soul, which, with God's help, can remain tranquil and peaceful in the midst of these storms and commotions. Agitation is, so to speak, only outside the soul in the exterior senses, to mortify them and cause them to die, as they must in order to be able to attain to pure love and union with God. It is for you to prevent this trouble from penetrating to the interior; and it is in this, that, up to now, you have not been sufficiently enlightened, nor faithful enough. 6th. In fact, although I can discover no particular sin in your conduct, yet I perceive a whole host of defects and imperfections in it which might do you great harm if you did not apply a strong remedy. These are uneasiness, foolish fears, depression, weariness and a discouragement not quite free from deliberation, or at least not combated with sufficient energy, all of which tend to diminish that interior peace the necessity for which I am endeavoring to inculcate. "But what can I do to prevent them?" This: first, never retain them willfully; secondly, never parley with them, nor yet combat them with effort or violence, because that would make them doubly hurtful; but drop them, like one drops a stone into the water; think of something else, speak to God of other things, as St. Francis de Sales advises, then take refuge in the interior silence of respect, submission, confidence and a total abandonment. "But," you say, "supposing that in these, or in other matters I commit faults, how ought I to behave?" Well! then you must bear in mind the advice of St. Francis de Sales; do not trouble yourself about your troubles, do not be uneasy about your uneasiness, do not be discouraged because you are discouraged, but return immediately to God without violence but humbling yourself quietly and tranquilly, even thanking him for having prevented you from falling into greater faults. This sweet and gentle humility united to confidence in the divine goodness will tranquilize and pacify your soul, and this is, at present, your greatest spiritual need. I forgot to tell you that your great desire of divine love in spite of what you undergo afterward, is certainly not an imagination, nor a chimera, on the contrary it is very real, very solid and most excellent, and must be preserved, but quietly and gently without giving way to those feelings of fervor, to those transports of the imagination, or to that natural activity that spoils everything. That which you experience, after having been all on fire with these ardent desires, when you try to return to yourself, need not surprise you. I will try and make clear by a comparison what then takes place within you. When you throw a very dry piece of wood that will burn easily, on the fire, the flame seizes it at once and consumes it quietly and noiselessly; but if you throw green wood on the fire the flame does not affect it except for a moment, and then the heat of the fire acting on the green wet wood makes it exude moisture and emit sighing sounds, and twists and turns it in a hundred different ways with great noise, until it has been made dry enough for the fire to take hold of it; then the flame spreads and consumes it without any effort or noise, but quietly. This is an image of the action of divine love on souls that are still full of imperfections and the evil inclinations of self-love. These must be purified, refined and cleared away and this cannot be achieved without trouble and suffering. Look upon yourself then, as this green wood acted on by divine love before it is able to enkindle it, and to consume it with its flames. Or else as a statue under the hands of a sculptor, or like a stone which is chipped and cut with the chisel and hammer to make it the right shape to take its place in a beautiful building. If this stone could feel, and if, while it thus suffered it asked you what it should do in so much pain, you would, without doubt, reply, "Keep perfectly quiet in the hands of the workman and let him proceed with his work, otherwise you will always remain a rough common piece of stone." Take this advice yourself, have patience and let God do the work, because there is really nothing else for you to do, only say, "I adore and I submit. Fiat!" ## Letter II. *On Different States of the Soul* To Sister Marie-Thérèse de Vioménil, on interior vicissitudes. My dear Sister, The different states that you depict in your letter to me are nothing more than interior vicissitudes to which we are all subject. These perpetual alternations of light and darkness, of consolation and desolation, are as useful, I should say, as indispensable for the growth and ripening of virtue in our souls, as the atmospheric changes are necessary for the growth and ripening of the harvests. Let us learn, therefore, to resign ourselves to them, and to accept with equal love trials and consolations, for all trials, even the most painful, are equally just, holy and beneficial, whether they proceed from the justice, or the mercy of God. Often they are sent to us both by justice and mercy, but while we are on earth justice is never exercised without mercy. I am delighted to hear that your usual occupation during prayer is the contemplation of your weakness, and the realization of your nothingness; this is the way to acquire, by degrees, an entire distrust of self, and a perfect confidence in God only; also in this way you will become perfectly grounded in interior humility, which is the firm and solid foundation of the spiritual edifice, and the principal source of all the graces of God in the soul. You need neither be surprised nor pained at the destruction of all that is dear to self-love; it would not be self-love if it did not fear this. Only those souls that are already detached from self are free from the fear of this death; and not only do they not fear it, but they desire and beg it of God without ceasing. For us it is enough if we endure in peace, and with patience the successive blows that are effecting it. It often happens that during the day we experience certain feelings and desires for God or divine things, which do not occur during prayer. God arranges it thus so that we may recognize that he is absolute Master of all his gifts and graces; that he bestows them when and where it pleases him. In receiving them thus, at times when we least expect them and in being disappointed at other times when we expect them, we shall no longer be able to persuade ourselves that they are the result of our own disposition, work or industry; this is what God intends to prove to us. Therefore if he is prodigal of his gifts he expects to receive all the glory of them, and would be compelled to withdraw them if he found that we appropriated any part of them through self-satisfaction. ## Letter III. *Abandonment During Trials* To Mlle. de Serre who afterward became Sister Catharine-Angélique. Keep steadfast my dear daughter, in the midst of your violent interior afflictions, and never relinquish the practice of entire abandonment to God, and of perfect confidence in his goodness. Encourage yourself with these two obvious and invariable principles: first, that God will never abandon any who have abandoned themselves entirely to him, and who trust completely in his infinite mercy. Secondly, that nothing happens in this world that is not according to the decrees of Providence who turns all things to the advantage and greater profit of souls that are submissive and resigned. Contrary thoughts and interior combats will only serve, if you remain faithful, to strengthen in your mind, and to root more firmly in your heart, the truths and feelings so necessary for your sanctification. The perfection of the state to which God calls you is, no doubt, beyond your power to attain, neither can you depend on yourself in the very slightest degree for its attainment; on the contrary you must beware of doing so, and rely on God only, grounding yourself on his succor and the power of his grace, with the help of which so many others weaker than yourself have been able, and are still able to do what seems to you so difficult. You ought, therefore, to repeat continually, "Yes! considering my weakness and misery, this would be as impossible as flying in the air. But that which is impossible to man becomes possible, pleasant and easy with the assistance of the all-powerful grace of Jesus Christ, and I hope to obtain this grace from his goodness, and through his infinite merits." In this way have many young people, who were naturally feeble and timid, triumphed over cruel tyrants, and braved the most terrible sufferings and outrages and shed their blood in imitation and love of a crucified God. The weariness, distaste and dryness from which you frequently suffer are the usual vicissitudes through which all those souls, aiming at union with God, are accustomed to pass. What merit should we gain, and how should we prove our fidelity to God if we were always supported, helped and consoled in a sensible manner by interior grace? What is essential is to be faithful in the fulfillment of all our duties, and of those interior and exterior practices that belong to our state, as much during dryness and distaste as in sweetness and sensible devotion. Although then we do nothing without effort and repugnance, the merit is nonetheless great. In this way only is our love of God completely free from that unhappy self-love which thrusts itself everywhere, mixes with everything and spoils everything, as St. Francis de Sales says. As there is a sweet and delightful peace to be felt during prayer, so also is there a dry, bitter and sometimes a suffering peace by which God operates more freely in the soul than by the former which is more subject to the inroads of self-love. Therefore one must abandon oneself to God in this as in all other things. We must allow him to work, because he knows better than we do what is good for us. Let us fear only one thing, and that is to allow our self-will to lead us astray. To avoid this danger it only needs to will exactly what God wills, always, at every moment and for everything. This is the safest, the shortest, I even dare to say the only road to perfection; any other is subject to illusion, pride and self-love. For the rest, drop gradually but quietly the lengthy reasonings which absorb your mind during prayer, and aim, rather, at affections, aspirations, desires for God, and a simple repose in him. This will not prevent you, however, from pausing a little over good thoughts, if they are simple, quiet and peaceful, and seem to come and go of their own accord. ## Letter IV. *Darkness and Doubts* To a Postulant,^2^ on obscurity and weakness. My dear Sister, All that you describe to me in your letter appears to me so easy to decide that God must have kept you in very great darkness if you have not been able, with the help of his grace, to find a clue for yourself. Besides, as you tell me, God does, occasionally, send you some rays of light to illuminate your soul, and disperse the darkness of your doubts. These gleams of light which enkindle your heart, filling it with a sweet peace and great courage in the service of God, can come only from Heaven. Therefore you can follow these lights without fear, and the recollection of them will suffice to sustain and guide you in moments of darkness. However, since God has inspired you to apply to me again, it will be quite easy to satisfy you in each particular. 1st. The snares and subtleties of self-love render you, you say, incapable of seeing things in their proper light. Then why do you attempt to do so? Have you not, in holy obedience, an infallible guide, and in humility and docility sure guarantees that you are not misled in following the decisions laid down for you? 2nd. After having consulted your Superior or your Mistress with the simplicity of a little child, remain in peace, for this is your security. If you do not submit to this rule, you will be much to be pitied, and it will be your own fault. 3rd. To feel so keenly your weakness, and need of sensible support, and as it were, always on the edge of a precipice is, in truth, a very humiliating trial, but a very salutary one, since it leads infallibly to a total distrust of self, and to the most perfect confidence in God. This is the only way to leave the region of the senses, and to enter the life of pure faith and love which is wholly spiritual. 4th. The dark dungeon in which you find yourself is a prison into which, I will not say the justice of God, but his very great mercy, throws you from time to time to purify you like gold in a crucible. You have only to stay there as quietly as you can. "But how then shall I practice virtue?" In this case virtue consists in suffering, in silent endurance and abandonment, and in humble and loving submission. You know the great maxim that more progress is made during suffering than in action. "But," you will say, "I commit sin while in this state." No, there is no sin, the Master of the prison will prevent that. "But it seems to me that I look upon Hell with indifference." This is a strong way of expressing yourself, but, thank God, I can understand the meaning of it better than you do. It only expresses the result of that interior operation by which God weakens your self-love. Take courage, the day will come, and perhaps soon, when you will be able to realize the great good effected in this dark prison; for the present you must live in this hope without other light than that of faith. 5th. No doubt, there occur, in your state of interior fever, paroxysms which seem to devour and consume you. These are caused by what is impure and earthly in the depths of the soul, which is thus consumed and devoured, like the evil humors of the body during the paroxysms of certain fevers. This is a symptom of cure not of illness. "But at these times I can neither pray, nor have recourse to God." No, perhaps not, at any rate not in a perceptible manner; but the heart prays without ceasing by hidden desires known only to God. Your conclusion really made me laugh; "Judge, therefore," you say, "how I acquit myself of the obligation of reciting the Office, assisting at Mass and the rest." Very willingly, my dear Sister, would I take upon myself all the evil you commit in these circumstances, if you would concede me all the good that God is effecting in you. That little word, "therefore", has given me an insight into a certain temptation which the subtlety of the evil spirit tries to introduce into your soul. But let us follow your letter, and the thread of my reply. You begin to think, say you, that you were very rash in making a vow to become a Religious, and that the observances of the religious life are far beyond your powers. If I had not had a long experience of the progress made by even the most manifest temptations, when they are given the least encouragement under pretext of examining them, I should never have imagined you capable of succumbing so foolishly to this one. To cut it short I must tell you firstly, that I knew by the drift of your letter that this was the temptation the devil aimed at by all the changes he has rung in your soul. If he can only make you relinquish your prize, what a victory he will gain! what a triumph for all Hell! Secondly, I forbid you in the name of God and by all the authority he has given me over you, either to listen to, or examine into this subject in any way; and I command you to act about it in the same way as if the devil suggested that you should throw yourself into a well or poison all the Religious. Thirdly, God wills you to embrace the religious life; this then ought to take place, and will take place in spite of all Hell let loose to prevent it. "But the spiritual afflictions! the bodily infirmities!" If necessary God will perform miracles about them, and you must expect these miracles when they are required. Now humble yourself, my dear Sister, annihilate yourself profoundly before God, confess to him that you are weakness and inconstancy itself. This experience should serve for the future to make you feel how necessary it is to distrust self in our boasted courage and apparent firmness in good resolutions which come to nothing without God's ceaseless support. How poor, weak and miserable beyond all expression are we not, and liable to go wrong in every imaginable way, and in things we should never have thought possible! 6th. The sensitiveness you feel when being corrected, in this state of trouble, ought to be a subject of humiliation, but not of discouragement; because it is true that at such times sensitiveness is so keen that St. Teresa herself was obliged to be on her guard against a spiteful and fretful temper which she was tempted to vent on the Sisters. It would take too long to tell you the great good God produces in our souls by these feelings and rebellions, provided they are borne patiently. 7th. God makes you feel that Satan is laying traps for you, and that, at the same time his invisible hand bears you up, and holds you back; what could be more encouraging? Keep firm, all this will turn to your very great good, and above all will serve to make you thoroughly convinced of your own weakness which you have never hitherto understood such as it is. You require all these temptations and trials to convince you of it, and to tear from your heart every fiber of foolish self-confidence. It is only when we begin to be cured that we recognize the evil. I finish by repeating that your state, although, in truth, very crucifying, is nevertheless, and indeed on that account, very safe, very purifying and very sanctifying. You need fear no danger, as long as you hold by Fénélon's great rule: despair entirely of yourself, and put not an atom of confidence in anything but God alone, who, from the very stones can raise up children to Abraham. ## Letter V. *Distractions in Prayer* To Sister Marie-Henriette de Bousmard (1734), on weakness and distractions. My dear Sister, 1st. Do not regret the consolations and sensible devotion that God gave you formerly, and has now taken away. With the consolations that you experienced were mingled a thousand imperfections. It is true that by the very fact that these consolations were felt they were extremely pleasant to nature which always desires to see, know and feel; but the more according to nature is the state, the less is it adapted for the requirements of divine love. This is the reason that God quickly withdraws a soul from this state; and the more quickly, the more faithfully it responds to his grace. If he did not act toward us, in this respect, with a fatherly strictness, we should always remain feeble, subject to all sorts of defects, and incapable of protecting ourselves against the allurements and illusions of self-love. The soul that has not been enlightened and set free by trials, indulges, almost without perceiving it, in continual self-examinations, and makes its satisfaction and peace depend on feelings, the most unstable things in the world; if it loves God, it is not only for himself but much more on account of the consolations it expects from him, and it remains in a vain self-satisfaction occasioned by the spiritual riches it supposes itself to possess, and God grant that it may not end by worshipping its own imaginary excellence. However, even if the soul avoids this criminal excess, it is to be greatly feared, that being full of itself it remains empty of God. Rather than expose the souls that he loves with a love of predilection to such a fearful misfortune, God sends them all sorts of trials. He strikes them, humiliates them and makes them contemptible in their own eyes. But how superabundantly does he not compensate those who remain faithful during trials, for the privations they have endured! When, by a complete destruction of one's whole spiritual fortune, one finds oneself reduced to nothing, then one suddenly discovers that one has neither vanity, presumption nor self-esteem, but is filled with distrust, humility, confidence in God and love for him; and this love is then absolutely pure because self-love has nothing to lean upon, and, consequently, nothing to become attached to, or to corrupt. Therefore I set more value on your present poverty than on all those former beautiful feelings that seemed to you so perfectly pure, but of which your self-love secretly made its most delicious pasture. 2nd. It seems, sometimes, as if one had neither faith, hope nor charity, and as if one were without religion, without any virtue, as if one had lost all knowledge of God. This happens when he is pleased to withdraw all delight, all unction and all that is sensible to make it reside in the essence of the soul, and to enable it to advance by the practice of pure faith. Then it is that God is served and adored in spirit and in truth, as Jesus Christ said to the woman of Samaria. This state is even further removed from the senses, and is, therefore, more valuable, higher, more purified and more solid. In it can the pure delights of the spirit be enjoyed; but this is only to be attained by the privation of all sensible pleasure, as sensible devotion can only be enjoyed by the privation of sensual and earthly pleasure. In this state, however, there is always peace, because the soul is then established in God and feels just as you feel; I mean a secret and hidden power proceeding from the inmost presence of God, and this support, imperceptible though it is, makes a soul stronger than when it believed itself ready to endure martyrdom. So remain in peace, and bless God. 3rd. As for the innumerable acts of offering, resignation, et cetera, without doubt they are suitable for beginners to form a habit of making them; but in your present state they are made by, and in your heart, and almost without your thinking of it. Does not God see all your intentions, even the most secret, without having them explained to him by what are called formal and express acts? When, in the midst of your good works some secret intention of self-love, pride or human respect insinuates itself into your heart, far from making express acts you would endeavor to hide from yourself these perverse intentions, convinced that God sees, and will punish them; do you not believe then that he also sees your secret good intentions and that he is as liberal in rewarding as he is strict in punishing? 4th. The wandering of your thoughts is but another trial from God, an occasion of suffering, of humiliation, and an exercise of patience and of merit, and the anxiety it causes you is a proof of the desire you have of being always occupied with God. Besides, God sees this desire, and, in his sight, desires are equal to acts, whether for good or evil. Suffer, therefore, humbly and patiently all the involuntary wanderings of your mind, and take care not to trouble about them, nor to examine anxiously what could have caused them; this would be a simple curiosity of self-love which God would punish with still greater darkness. Remember what St. Teresa said on this subject, "Let the clapper make a noise, provided the mill grinds the corn." She compares the wandering mind to the clapper, and the will tending to God to the mill that grinds the corn. A will fixed on God is what we should hope for above all things. What do you think takes place in the heart of a worldly woman during a fine sermon? Doubtless a hundred good thoughts pass through her mind and imagination while her will and her heart are fixed on the object of her passion; is she any holier for that? With you it is exactly the contrary; why then do you distress yourself? Otherwise what signifies this tranquility and peace of the soul in the midst of these attacks, these pains and this torment, and the little desire you have to refer to them? Is not this a great gift of God, and an evident sign that it is he who, so delicately, and so peacefully wounds the heart? Remain then tranquilly in your state of total abandonment to God, and do not trouble yourself to find out how you form acts; they are formed by the secret and imperceptible movements of your heart that God touches interiorly, and which he moves as he pleases. 5th. I am not surprised at the fatigue and emptiness you experience in making efforts to multiply and reiterate your interior acts. This is because in this way you withdraw yourself from the operation of God to act for yourself, as if you wanted to anticipate grace and to do more than God wished. This is indeed natural activity! Be content to remain at peace in your soul, and keep yourself there as in a prison where God is pleased to immure you, without bethinking yourself of making unseasonable escapes. Thus you will be in that state of holy and fruitful idleness that the saints describe, and thus also you will have many and great occupations without labor. It is self-love only that complains and is in despair at having nothing to do, to see, to feel nor to hear; but let it groan as much as it likes, by dint of worrying and despairing it will rid you finally of its presence. By cutting off supplies we shall starve it out. Oh! what a fortunate release! I wish it for you as for myself with all my heart. 6th. The way in which you keep in the presence of God by a simple glance of faith without mental images, figures or any kind of representation, in a total surrender of your whole self, is the most pure and most perfect way of treating with God. It is the true prayer of the heart, a quite interior prayer, the sincere prayer of spirit to spirit, and the more simple, free, imperceptible and removed it is from all that can be felt so much the more solid, sublime, penetrating and efficacious it becomes, says the holy Mother de Chantal. ## Letter VI. *Fear of Wasting Time* To Sister Marie-Henriette de Mahuet, on interior rebellion and spiritual poverty. (Albi, 1732). My dear Sister, Nothing is more common with souls who have not yet acquired much experience in the ways of the spiritual life, than the fear about which you have consulted me; I mean the fear of wasting time in the prayer of the simple presence of God. But it is easy to reassure such souls, and to reassure you also. For this it suffices to recall to your mind the principle laid down by the Divine Master: "the tree is known by its fruits." That which produces only good effects cannot but be good. Besides, your own experience teaches you that since you applied yourself to this kind of prayer you have become, interiorly, greatly changed for the better. You have, then, only to thank God for the favor he has granted you in substituting as he has, the peaceful action of his grace for the agitation of your natural activity. I wish you could accustom yourself always to judge of your progress and the state of your soul by the infallible rules of faith and the counsels of the Gospel. When you find that your ways, your ideas and your conduct agree with the teachings of faith, and with the practice of the saints, you may hold them to be good, and perfectly safe. In this no illusion is possible, as it is when one judges oneself by sensible impressions, which are always deceptive. To guide one's conduct by these impressions is to take a weathervane, which turns with every wind, for a mariner's compass. It is impossible to navigate safely unless guided by the sure and infallible rules of faith which make us turn away from sin, love God and our neighbor, detach us from creatures, and lead us to obedience, self-forgetfulness, complete submission to the will of God, abnegation and mortification. The kind of prayer which produces these effects is, without doubt, the best. 2nd. As those spiritual books which treat of prayer might fall into the hands of all sorts of persons, and consequently not be well understood, authors and preachers do wisely in making use of general terms and in laying down only general rules, in order to avoid giving any handle for illusion; but directors, in speaking to persons they are well acquainted with, make use of a different method to reassure those under their direction who, without cause, would be terrified in reading or listening to sermons. It is because of my knowledge of your state and of God's designs on your behalf that I do not hesitate to reassure you. Go forward without a shadow of fear. No one can experience the fruit of the blessing of God, unless he follow the attraction of God. The deceptions and illusions of the spirit of darkness are made known by their effects and fruits which are contrary to those produced by grace. If I saw you exposed to these illusions I should not fail to tell you of it; and in default of me there are others who would render you this service on condition that you laid bare your mind to them with sincerity. 3rd. The rule of faith must be also taken, by which to form a judgment about the stupidity you have experienced for some time past. If it be only a question of being stupid, dull and slow, and even insensible to all the things of this world, faith teaches us that this stupidity is true wisdom. But even if this same stupidity should seem to extend, sometimes, to things of salvation, that is no proof that it is a sign of your being at a distance from God, if it does not prevent you from fulfilling your duties, keeping the Rule and carrying out your exercises of piety. You should, therefore, regard it as a trial from God which you have in common with nearly all the saints. Be faithful, and while accepting this apparent stupidity you will find in it a very meritorious exercise of patience, submission and interior humility. It can only be prejudicial to self-love, which dies gradually and is thus destroyed and annihilated more efficaciously than by any exterior mortification. 4th. When we have to make great sacrifices, nature and self-love, reluctant to do so, excite rebellions in the heart which seem to overthrow the whole soul. Did not Jesus Christ himself experience the same in the Garden of Olives? It is enough therefore for the superior part of the soul to remain firm and to say with Jesus Christ, "Fiat voluntas tua." These are the interior combats of which St. Paul speaks, and after him all the masters of the spiritual life: this is how the just man truly lives by faith and escapes from the rule of the senses: these are the great victories which will be crowned in this world by peace, and the submission of the lower nature; in the next by the possession of a God. 5th. The last and most efficacious of all the remedies I have to offer you is an entire and total abandonment into the hands of this God of goodness, who has not ceased for a long time in being beforehand with the blessings of his very great mercy. You must throw yourself into this abandonment with the same courage with which you would cast yourself into the sea if God asked this sacrifice of you; in the same way as, in times past, a holy martyr by a particular attraction, and an especial inspiration threw herself into the midst of the flames without waiting for the executioners. It is this courage, and this holy abandonment founded on faith and love which charms the heart of God, and establishes in the soul a peace that nothing can disturb. 6th. Your conduct in avoiding useless visits, waste of time, and distractions, seems to me excellent. Know that exterior solitude is the rampart of that which is interior which, without it, can with difficulty be preserved. I advise you to add, with regard to the people in the house, the greatest possible silence, never speaking without a reason, nor without some holy motive ---such as for a necessary recreation, to refresh yourself a little, for the sake of charity, or religious condescension; or to overcome yourself about certain persons toward whom you may feel some antipathy. Finally I recall to your mind a maxim that I wish I could engrave on every heart, and especially on the hearts of Religious, and devout persons who are distressed and uneasy at seeing how poor, miserable and destitute they are; as they say with sighs and groans. This maxim alone can make them tranquil, contented and even exceedingly rich in their spiritual poverty. You understand what I mean beforehand, that true perfection and consequently the real wealth of the soul consists in conforming our will to the will of God. Consequently every time that, overcome by the sense of your weakness and interior misery, you think that, while avoiding by the grace of God everything that could offend him, you are, at the same time very devoid of those gifts and graces by which the saints were enriched, you can and ought to say: "My God, I will all that you will and for as long as it pleases you." "But," you will say, "what resource shall I have if God takes me at my word, and keeps me always in this state of spiritual poverty?" You will have, my dear sister, only the will of God, and this resource will take the place of every other. This divine and adorable will will supply you with all the gifts in which you are wanting, it will become your treasure, and will constitute a spiritual fortune in the very midst of your poverty; for how can anyone be more rich in the sight of God than by conforming in all things to his most holy will even in those things that are most afflicting? Can anyone be more certain of possessing pure love, than those who resign themselves willingly to all that is most mortifying to that most sensitive form of self-love, spiritual self-love? Believe me, my dear Sister, the soul that regards its poverty in this light need not envy even those souls which are most greatly enriched with the gifts of God. ## Letter VII. *On Darkness and Want of Feeling* To Sister Marie-Thérèse de Vioménil. My dear Sister and very dear daughter in our Lord. May the peace of our Lord be always with you. By what you tell me I understand that you are in a state of obscurity; but far from sharing the alarms that this state ---a very ordinary one in persons of your sex ---causes you; I believe it to be, unquestionably, the most safe because it is less exposed to the delusions of self-love, to attacks of vanity, and therefore, even this obscurity is a grace of God; for, during this life the way that leads most directly to God is the way of bare faith which is always obscure. In spite of this obscurity you are able to understand your state and to explain it clearly enough to enable any director with a little experience to guide you. I will tell you what I think about your general state and take your difficulties one by one. 1st. You say you do not know how to pray. Experience has taught me that persons of goodwill who speak in this way know better than others how to pray, because their prayer is more simple and humble, but, on account of its simplicity it escapes their observation. To pray like this is to remain by faith in the presence of God, with a hidden, but constant desire to receive his grace according to our needs. As God sees all our desires, and as, according to St. Augustine, to desire always is to pray always, so in this consists our great prayer. Follow the leading of simplicity in prayer, there can never be excess of it, for God loves to see us like little children in his presence. 2nd. As to Holy Communion, the increasing hunger that is felt for this divine Food, and the strength it imparts are great reasons for receiving it frequently. Therefore fear nothing, but rest on the assurance I give you. 3rd. Insensibility toward all created things, and detachment even from relations, are greater graces than you imagine; it only remains to become detached from self by renouncing all interior self-seeking. Frequent union with Jesus Christ and prayer will gradually achieve this task, provided you do your share of the work in forgetting yourself to think only of God, abandoning to him all your interests, both spiritual and temporal. 4th. It is right that you should realize that all God requires of you is submission and resignation. Ah! my dear daughter, in that is comprised all perfection. To look for it elsewhere would be only error and illusion. Therefore a spiritual person inclined to an interior life, has, truly, but one thing to do, which is to submit with hearty concurrence, to all imaginable circumstances, whether interior or exterior, in which God wills to place him. Therefore when you are ill say "God wills it, very well, I will it also as he wills it and for as long a time." "But what if it should incapacitate me from fulfilling my duties and being of use to the community?" Well, if God wills it, will it also, and accept beforehand, with the pain you suffer, the holy abjection and humiliation which accompany it. "But in this state, perhaps, I give in to myself a little, and do not make all the efforts that I could and should make." If, even so after having consulted your superior and your confessor you follow their judgment blindly, you are then doing the will of God which is also your will. Then rest satisfied in having acquiesced in the divine will in all this, and preserve that interior peace in which God dwells and works. This, my dear Sister, is a clear and safe way; follow it faithfully, and constantly reject all contrary thoughts and ideas as suggestions of the devil, who desires at least to disturb the interior peace in which your soul should be settled, and which forms the solid foundation of the spiritual life. 5th. You have committed a grave fault of disobedience and imprudence in exposing yourself to three months of fever. Hold for certain that to refuse a dispensation in such circumstances is, by no means, an act of virtue, but stubbornness, and an obstinate attachment to your own judgment, and your own will under a pretext of piety. Many devotees and spiritual persons are to be pitied when they act in this manner, and great patience is required to put up with them. Their blindness and illusion are sometimes so strong that an angel from Heaven would find a difficulty in making them see clearly. As for you, submit to everything, listen to every advice, suffer with all peace, gentleness and patience, and do the will of God in all things, in the same spirit, this will be of great benefit to you. 6th. They were quite right to forbid you to think of giving up your post, or of even wishing to do so. I, also, forbid you most strictly. Be very careful not to attempt to escape from the commands of God. "But I am not strong enough." God can very easily make you strong enough. "I am not clever enough." Well! the power of making you clever enough is not wanting to God, and he has already given you the principal qualification, which is, a distrust of your own powers. To know, and to feel, one's incapacity is the essential thing, because then one depends entirely on God, applies to him for everything, and attributes nothing to oneself, but all to God alone; and these graces will by themselves make everything prosper. In fine be at peace, and place your confidence in the God of all goodness; after that you can despair of yourself as much as you like. This humble feeling of your incapacity, weakness and imbecility is exactly the instrument made use of by God to exalt his glory, and to make it shine forth more visibly. To have no feeling about the truths of religion is not a bad sign in certain souls; on the contrary, it is often a sign that God desires to lead them by the safest way, that of simple, bare faith without those feelings of devotion that he can give when he pleases. In the ways of God the only violent efforts to be used must be employed against sin, but with regard to everything else there must only be peace and tranquility. When you find you cannot succeed in making acts say to yourself: "Very well! they are all made in the sight of God since he has seen my desire; he will enable me to make them when he pleases, he is Master. His most holy will shall always be my rule; to accomplish it is the reason I am in the world. It is my wealth, my treasure. May God grant to others all the light, talent, grace, gifts and sensible and spiritual sweetness that are pleasing to him. As for me I desire nothing but to do his holy will. That is my wealth." This, my dear daughter, is your path, walk in it continually in peace, confidence and abandonment of your whole self; you are in perfect safety. 7th. In order to advance, endeavor to suffer peacefully all that God wills or permits to happen to you, without going to creatures to complain, or to seek consolation; neither try to find distraction in useless conversations, nor amusement in frivolous thoughts and idle projects for the future, as all this would withdraw you from God, and prevent the operations of his grace in you; so take great care. 8th. To help you to occupy yourself with God easily and uninterruptedly according to your wishes and requirements this is what you ought to do. Firstly, love solitude and silence, for this will do much toward forming an interior spirit of recollection. Secondly, read only choice books that are solid, and full of piety, and read them slowly, with frequent pauses, trying more to enjoy than to understand or remember them. Thirdly, during the day make frequent aspirations after God, especially those that occur to you in sufferings, temptations, weariness, disgust, sadness of heart, contradictions, et cetera. 9th. The prayers you make to God for detachment from all things are inspired by grace; continue them, and be assured that sooner or later they will be answered. It is but just that we should wait God's time, since we have kept him waiting so long, and the great graces we ask of him deserve to be desired and waited for with patience and perseverance. ## Letter VIII. *On Dryness and Distractions* To Sister Jeanne-Elizabeth Gaury (1735), on dryness and distractions during prayer. My dear Sister, 1st. Your method is very simple, and that which is simple is always best. It goes straight to God, and you must continue it; but do so quietly, without effort, and without eagerness either to preserve it, or to regain it when the perception of it has been lost; that would be to wish to appropriate to yourself the gift of God. In this method of prayer, distractions and dryness are pretty frequent, but all the same if these are endured patiently and with abandonment to the will of God, it is an excellent prayer. Besides, although these distractions and this aridity are painful, they do not prevent the constant desire to pray which remains in the depths of the heart, and it is in this desire that heartfelt prayer consists. If you have been praying in this excellent manner for a considerable time, say for two or three years, it would serve no purpose to take a book; but if these times of powerlessness and aridity have lasted only for seven or eight consecutive days, then make use of a book, but read with frequent pauses; and should you find that this reading distracts you still more, or troubles your soul, leave it off, and try as well as you can do to remain peacefully and silently in the presence of God. You need not be surprised, nor still less troubled that the very same things that used to touch you deeply at one time, should now make not the slightest impression on you; this is one of the vicissitudes that have to be put up with interiorly just as the exterior vicissitudes of weather and seasons have to be borne; and it is only the very inexperienced who do not expect this. 2nd. In this method of prayer resolutions are seldom made, but virtue is practiced much more easily than when resolutions were made in meditation; because by the previous operation of the Holy Spirit the heart is disposed to do so when the occasion arises. The interior dispositions of persons following this method might be expressed in the following manner which would be of more value than any resolutions. "Lord make me do good and avoid evil on such occasions, or in such circumstances, otherwise I know by personal experience that I shall do exactly the reverse of what I ought." The sweetness and efficacy of holy recollection are often the prize and recompense of former sacrifices; but this sensible pleasure does not, at first, take away all repugnance and interior rebellion, though it gradually diminishes them until, in time, a sensible joy is felt even in the most bitter trials. 3rd. God permits your slight infidelities to give you a deeper conviction of your weakness, and gradually to destroy in you that unhappy self-esteem, presumption and secret self-confidence which would never otherwise allow you to acquire true humility of heart. As you know nothing pleases God more than a complete contempt of self, accompanied by an absolute confidence in him alone. This God of all goodness, therefore, does you a great favor in compelling you, often against your will, to drink from this chalice so much dreaded by your self-love and corrupt nature. And to know how to appreciate this favor at its proper value, and to realize your own happiness, are feelings so supernatural that they can only be attributed to the operation of the Holy Spirit. Another operation of grace is to feel happy in bearing some resemblance to Jesus Christ, but this feeling is not to be greatly depended on, have a fear of meeting with difficult circumstances, and distrust your own weakness. 4th. There are never any illusions to be feared in repugnance and involuntary rebellion, as they are incompatible with holy prayer by which they are vanquished and overcome. You are wrong in persuading yourself that you will never be able to acquire true humility nor perfect mortification on account of feeling in yourself such a strong opposition to these virtues. If you had only your own powers to rely upon it would indeed be impossible, but as you very justly add yourself, with the help of God's grace merited for you by Jesus Christ, all becomes easy. It might happen that even this truth should make no impression on you and I should not be surprised if such were the case, but your remark to me on the subject proves plainly that like all beginners, you attach much too much importance to feelings of devotion. Nevertheless, it is an understood fact that in the order of supernatural operations of grace what is most sensible is least perfect and least safe, while that which is most spiritual and most hidden is by far the best. When God deprives you of his sensible presence, and of devotion in recollection, content yourself with having a holy desire and wish to retain it; this will suffice, as it is most pleasing to God and very meritorious. 5th. Any disquiet is an injury to the soul, therefore you should exert all your energy to repel that which you experience on the subject of the Divine Office, especially as there is no reason for it, the desire to say it well and the will to do so always remaining in spite of involuntary distractions, and yours are all of this kind. The proof of this is manifest, which is, that you feel a real pain at heart whenever you notice this wandering of the mind. What more certain or better sign could you have that you have not consented? If you are afraid of distractions, it shows that they are not voluntary in their origin, and especially if you try to practice recollection during the day. Therefore be at peace and accept submissively these involuntary miseries. 6th. You have shown me another subject of uneasiness; one which is of no consequence, and which has its foundation in various illusions, and of which you must cure yourself. The first is the great desire you have of sensible pleasure in Communion, and is an effect of spiritual self-love. The second is the belief that this sensible pleasure is a necessary condition of a good Communion. Alas! my dear daughter what would become of so many holy souls who usually feel nothing but dryness, callousness and often distaste? In all our spiritual exercises we must approach God by pure faith which is scarcely felt. The less feeling you have in your Communions and prayers the more likely they are to be purer and more pleasing to God. This is the way of bare faith and pure love which is never self-seeking. St. Francis de Sales used to say, "Our miserable satisfactions do not satisfy God." Pure love consists in being content with all that pleases God, and will not permit us to will anything contrary to the will of God, even as to our holiest desires and actions; nor, consequently, to act against his holy permissions, even should the cause of certain occurrences be the result of our own fault. This principle is either ignored, or, at least, obscured by the subtlety of our self-love, so ingenious in making out everything that satisfies it, or gives it pleasure, to be good and holy. A good Religious speaking on this subject said that God had gradually taken away all her pleasure, and all the spiritual attractions and feelings in whatever she did, to purify her love, which the first sweetness had left so imperfect and impure. For Communion and the spiritual exercises of the morning and evening follow the method that most attracts you. One short act of your own is worth more than all the long prayers you read. The indifference you feel as to what is thought or said about you is an effect of the operation of the Holy Spirit. Continue as you are doing, never excusing nor justifying yourself, unless you are ordered to do so; it is the most perfect way of acting. God be praised for all, and in all. Amen. ## Letter IX. *Passive Recollection* To Mother Louise-Françoise de Rosen, on distractions, weariness and impulses. My dear Sister. To all the anxieties you express in your letter to me, and to all the doubts you lay before me, I have but one answer. I will say to you in the words of our good Master: "Peace be with you, fear not." What troubles you, ought, on the contrary, to be a subject of joy. Where you believe you see symptoms of laxness I see undoubted signs of solid progress. 1st. This inattention, almost perpetual, this weariness and distaste that you experience at prayer, at the Office, at confession and Communion, et cetera, are nothing else but the natural effect of the apparent absence of God. The Divine Spouse of your soul, in order to put it to the test and to purify it, withdraws his sensible presence, and then the poor soul suffers acute grief which sometimes affects the bodily health. In this way it is a martyr of grace, and of the Holy Spirit; for, now that there are no longer any tyrants to make the blood of the martyrs flow in testimony of their faith, the Holy Spirit knows how to make martyrs of divine love by the suffering caused by his apparent absences, and by many kinds of crucifying operations. Those who submit to this spiritual torture do so by practicing resignation, blind abandonment and the same unwearied patience that the martyrs of old practiced in the midst of their torments. The same Holy Spirit who filled the souls of the martyrs with divine peace and joy, while their bodies were suffering the most frightful torments, will in the same way preserve the peace of your soul in spite of all the agitation of your mind and senses. But you must, faithfully, cooperate with his action by giving no voluntary consent to the anxieties which assail you. To regain recollection when you think you have, to some extent, lost it, make no violent efforts. Resign yourself with a good grace to being deprived of sensible and active recollection, and be content with passive recollection which subsists at the bottom of your heart, even when the mind seems all astray, for this is the inalienable right of souls that are free from all inordinate love for the things of this world. It is true that in this state God is not always the distinct object of our thoughts, but he is the principle of our life, and the rule of our actions. There is a kind of abstraction during which it seems to us that we do not think of anything, because, on the one hand visible objects do not occupy us, and on the other we have such a general idea of God, a notion so dim and obscure, that the mind cannot grasp it, and loses itself, seeming to have no consciousness, and to escape control. In this state all that has to be done, being suggested by the Spirit of God gently, is carried out in peace, without eagerness or uneasiness. But, directly the activity of self-love begins to meddle, the Holy Spirit, jealously desirous of being the only guide of the soul he has raised to this state, puts a limit to its action, and then there is nothing to be done but to drop this activity, and to resume and reenter the state of passive recollection. This recollection, you must know, is nothing else but the fruit and the extension of the prayer of quiet and of silence, which consists in holding one's peace interiorly, and in leaving off all thoughts rather than in combating those that come, or in seeking for those that do not present themselves. 2nd. The occasional outbursts to which you give vent, sometimes lasting for a lengthy period, are trials that should prove equally fruitful. While causing you interior suffering they bring you infinite riches, purifying, humiliating and diminishing you so much in your own eyes that you will gradually become like those little children whom Jesus Christ desires us to resemble if we wish to enter into his Kingdom. You are quite right in saying that we have a great need of patience and gentleness in bearing with ourselves; perhaps more than in putting up with others, following out the thought of St. Francis de Sales. 3rd. The continual vicissitudes that take place in the soul are a good sign. By them the Holy Spirit renders us pliant to all his movements; for, by dint of these constant changes nothing of self remains, and we are prepared to take any shape that is pleasing to this Divine Spirit who breathes where he will and as he pleases. It is, as Fénélon says, like a continual melting and recasting of the soul, which, in this process, becomes liquid like water having neither form nor shape but taking any form or shape according to that of the vessel into which it is poured. 4th. It will be quite easy for you to guide yourself in these different situations. You have but one thing to do, and that is quite simple, it is to notice in what direction the deepest bias of your heart inclines you, without consulting the mental attitude which would spoil all. Always act with the same simplicity, in good faith and uprightness of heart, without looking back or about you, but straight in front at the present time and moment, and I will answer for everything. Do you not see that such a way of acting is to die to self perpetually by the most complete abnegation, and a true sacrifice of abandonment to God in the darkness of faith. 5th. You say that you do not experience any interior reproach, nor any feeling either for good or evil, and that this silence seems to you terrible. It is part of your state. All feeling ought to be taken from you: it is so in the state of pure faith. Again, fear nothing, go on in peace, in simplicity, in total abandonment, without self-examination or particular reflections: when any should be made God will give them to you, or supply the want of them by an interior feeling or a hidden attraction which will guide you in everything more surely than your own miserable reflections. Are these, then, so precious that you need regret their loss and the deprivation of them? Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven. Love this spiritual poverty which strips us interiorly of self, as exterior poverty strips us of goods. It is thus that the Kingdom of God is formed within us. ## Letter X. *The Use of Faults* To the same person, on weariness and idleness. My dear Sister, I see nothing in your present state that should alarm you. This weariness, idleness and indolence that we experience occasionally in spite of ourselves has no culpability about it, provided we suffer it with resignation, and do not curtail any of our exercises of piety in spite of the disinclination we feel to perform them. If, with this want of feeling about everything else we experience a strong desire for the Sacraments and a great contrition for our faults, it is a sensible effect of the mercy of God who makes use even of our faults to make us increase in fervor and humility. There are two kinds of interior peace; one is sensible, sweet and delightful, and this kind does not, in any way, depend on ourselves, and is not at all necessary. And there is another which is almost imperceptible, which dwells in the depths of the heart in the most hidden recesses of the soul. It is usually dry and unfelt, and can be retained in the midst of the greatest tribulations. To recognize it would require the most profound recollection, you would say it was hidden in a deep abyss. It is there that God dwells, and he fashions it himself in order to dwell there as in an atmosphere of his own in the inner chamber of our hearts from whence he works marvelous but inscrutable things. These can only be recognized by their effects, as, when, by his beneficent influence you feel yourself capable of remaining firm in the midst of trials, violent shocks, great pain and unforeseen misfortunes. If you find that you possess this dry peace and a sort of quiet sadness, you ought to thank God for it; this is all that is necessary for your spiritual progress. Guard it as a most precious gift. As it gradually increases it will one day become your greatest treasure, but this will not be till after many battles and many victories. I congratulate you on having adopted my favorite motto, "God wills it! God be praised in all things." Oh! what consolation there is in these few words! St. Francis de Sales said it was a tonic for the heart by virtue of which it would never give way; a strong potion which would enable us to digest iron, steel and any other hard or revolting object that we were obliged to swallow, a balsam that could soothe and heal the most poisonous wounds. Oh! my dear daughter! let us make use of this remedy against the weakness of nature which opposes everything that is contrary to our inclination. By the use of this simple recipe you will find bitter things become sweet and everything will seem good and pleasant; nothing could better cheer the heart. ## Letter XI. *Remembrance of Past Sins* To Sister Marie-Antoinette de Bousmard (Nancy, 1734). On weakness, remembrance of past sins, fatigue and fears. Nancy, 1734. My dear Sister, 1st. The calmness you enjoy in solitude, and the peace of mind and heart which, emptied of all created things, is no longer occupied with them in any way, are signs of true interior recollection. God deprives you of feelings of devotion during prayer, to prevent the desires and eagerness they give rise to. While you are at prayer remain exactly as you are in solitude. I do not exact from you an atom more of application or attention. Continue in this thoughtful pensive state without allowing your thoughts to dwell on created things and then you will be in God without understanding how, without feeling his presence, nor even knowing how this can be. This is a mystery which you will only be able to recognize by its happy effects which are death to self, and unconsciousness of the things of this world. 2nd. To believe that you do nothing for God, and that the little you try to do is spoiled by an admixture of self-love, is nothing but the truth, and a truth so self-evident that it is extraordinary that it is not seen by everyone, and that we are not all trembling and annihilated before God. On the other hand, however, this truth is so shrouded in darkness for us, so completely hidden in the folds of our self-love, that we cannot be too grateful to God when he is pleased to allow us to grasp it. When it pleases God to grant us by his holy grace, this clear knowledge of ourselves, accompanied by feelings of humility; then we no longer expect anything more from self, but everything from him alone. No longer do we count on our good works, but solely on the mercy of God and the infinite merits of Jesus Christ; this is that true Christian hope which will be our salvation. Every other state, every other spiritual condition is full of risks to our salvation; but, to hope only in God, to depend only on God, in and through Jesus Christ, is that solid and immovable foundation that neither illusion, self-love nor temptation can affect. Oh! how I congratulate you on having arrived at this state! Hold to it firmly, it is the anchor of the vessel in the harbor of salvation. 3rd. I am glad to find, by your letter, how completely the good God in his mercy is keeping you in the dark. You attribute to your wickedness the recollections of the past which fill you with horror of yourself; but it is as clear as day that this is one of the most salutary impressions that grace can produce in you; there is, in fact, nothing better calculated to sanctify you than this holy hatred of yourself occasioned by these recollections, and the deep humiliation in which they keep you before God. These feelings are given you suddenly when you least expect them or are thinking of them, to make you understand that they are an effect of grace. "But why used you formerly to experience exactly contrary feelings when recalling the past?" It is because formerly you would not have been able to endure the sight of your imperfections without great despondency. It was necessary then that hope should predominate in you, but now you require a holy horror of yourself which is a true change of heart. When God gives you these feelings, receive them quietly and with gratitude and thanksgiving, and allow them to pass away when God pleases, abandoning yourself entirely to all he wishes to effect in you, and do not attach yourself to any of the interior conditions in which he places you, nor regret any of which he deprives you. 4th. I understand the difficulties of the duty about which you speak, and the strain to tired lungs of sustaining the chant, especially on great feast days. All this is very painful it is true, but what is also true and extremely consoling is that such is the will of God, and permitted by him that you may overcome your own will. In a few words I will suggest to you how to act in this, and in any similar case. Prayers, frankness, sacrifice, abandonment. I will explain my meaning. Having implored light from God, go and explain clearly to your Superior how you feel, and in what state you are, then wait to hear from her mouth what God is pleased to arrange for you, being resolved to sacrifice to him by perfect abandonment your dislikes, your health and even your life, never doubting that God, who has never been known to forsake those who abandon themselves to him, will inspire her who is charged to manifest to you his will, to tell you what is necessary. One of three things will infallibly happen; either you will be relieved of your office, or God will sustain and preserve you in it, or else he will allow you to succumb and will take you to himself out of this wretched life. Then, I ask you, my good Sister, if you could end your life in a better manner than by a sacrifice so generous, and an act of abandonment so perfect? Whatever happens, then, keep firm after making your attempt. Live or die in peace. We will not speak about it any more, it is God's affair, and no longer yours. He well knows how to make everything turn to your advantage, and to his own greater glory. Oh! my dear Sister! in what a saintly, happy and generous manner you will be able to act! How good it is to have chosen, once for all, the part of obedience and abandonment in all things! What peace! what a sacrifice! what a grace! what certainty of salvation! and above all, what merit in the eyes of God! What a consolation for me, in such a case, to learn that you have died a martyr to holy abandonment, and that God has permitted you to immolate yourself as a holocaust on the altar of his most holy, most adorable, and divine will. 5th. Make yourself, therefore, a partaker of the contentment of God; place your happiness in the knowledge that his good pleasure is always accomplished in you; in this way even when you have occasion to be dissatisfied with yourself, you will reflect the satisfaction of God who, as St. Augustine remarks, is never so pleased with us as when we are displeased with ourselves. In this way it is that we constantly practice without even adverting to it the virtue of pure charity which consists in loving, in satisfying, and in willing in all things the good pleasure of God, preferring his holy will to everything that we could possibly wish, however holy our wishes might appear to be. You have chiefly two ways of exercising this meritorious abandonment. The first is, to say to God, "Lord I hate and detest my sins and imperfections, and I will make every effort to correct myself with the help of your divine grace; as for the pain and abjection they bring me I accept this with all my heart for the love of you." The second way is to say, "My God, I desire to please you, I desire my own salvation and sanctification, the gift of prayer, of mortification, and of all virtues. I ask them of you, and I will exert all my powers to acquire them, whenever you show me an occasion of doing so; nevertheless in this as in all other things I prefer your holy will to my own wishes, I only desire to possess that degree of grace and virtue that you are pleased to bestow on me, and at the time appointed by your divine wisdom even should that be the last moment of my life; for your most holy will is the rule and measure of my desires, even of those that are most holy and lawful." These acts, made with the whole heart, are the fruit of that pure charity which, according to the Doctors of the Church, is as efficacious as baptism and martyrdom for blotting out all our sins; as Jesus Christ said about Mary Magdalen, "Many sins are forgiven her because she has loved much." Could anything be more consoling, fortifying and encouraging? You say that you live in a mean and poor way. "Blessed are the poor in spirit." By this is intended interior humility and a holy self-contempt. You live without assistance, that is to say that you live in spirit, and in pure faith. Oh! what a happy state! Yes, happy indeed although this happiness is hidden from the soul. You go on blindly from day to day. This is perfect abandonment, you do not feel it, and hardly realize it, but if you felt and understood it, it would no longer be abandonment, but the strongest assurance of your salvation that you could possibly desire. For, what assurance could you have more satisfactory than the knowledge of being completely abandoned to God both for time and eternity? Abandonment is a virtue the entire merit of which cannot be acquired unless the possession of it is unrealized. Go on in peace, then, in the midst of your fears, pains and obscurities, and put your whole trust in God above all knowledge, and all feeling, in, and through Jesus Christ. May he be with you forever. ## Letter XII. *How to Make Use of Trials* On the use of trials and how to act about them. Before anything else, my dear Sister, I think I had better explain what thought was suggested to me by your anxious doubts, and eagerness to consult me about your soul. I cannot help thinking that, if we were more attentive to the light given us by the Holy Spirit, better disposed to receive his holy impressions, and more faithful in following the impulsion of his grace, nothing more would be required to enable us to attain that perfection to which we are called; for I have noticed that even in the midst of the most profound spiritual darkness, there is ever in the center of the soul a certain light of pure faith which is a most safe guide. Besides this, there are certain moments when the Holy Spirit makes known to us by a brighter, but very rapid light, that we are in the right way. Add to this a certain settled peace, even during interior storms, a right way of acting, and a regularity in the performance of duties, which, in spite of the frailty of nature, we never deliberately set aside, but follow with perseverance the maxims of the Gospel and the rules of perfection. An obedient and faithful soul ought to find in this a sufficient guarantee for confidently trusting herself with entire abandonment to this interior Spirit who guides her so well. It is often a sign of weakness, and an effect of the workings of self-love that we hanker after more complete assurance. However, there are exceptions to be made, such as the beginning of the spiritual life when the Holy Spirit has not yet acquired full dominion over us, and some extraordinary occasions when the tumult of the storm prevents us hearing his voice. I might content myself with this general reply but will, however, answer you in detail. 1st. This fresh condition of obscurity, dryness and distaste, into which God has permitted you to enter, does not surprise me. This good Master always begins by making himself known and loved in sensible devotion, and afterward deprives the soul of these consolations to withdraw it from the earthliness of the senses, in order to unite it to himself in a far more excellent way, more intimate and solid, by pure faith entirely spiritual. To make this purification complete, suffering has to be added to privation, at least interior suffering, interior rebellion, diabolical temptations, anguish, weakness and repugnance for all that is good which sometimes rises to a sort of agony. All this serves marvelously to deliver the soul from self-love and to give it some trace of resemblance to its crucified Spouse. All these trials are so many blows that are inflicted on us by God to make us die to self. The more strongly self-love struggles against these blows the harder they seem and the more cruel the agony. Divine love is a two-edged sword, and strikes self-love until it is killed and destroyed. Great sorrow in these trials proceeds from the strong resistance of our cursed love of self which is loath to relinquish the empire it has gained over our hearts, and to allow the love of God to reign in its stead. This love produces only sweetness and delight as long as it finds no obstacles to its divine influence, nor any enemy to resist it. Do not regret, then, in any way those days that you pronounce happy because you enjoyed sensible devotion in prayer and Communion, and because your union with your Beloved was so charming and delightful. How much more precious and of inestimable value are your present days of agony and martyrdom! These are days of the purest love, since in them you are loving God at your own cost, and for himself alone. You need not fear any mixture of self-love in your intercourse with him, since there is nothing in this intercourse but what is crucifying to self-love. In such a state our will is united to the will of God, and it is this that we love, and with a love so pure that the senses have no share in it. It is most difficult indeed to love God in happiness without any admixture of self, or of vain self-complacency, but in the time of crosses, and of interior spiritual privations, all that is needful in order to be certain of the purity of our love, is to endure them patiently, and to abandon ourselves sincerely. How truly consoling and encouraging is this certainty for those who understand the value and advantages of pure love. When God makes you understand this you will also understand why so many of the saints preferred privations and sufferings to consolations and joys, how they so passionately loved the former that they could hardly put up with the latter. God may possibly allow you to think that this painful state is going to last you your lifetime, in order to give you an opportunity of making him a more complete sacrifice. Do not waver, do not hesitate for a single moment, sacrifice all! abandon yourself without reserve, without limitation to him, by whom you imagine yourself abandoned, and keep yourself always in this interior state which is, at present, the most essential for you. I would almost say it is the only one for you during prayer, at Holy Communion, at Mass, during the Office, and all the day long; but attend to this quietly without effort, and do not even attach yourself to the frequent repetition of formal acts, it will suffice to keep your soul in this habitual condition of total abandonment without any reserve. I forbid you, therefore, voluntarily to desire anything but the accomplishment of the most holy will of God. Ask neither for more nor less pain, God knows better than we do the right measure that is necessary for us. It is very often nothing but presumption and illusion that makes us wish to imitate certain saints who, in their sufferings were especially inspired to say, "More, Lord, more! We are too little and too weak to dare to speak thus unless we have a moral conviction that God requires it of us. I forbid you also, all voluntary scruples, troubles or doubts on the subject of the Office, of Holy Mass, et cetera. To act with a pure intention, and in simple good faith is enough; in this respect God asks no more of us, and I daresay you would not be able to do more at present." 2nd. Oh! how glad I am to hear you say that you are insupportable to yourself, that at every moment you are on the point of falling into a state of despondency and trouble, without, by God's grace, actually doing so. That is to say that God, in making you understand all your weakness upholds you invisibly, thus giving you the victory, while at the same time preserving you in humility. You might very likely lose this virtue, either entirely, or to some extent, if you found yourself possessed of courage, or felt some spiritual strength. Learn from this a most important lesson inculcated by Fénélon. It is a pure grace from God, and one of the greatest to suffer in a petty way, to conquer in a feeble manner, that is to say with a sort of spiritual feebleness, humbly and with self-contempt, and to be so discontented with ourselves that we do not believe that we ever do anything well. This discontent with ourselves is very pleasing to God, and his content should be the basis of our own. Nothing could give us any further anxiety if we found our sole satisfaction in pleasing and satisfying God. 3rd. God gives you a great grace also in enabling you while in your present state to faithfully fulfill all your duties and rules. I greatly commend you for having sought no consolation from creatures and for having made no mention of your troubles to anyone even in confidence. Your silence will sanctify you more than any conversation or advice. 4th. Another great grace is to feel neither trouble, nor fear nor anxiety about your present state, nor about the future, just as though you had become callous about everything. This is the fruit and happy effect of your entire abandonment. As you have abandoned all to God, he takes charge of everything, banishing all trouble, fear and anxiety from your soul. He takes from it all feelings of self-interest, and leaves it alive only to his interests. This disposition is the solid foundation of the most absolute security that a soul could possibly enjoy, it is the greatest happiness this life contains for us, and a sure sign of the friendship of God. 5th. The words that were spoken to you interiorly, and that you heard so distinctly were assuredly from God. I recognize this by the good and immediate effects they produced in you. Only God can impress souls to such a profound extent with whatever he pleases. You see that the divine goodness does not refuse you occasional scraps of comfort and strength to fortify you during the journey he makes you take through the desert. 6th. There is no reason to be surprised that your spiritual afflictions have no influence with regard to your conduct toward your neighbor, nor deprive you of your patience and equable temper, and kindness. As a rule while in this state of trial one is generally more able to help, to console, to comfort and to serve others. ## Letter XIII. *The Use of Trials Continued* To Sister Anne-Marguerite Boudet de la Bellière (1734). My dear Sister, 1st. Your present state of obscurity is a real grace from God, who desires to accustom you to walk in the darkness of pure faith which is the most meritorious way, and the most certain road to sanctity. 2nd. Dryness and powerlessness are graces equally precious, and make you participate very meritoriously in the sufferings of Jesus Christ. "But," say you, "this powerlessness prevents me asking God for necessary helps." At any rate, it does not prevent you wishing to ask for them, and you ought to know that with God, our desires are real prayers, according to St. Augustine. This made Bossuet say that a cry pent up in the depths of the heart was of the same value as a cry that reached the skies, because God sees our most secret desires, and even the first simple movement of the heart. Apply these principles to your own case, whether at prayer, or before and after Communion. Nothing more is required to make our intercourse with God safe, easy and efficacious in spite of aridity, involuntary distractions and powerlessness, because none of these things prevent the desire to pray well, or to sigh and lament before God. His all-seeing eye detects the pure intention and preparation of heart, with all those acts that we should wish to have made; as he sees the fruits of the trees before the buds of springtime have formed on the branches; this is the beautiful comparison made by the Bishop of Meaux. In God's name, my dear Sister, try to enter into this maxim and to make it your own; it will console and sustain you on a thousand occasions when you feel that you are doing nothing, are incapable of making any effort. The goodwill is always there, and that is everything in the sight of God even when you imagine it to be absolutely idle. 3rd. Acquiescence in and submission to the will of God and the union of our will with his are so essential to perfection that it may be said to consist entirely in adhering firmly to them in all things, everywhere and for everything. To do this is to do all, and without this, prayers, austerities, and works of even the most heroic nature, and all our sufferings, are nothing in the sight of God, because the only way in which we can please him is by conforming our wills to his. The more involuntary opposition to this complete resignation we feel in ourselves, the more merit shall we gain on account of the greater effort required, and of the more complete sacrifice exacted. 4th. The knowledge and fear of the traps that are laid for us in all quarters both outside and within our own souls is exactly the grace that will enable us to avoid them, especially if, with this humble fear a great confidence in God is united; then we can rely on being always victorious, except perhaps in matters of minor importance where God permits us to fall for our greater good. These lesser falls are very salutary for us, in keeping us always lowly and humbled in the presence of God, distrustful of our own powers, and as it were, nothing in our own eyes. 5th. You must accustom yourself to seek, and to find the peace of your soul in the higher part, that which is furthest removed from the senses; and disregard the troubles, revolts and uneasiness of the lower and animal part which should be accounted of no importance because God pays no attention to what takes place there. St. Teresa says that it is like the courtyard of the castle of the soul. Take advantage of this teaching which is that of the saints, and behave as a person who, finding the courtyard of her castle full of unclean animals and hideous reptiles does not stop there a moment, but mounts at once to the upper rooms which are well furnished and filled with an honorable company. Do you also mount into the sanctuary of the soul, and endeavor always to remain there, because it is there that God makes his permanent dwelling. 6th. Yes, you were right to abandon yourself to God in all things, and to cease disturbing your mind voluntarily with the recollection of the frequent experiences you have had of your misery and weakness; in this way the foundation of true humility and a complete self-distrust is laid and consolidated. These valuable dispositions draw down upon us all the graces of God and bring them to us clothed with his power; especially if he finds us convinced of our own powerlessness to do any good. This it was that made St. Paul exclaim, "When I am weak, then am I powerful." 7th. I assure you on the part of God, that usually, indeed nearly always, when you think you are praying your worst, that is the very time when you are praying best. Why? Because on the one hand the will, and the firm desire to pray, is a real prayer of the heart; and because, on the other hand, you pray then without any self-complacency, without any of those vain reflections which spoil everything; you pray by your patience, your silence, your self-effacement, your submission and abandonment to God; and you leave off praying greatly humiliated and cast down, and without any of those sensible feelings of satisfaction to your self-love that made St. Francis de Sales say that our own miserable satisfactions were not those of God. You may judge by this with what contempt you ought to repulse the fears by which the enemy tries to disgust, and to weary you, or at least to throw you into a state of anxiety. 8th. The great and sincere desire you have to be all for God without reserve, and whatever it may cost, St. Francis de Sales calls the firm pillar of the spiritual edifice. This pillar ought to sustain the whole weight. Fear nothing as long as it remains, and it will remain, by the grace of God, in the superior part of the soul; as for the inferior or sensitive part, think nothing about it. 9th. It is quite true that we can conquer self-love, but not without great trouble, and remember that this is far more the work of God than our own. Take advantage of little occasions for combats and victories, and be well assured that when God sees that, in good earnest, you are doing the little that is in your power with the help of ordinary graces, he will at last set his own hand to the task, and finish and perfect the work you could not accomplish. It is on this account that I advise you always to beg of God without ceasing the gift of his Divine Spirit with all his holy operations, without which it is possible to spend a lifetime in great defects and considerable imperfections from which there is great risk of never rising, but rather of falling ever lower, and even of being lost. 10th. Holy Communion is the true daily bread of our souls. In it alone can we find subsistence, power, remedy and support. What a difference there is between those who communicate frequently, and those who do so but rarely! Oh! how little do the latter realize the riches and the treasures of grace of which they deprive themselves! ## Letter XIV. *Remedies for Troubles* To Sister Marie-Thérèse de Vioménil (1734), on the use of trials, continued. My dear Sister, To apply a remedy to the trouble that makes you so unhappy, it will suffice for me to indicate the causes of it, in order to oppose it with the contrary principles. The origin of the evil is first an ignorance of your attraction. It seems to me that you have forgotten that divine grace makes different souls experience different attractions, some sweet, and some exceedingly crucifying. Among people in the world there are those whom God conducts by the way of prosperity; but a far greater number whom he compels to walk in the thorny path of the Cross, of afflictions and difficulties. Thus he apportions, according to his wisdom, spiritual joys and tribulations to those who lead a spiritual life. The work of salvation and perfection consists in following faithfully the path allotted to us according to the attraction God has given us, whatever this may be. 1st. You seem equally ignorant of this great principle, that usually more progress is made by suffering than by acting, and that to take things patiently is to do a great deal, and especially to be patient with oneself. 2nd. You forget, at any rate in practice, this other incontestable truth, that perfection does not consist in receiving great gifts from God such as recollection, prayer and the spiritual taste for divine things, but simply in fulfilling the will of God in every possible circumstance whether exterior or interior, and in whatever situation Providence may be pleased to place you. 3rd. Your troubles proceed from this ignorance and forgetfulness together with those anxieties and that interior depression which have embittered and doubled your pains, and have deprived you of the peace of your soul which is the foundation of the spiritual life, and have often led you to seek consolation in creatures by confiding your troubles to them when it was God's will that you should have no consolation but that which he was pleased to give you himself. You must correct this by other rules of conduct and a totally different way of acting. 1st Principle. Often say to yourself, "My way is painful, it is true; it is hard and bitter, but as it is the will of God I must submit, no matter what it costs; firstly, because God is my sovereign Master who has a right to dispose of me absolutely as he pleases. Secondly, because he is my father, and so tender, good and merciful a Father that he can will nothing that is not for the benefit of the children whom he loves, and makes all things turn to the benefit of those who are submissive to him. Thirdly, because I shall never find peace, calm, nor repose of heart, nor any solid consolation except in resigning myself humbly and patiently to all that he is pleased to ordain. Fourthly, because I cannot take a single step in the spiritual life unless I follow the path marked out, and decided for me in the eternal decree of my predestination. Can I mark out a path for myself? And if I could, would it not be like the path of a blind man, leading to destruction?" 2nd Principle. "I ought to desire only that progress and perfection which God wills for me, and to wish to attain them only by those means he wills me to employ." Such a desire can only be calm and peaceful, although at the same time, full of power and energy. There is, however, another kind of desire for perfection, born of pride, and of an inordinate love of one's own excellence. This does not rely upon God for support, and besides, is restless and always in a state of turmoil. The more we have to give ourselves up to the first of these desires, the more strenuously we must resist the second. Therefore every desire for our progress, however holy it may seem, must be suppressed directly it shows signs of eagerness, disquiet or anxiety. These effects can only proceed from the devil, while everything that comes from God leaves the soul tranquil. Why then, my dear Sister, do you desire with such fiery eagerness those lights of the soul, those feelings, interior joys, and that facility of recollection and prayer, and other gifts of God, if it does not please him to bestow them on you yet? Would not this be to make yourself perfect for your own pleasure, and not for his? To follow your own and not the divine will, to have more regard for your own inclination than for that of God, to wish to serve him according to your own caprice, and not according to his good pleasure! "Ought I then to be resigned to spending my whole life in this state of poverty, weakness and misery?" Certainly, if such is the will of God. Your poverty, weakness and misery ought from henceforth to be pleasant to you, and preferable to any other state since it is willed for you by God. Henceforth this poverty will be converted into wealth, for to be exactly what God wills is to be very rich indeed, and all perfection consists in this alone. Moreover are you not aware that there is heroic virtue in the patient endurance of misery, weakness, spiritual poverty, darkness and callousness, of fickleness, folly, and extravagance of mind and imagination? It was this that made St. Francis de Sales say that those who aspired to perfection are required to exercise as much patience, kindness and endurance toward themselves as toward others. Let us then bear our own burdens of misery, imperfection and defects in the same way that God wills us to bear one another's burdens. It often happens however that in this spiritual tumult the will endures strange commotions, and is on the point of giving way out of all patience. Let us keep firm for, in this new battlefield fighting for patience and making fresh sacrifices, we shall find fresh subjects for merit and triumph. And if during the first moments the poor will should escape, it must be made to try to regain possession of itself in humbling itself quietly and peacefully before the infinite mercy of God. "But all these spiritual vicissitudes take off my attention from prayer, Holy Mass, the Office and Holy Communion, and my spiritual exercises seem useless." No! No! none of them are useless, because merely the will to acquit yourself well of these duties, which you formed at the beginning, will be valid throughout, unless nullified by long continued and altogether voluntary distractions, in a word, by deliberate venial sin. Far from losing anything, you will have gained doubly, because combined with the merit gained by your spiritual exercises will be that of having made them in a most penitential and crucifying manner, and also with much humiliation; in this way, very far from having spoiled these holy exercises by foolish self-examination, and a thousand satisfactions of self-love, to which you would have been exposed in making them with feelings of devotion, you will have fulfilled these duties well by the practice of holy humility which is the foundation and guardian of every virtue. "But this will prevent me from feeling contrite." The efficacy of contrition is not in the feeling of it, it is entirely in the higher part of the soul ---in the will. Sensible contrition very frequently serves only as food for self-love and can never be reassuring, since it is not what God requires. "But supposing I have no contrition of the will?" You should believe and hope firmly that God has given it to you; but if you should only have had contrition once after having already confessed your sins it would be enough to remit them all, both past and present sins, so great is the mercy of God. My dear Sister, I will conclude with this consoling assurance; if it had pleased God to make your state known to you as it is to me, you would be thanking him for it instead of afflicting yourself about it. Remain in peace then in whatever condition you may possibly find yourself: when you have achieved that you will have done all that is necessary. Repeat constantly "Blessed be God for all and in all. I wish only what he wills and nothing more. May his holy will be done in me, and by me. May none of my wishes be accomplished; they are all blind and perverse. I shall be lost if they are accomplished." ## Letter XV. *Trials to Be Endured Peacefully* To the same person. 1st. We are entirely of one mind, my dear Sister, now that you admit with me that your activity and eagerness are defects. Strive against them with all your strength, that is all that I ask. You say that I want you to be faultless and quite perfect. That is true, and has always been the object I had in view for you. At the same time I do not consider it a crime that you have not yet attained this perfection. I realize that this can only be achieved gradually by a great confidence in God, and a great fidelity to his grace. He alone can accomplish in you the work he has begun; what you have to do is simply to abandon yourself to him, and to allow him to act. Do not be one of those of whom Jesus Christ said, speaking to St. Catherine of Siena, that they made hardly any progress in perfection because they talked so much themselves, that they could not listen to him, and would act themselves, and gave him no opportunity of acting in them. 2nd. I am delighted to hear that you feel that God supports you in your afflictions; continue to endure them as peacefully as you can, and in a perfect interior silence. This practice alone will cause you to advance in a calm and peaceful way. God has given you courage and energy; these are talents that you must profit by. This Divine Master asks that, for the present, you will make your courage consist in patient endurance and resignation; but it is in the depths of your soul, not in feeling, that he wishes to find this abandonment, and, in his infinite goodness, at the same time that he requires it of you, he bestows it upon you. For this grace unite with me in returning thanks to him, for he could not have bestowed upon you a more precious gift. Perhaps a day will come when this resignation will become sensible, and then it will be as sweet, as now it is bitter, and you will enjoy that heavenly unction which Jesus Christ has attached to his Cross. This is what makes the peace and joy of the saints unchangeable, and it is what those experience who follow generously the path of perfection and a spiritual life, in sacrificing everything for God. You tell me that with your character and temperament it seems to you impossible to acquire a taste for the interior life. So it is, truly: but what is impossible to man is easy to God, and it is on him alone, and on his grace through Jesus Christ, that you have to depend. In order to compel you to lay a foundation of humility in your soul this God of goodness begins by making you feel most keenly your own weakness; but, when this feeling depresses you, encourage yourself to hope, for God, as you know, is pleased to make his grace triumph most in our greatest weaknesses. 3rd. The petition you so often make interiorly, "Lord, have pity on me, you can do all things", is the best and most simple prayer that you could possibly make. Nothing more is required to draw down his powerful aid. Keep steadfastly to this practice and to the habit of never expecting anything from yourself but of hoping to obtain all from God. He will do the rest, without your perceiving it, and I feel assured that this will be visibly shown by the result. I am interiorly convinced that unless prevented by great infidelity on your part, God, by his holy operation, will perform great things in your soul. You may count upon this, if you do not voluntarily oppose any obstacle. If you become aware of having unfortunately done so, humble yourself immediately, and return to God and to yourself with a perfect confidence in the divine goodness. 4th. We must only attach ourselves to God and to his holy will by acquiescing in all his arrangements which cannot fail to be for our happiness and profit. If, on our part, there should be nothing else but this blind submission to his good pleasure, we ought to be contented, because in this alone consists all perfection, and the true love of God. 5th. It is a great grace to realize the folly and extravagance of the pleasures that worldly people pursue so eagerly. From this you will derive great good for your soul which, in this contempt for the world, will find a powerful motive for giving itself entirely to a spiritual life. Perhaps you will say that you are still but a novice in this life. I acknowledge that, but you admire it, desire it, ask for it, and are tending toward it; here are so many different degrees of grace; the rest will follow in due time. Meanwhile moderate your spiritual vehemence, and your holy ambition. 6th. You are beginning, you say, to be indifferent as to whether people behave well or badly toward you. This is a greater grace than you imagine. But there are times, you say, when sadness and discouragement seem to overwhelm you. This you must put up with as well as you can, and accept the annoyance of finding yourself so weak, for this is most irritating to our spiritual self-love. This is the most meritorious of all the sacrifices by which we must immolate it, as it is the most humiliating. It is quite permissible to expect some sensible help and support in the spiritual life, but we must hope for it with moderation, seek it without excitement, and make use of it without becoming too much attached to it, and lose it when God wishes to deprive us of it, I do not say, without pain, but without being voluntarily cast down and troubled. Above all it is necessary to make God our principal help, to count on him in default of others, to trust in him unreservedly, to have recourse to him in all dangers and for everything, as little children do with their loving mothers. This holy simplicity, this humble and childlike conduct toward God will touch and move his paternal heart, and obtain sooner or later all that we ask, or something else better for us, which is often given us even without our knowledge. 7th. The complaints made by our Lord to St. Catherine of Siena of the exaggerated activity of those souls in saying and doing so much themselves, that they left him not one moment in which to effect anything, should be understood in this sense; that in working and accomplishing our duties, we should do so without excitement, and natural impetuosity, and that, during the day we should listen to the voice of Divine Wisdom to hear him who speaks in the center of our hearts without sound of words, because his operation is his word. Moreover, that in all our prayers, readings, examens and thoughts of God we should act quietly, gently, without confusion or effort, seeking only the union of our hearts with God, and for that making use of frequent pauses to give the Holy Spirit of God time to work in us what he pleases, and as he pleases. 8th. All that you tell me about your fear of your faults being rendered greater on account of your realization of the presence of God is an illusion of the devil who, in this way, tries to withdraw our attention from this Divine Presence, and to diminish our devotion while we are before the most Holy Sacrament. Continue to follow this exercise without fear; I see the fruits of it, and they will become so sensible that you will see them yourself in course of time. 9th. I congratulate you that God has taken away some of your natural vivacity. The loss of your gaiety will only be temporary. It will return, but completely changed, or rather transformed into spiritual joy, quiet, tranquil and peaceful, because it will be like that of the saints, in God and coming only from God. 10th. I greatly approve of your method of prayer; continue the same, and make acts when you feel inclined. When, during pauses or interior silence, some good thought or inclination should be suggested to you, receive it quietly; and do the same with interior repose, whether sometimes greater or less, as God pleases. In a word, tend always toward that sovereign Lord, more by the affections and desires than by the mind and intellect; and no matter what he gives you be always satisfied. God knows better than we do what is necessary for us; let him act, but let us be absolutely convinced that the least repose of heart we enjoy in his holy presence is worth more than anything we could say or think ourselves. May this conviction impel you ever more strongly to tend with all your heart toward this holy repose; and when God gives it to you do not interrupt it, for these are the precious moments when the King of Kings admits those souls whom he honors with his predilection to a friendly audience. ## Letter XVI. *Sensitiveness About Defects* To Sister Charlotte-Elizabeth Bourcier de Monthureux. Sensitiveness about defects a sign of self-love. My very dear Sister, 1st. I thank you for your good wishes, and above all for your prayers. I also pray for you every day at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. I thank our Lord for the good effect produced in your soul by my letters, but you must allow me to remark that I find you still very sensitive about the state of misery, poverty and spiritual weakness to which you find yourself reduced. This can only come from a great amount of self-love which cannot endure a state of nothingness, and abhors the necessity of self-effacement. Nevertheless you must necessarily pass through this trial because your mind has to be emptied of self before it can be filled by the Spirit of God, and he will make you die to your old life, before you are able to begin a new one. What you want is to acquire the one without losing the other; this cannot be: have patience and preserve a certain peace in the center of your soul during these interior tempests. Your state of obscurity and callousness, to whatever degree it may attain, need not alarm you; all that is necessary is to submit, and to abandon yourself entirely to God. Do not worry yourself to try and feel submissive; feeling has nothing to do with this business; it is enough if you are willing to submit, for this is practiced by the higher part of the soul. 2nd. You are wrong in finding your weakness a subject for anxiety. As long as you have confidence in God, he will sustain you as he has done hitherto on the brink of the precipice. Possibly it will be by an imperceptible thread, but, in the hand of God, this slight thread is like a thick rope. 3rd. In the painful positions of which you speak there are only two things to be done; either to throw yourself in spirit at the feet of Jesus Christ, and to kiss those sacred feet, or, if you cannot do that, keep an interior silence of submission and adoration, and content yourself with an exterior sign, such as, raising your eyes to Heaven, and then lowering them and bowing your head, remaining thus for a little while in union with Jesus Christ in the Garden of Olives. If possible, remain ever there, by the side of Jesus Christ humiliated, cast down, and annihilated before his Father. I love to see you in prayer taking the position of a beggar, of a beast of burden; but still more do I love that indescribable something which inwardly draws you on without any distinct aim, but with a certain dry repose full of aridity. When you get so far, hold on to this state contenting yourself with waiting in that peaceful expectation of which I have so frequently spoken to you. Again at other times try to make some acts, or to read something as quietly as possible and with frequent pauses to give room for the interior attraction to act. But always remember that you ought to follow the least attraction that draws you interiorly, and to retain it peacefully without too much exertion, and without seeking out distinct thoughts. This repose in the presence of God, this slight recollectedness is of even greater value, and will cause you to make more progress than the most sublime thoughts. 4th. I congratulate you in having, by the help of the grace of God, overcome the rebellion and repugnance you felt with respect to your office. It is by these difficult victories that solid virtue is acquired. All the details you give me about your painful feelings and distastes make me see the goodness of God who desires to destroy in the center of your heart that presumption of which you could never be cured without this bitter medicine. These truly diabolical feelings that God allows the devil to produce in your soul are an antidote to that much more diabolical feeling of pride. Learn from this to allow God to act, and to abandon yourself, if it so please him, to much greater miseries and interior humiliations. If he should condemn you to these, he knows well how to draw you out of them, with great profit to your soul, provided always that you are faithful in calling upon him with confidence out of the depths of your nothingness. 5th. I think that what you say is true; God wills your humiliation; love this state for yourself because it forms some resemblance between you and your Divine Spouse. This love for and desire of humiliations will make you progress more in the ways of God than all the other practices together. Try, therefore, to profit by every little occasion, and feed your mind on the thought and desire of abjection, just as worldly people feed their minds on thoughts and desires of vanity. The profound peace that you have begun to experience, in the midst of humiliations, contempt and rebuffs, is one of the greatest graces of which you have ever spoken to me. If you continue thus a great change will be effected in your soul by this means alone. 6th. As to what regards exterior mortification, follow in everything the rules of moderation, discretion and obedience, but make up for what they refuse to allow you to do, by interior abnegation in refusing yourself the least little desire, the least little pleasure, and the least thought which is not of God and for God, rejecting all that is useless in order to occupy yourself exclusively with him. Oh! what a joy and triumph for me when I shall see my dear daughters abject like Jesus Christ, humbled and annihilated! Do you, therefore, follow the grace of this attraction; it will lead you on. I cannot repeat often enough that I will never cease praying that God may give you this holy love of abjection. About evening devotions; I have neither time nor inclination to enter into the subject. Believe me you already have too many practices, and must try to simplify matters that relate to the soul. Just the presence of God, abandonment to God; just the desire to love God, and to be united to him. These are the most simple exercises, and more definite for souls a little advanced in spiritual matters, and of far greater importance than any exterior practices. ## Letter XVII. *Confidence in God* To Sister Marie-Thérèse de Vioménil. Confidence in God is the cure of self-love. My dear Sister, When you have neither time nor inclination to read, try to keep yourself simply in peace in the presence of God, and do not trouble to practice works of supererogation unless by his special intimation and impulse, and if they are done with facility. If you seem to be wanting in courage for many things, compel yourself at any rate to retain in your heart a determination to be all for God. Humble yourself with the consideration of the inefficacy of your own resolutions, and look upon yourself as having so far done nothing. The less confidence you place in yourself, the more easy will it become to have entire confidence in the mercy of God alone, through the merits of Jesus Christ. This is that solid and perfect confidence which completely annihilates self-love by withdrawing all those resources upon which it was accustomed to rely. There could be nothing more salutary for some souls than this kind of martyrdom. You say that some sort of sacrifices lead to God while others do not, but rather lead to revolts against him. This idea is a mistaken one, caused by judging of good and evil in matters of devotion, by the senses. Some sacrifices, which do not touch the heart in a vulnerable spot, always afford consolation, and thus lead us sensibly to God; but those that wound the heart, poignantly cause so much pain that we are greatly troubled, and inclined to break down completely. To the sorrow these sacrifices entail is joined another very painful suffering; namely, the fear of being unable to bear it, and of gaining nothing by it. This it is that produces the false idea that these sacrifices turn us away from God. Nevertheless it is an assured principle that the more these sacrifices touch us to the quick, and the more they make us die to ourselves, and detach us from all consolation, and sensible support, the closer they draw us to God and unite us to him. This union is all the more meritorious in being hidden and further out of the range of the senses. Self-love, therefore, has no share in it, since it cannot feed on what it can neither know nor feel. May God deign to convince you of the truth of this consoling assurance, which is the teaching of all the Doctors of the Church, and is confirmed by every experience. In order to understand it thoroughly you must remember that in almost everyone there is such a depth of self-love, weakness and misery, that it would be impossible for us to recognize any gift of God in ourselves without being exposed to spoil and corrupt it by imperceptible feelings of self-complacency. In this way we appropriate as our own the graces of God, and are pleased with ourselves for being in such or such a state. We attribute the merit to ourselves, not, perhaps, by distinct and studied thought, but by the secret feelings of the heart. Therefore, God, seeing the innermost recesses of the heart, and being infinitely jealous of his glory, is obliged, in order to maintain it, and to protect himself against these secret thefts, to convince us, by our own experience, of our utter weakness. It is for this purpose that he conceals from us nearly all his gifts and graces. There are hardly more than two exceptions to this rule; on the one hand beginners who require to be attracted and captured through their senses, and on the other hand great saints who, on account of having been purified of self-love by innumerable interior trials are able to recognize in themselves the gifts of God without the least feeling of self-complacency, nor even a glance at themselves. For my part I can bear witness to this constant action of Divine Providence. God has so completely hidden from those who have appealed to me, the gifts and graces with which he has loaded them, that they cannot see their own progress, nor their patience, humility and abandonment, nor even their love of God. Then, too, they can hardly help weeping at the supposed absence of these virtues and at their want of generosity in their sufferings. However, the more afflicted and full of fear are their souls, the less need have their directors to fear and to be afflicted on their account. This ought to cure you of making so many difficulties for yourself. You would understand this still better, perhaps, if you were to consider what Fénélon said on this subject. "There is not a single gift so exalted but that after having been a means of advancement, cannot become, in the sequel, a snare and an obstacle to the soul, by the instinct of possession, which sullies it." On this account God withdraws what he had given, but he does not take it away to deprive us of it absolutely. He withdraws it to give it back in a better way, after it has been purified from this malicious appropriation made by us without our perceiving it. The loss of the gift prevents this feeling of proprietorship, and this gone, the gift is returned a hundredfold. All this seems to me to be of such great importance for you that I think you would do well to read it over often although it is rather lengthy. By dint of impressing it on your mind you will, I hope, relinquish those false prejudices, and the many errors that so frequently disturb and destroy the peace of your soul. Without this peace, as you know, it is impossible to make any progress in the spiritual life. I am acquainted with a spiritual person who is so convinced of the truth of this rule that I have heard her say many times, that after having prayed for certain spiritual favors for a very long time, and after having had innumerable novenas and prayers offered for the same intention she often said to God, "Lord, I consent to be forever deprived of the knowledge as to whether it has pleased you to grant me these graces, because I am such a miserable creature that when I know I possess a particular grace I immediately convert it into a poison. It is not that I wish to do this, Lord, but such is the corruption of my heart that this accursed self-complacency spoils all my works almost without my knowledge and almost against my will. I feel that it is I who tie your hands, Oh my God! and who oblige you to hide from me in your goodness those graces that your mercy induces you to bestow upon me." You, my dear daughter, have more need than anyone else to understand these feelings, for I have never hitherto met with anyone who depended so much on what is called the sensible help of direction under the specious pretext of spiritual need. I have always thought, without mentioning it to you, that the time would come when God, desiring to be the only support of your soul, would withdraw from you these sensible props without even allowing you to learn in what way he could supply all that of which he had deprived you. This state I must own is terrible to nature, but in this terrible state, one simple "Fiat", uttered very earnestly in spite of the repugnance experienced in the soul, is an assurance of real and solid progress. Then there remains nothing but bare faith in God, that is to say, an obscure faith despoiled of all sensible devotion, and residing in the will, as St. Francis de Sales says. Then it is, also, that are accomplished to their utmost extent the words of St. Paul when he said, "We draw near to God by faith", and "The just man lives by faith." All this ought to convince you that it is not in anger but in mercy and in very great mercy that God deprives you more than others. It is because he is more jealous of the possession of your whole heart and all your confidence, and for this reason he is obliged to take away everything and to leave nothing sensible either exterior or interior. Therefore, my dear Sister, a truce to reflections on present or future evils. Abandonment! Submission! Love! Confidence! ## Letter XVIII. *Sacrifice and Fidelity* To Madame de Lesen after she had become a Religious in the Order of the Annunciation. Sacrifice and fidelity are the death of self-love. My dear Sister, You ask me several questions, but what can I say in answer that holy books, meditations, preachers, directors, and above all the interior spirit have not told you hundreds and hundreds of times? 1st. Do you not know that it is only very gradually that self-love dies, and that we learn to live only in God and for God? This is effected by a constant fidelity in carrying out those sacrifices demanded by the interior spirit; sacrifices of the mind, of the will, of every passion and caprice, of every feeling and affection, in fine and above all, the sacrifice of an entire submission in every trial, in the perpetual vicissitudes of the soul and in those sometimes very painful states through which we have to pass in order to be entirely united to God. 2nd. Do you know that the state of pure faith excludes all that can be sensibly felt? In this state of deprivation progress is made without assistance from anything created, but the bare light of faith remains always in the highest point of the soul, and by this light we can not only see what we ought to do, and what to avoid, but we know also that, by the grace of God, we live in horror of evil and fly from it, and in the love and practice of virtue. Therefore it is well to say, "I am living in perfect confidence, and am not risking my eternity." "But suppose I am mistaken, and deceiving others without knowing it?" If you do not know it, then you are in good faith, and this will excuse you in the sight of God who is as merciful as he is just. "But in spite of all this I still feel very much alarmed." Yes, that cannot be helped; our condition in this life is one of fear, because no one can be perfectly sure. God wills that we should glorify him by an abandonment full of love and confidence. This is the tribute he most particularly exacts, and as he gives us the means of offering it with greater merit, why should we be alarmed? We should have more reason to be afraid if we had ceased to fear. There is no state that is more suspect than that which is devoid of fear, even if it should be accompanied by love and confidence. When, on the contrary, the fear of offending God is the prevailing sentiment, the considerations I have explained ought to be sufficient reassurance. They are perfectly solid, because they rest on the immutable principles of faith. In default of sensible devotion we should attach ourselves to this bare faith preserved by God always in the center of the soul, or the higher point of the spirit. 3rd. Do you not know that the sensible presence of God is often by its sweetness an occasion of satisfying our self-love, and that in order to prevent it being dangerous to us God deprives us of it leaving us only bare faith devoid of sweetness, or any kind of mental images, figures or representations? "But," you say, "I do not know if I have this faith." Well! at any rate you know that you aspire to it continually. This desire is, in fact, perhaps too vehement in you, since you are so prone to get excited and vexed when you are disappointed. Therefore you have, at least, the continual and habitual desire of this divine presence. This desire is known to God who sees the slightest movement of the heart. That ought to be enough for you. Remain then in peace, confidence, submission and abandonment, and in grateful love. 4th. Do you not know that the best preparation for Holy Communion is that operated in the soul by God himself? Approach then with confidence, with complete abandonment to the state of poverty and deprivation in which it has pleased God to place you. Remain in it as though sacrificed, annihilated and unseen like Jesus Christ in his Sacrament, because he is there in a kind of annihilation. Unite yours to his. Where there is nothing left that is created, or human, there is God. The more destitute of all things, and divested of self you become, the more will you be possessed by God. Make for yourself a spiritual treasure of this very poverty by a continual adherence to the will of God. From the time you begin this practice you will become richer than any of those who possess the greatest gifts of joy and consolation. You will possess the riches of the holy will of God without fear of self-complacency, since this holy will is bitter to nature and humiliating to pride. Sweet and salutary bitterness which serves as an antidote to the poison of self-love and the sting of the serpent of pride! ## Letter XIX. *God Glorified by Sufferings* To Mother Louise-Françoise de Rosen, on the use of trials even if they be punishments. Reverend Mother, I do not presume to find excuses for the imperfections of the good Sister^3^ about whom you ask my advice, and since God has taken upon himself the punishment of them by sending her the most cruel trials, she seems to me more to be envied on this account than to be blamed for her faults. There is much in these faults that deserves the verdict of the church on the sin of Adam. "Happy fault which merited so glorious a Redeemer!" This good Sister, you tell me, has acknowledged her faults, and now, overwhelmed by the weight of her trials, is much more inclined to depression than to obstinacy. Therefore you only have to revive her courage and to console her gently. Tell her that she has lost nothing, and that far from being abandoned by God she is much nearer to him than when all was prosperous with her, and she seemed to succeed in everything. I authorize you to tell her from me that I consider her more happy than before in consequence of her sufferings by which God is purifying her more and more, like gold in the crucible, to unite her more closely to himself. For you must both take into consideration this great principle: the extent to which the soul is purified in its most secret recesses is the measure of its union with the God of all holiness. By this you can judge if this poor Sister should not be considered the happiest of all, if she could be persuaded to look upon her state of suffering from this point of view. However, if the violence of this trial prevents her seeing clearly the value and use of it, let her rely on her faith, and let her glorify God by patience and an unreserved submission, abandoning herself entirely to his adorable permissions without relaxing in the least degree any of her spiritual exercises, especially as regards prayer and Holy Communion; and without giving way to a secret desire suggested by self-love, to shake off the yoke of the cross of God. "But," she will answer, "this comfort would be just if my state were a trial only, but I have every reason to believe that it is a punishment inflicted by God." I acknowledge this, but in this life no punishment is inflicted by divine justice without a loving intention of divine mercy. This is particularly the case with those souls whom God most loves. God often permits their faults in order to be enabled to derive glory from them, and to make them serve for the salvation of these souls. The chastisements he inflicts sanctify while humiliating them, and dispose them to unite themselves more closely to God, at the same time as they become more detached from self. Therefore they are chastisements as well as trials; chastisements inasmuch as they atone for the past evil and satisfy divine justice; and trials because divine mercy makes use of them to prevent future danger, and for the exercise of many very meritorious virtues. You cannot insist too strongly on these truths with souls in trouble and affliction no matter what may be the cause of their anguish. Let all such remember that nothing happens except by the ruling of Divine Providence, and by his adorable permission. Give this dear Sister who is so full of pain the most deeply spiritual reading; this is the only means she has to soften and relieve her continual torment, and to make it bearable; to convert her pain into profit, and to recover from it at the time arranged by Divine Providence. God has given me in her behalf, all the interest and charity of a spiritual father, and the thought never leaves me that the day will come when she will be my joy and my crown in the presence of God, and even now visibly before men by a most edifying life. I hope she will always keep before her mind the memory of the past in order to humble herself before God, and thus to establish firmly a solid foundation for the spiritual life in which even her faults may prove a guarantee of her perseverance and progress. ## Letter XX. *The Fruit of Trials* To the same person, on the fruit of trials; profound peace. 1st. The deep calm you experience, the profound inner peace with which you are filled and which you find so sweet, is not an illusion but a true operation of the Holy Spirit who speaks in the center of your soul. Peace and love, says St. John of the Cross, are one and the same. Peace can be felt, but love cannot be perceived in the same manner, but is very real, nevertheless. I am not surprised that when God deigns to bestow these precious gifts upon you, you no longer feel your usual infirmities. The interior grace in your soul reflects itself in your body, and causes your pains to cease. I know many who find no more efficacious means for the cure of their maladies than this quiet recollection in God, when he is pleased to bestow it upon them; for, as you truly say, it does not proceed from ourselves. 2nd. To remain simply in the presence of God, quite abandoned to his love and mercy is also an effect of the Holy Spirit in the soul. You have but to remain humbly and simply in the hands of God, adhering to him, and giving yourself up to his love, so that he may do with you, and in you all that he pleases. But never make this sweet repose your object; always go further and aim at the possession of him who bestows it upon you, and value it only as a means of uniting you more closely to God who is your center, your life and your all. Never forget that you may, possibly, find yourself bereft of everything in the most complete spiritual poverty, and left to the simple practice of bare faith for the extinction of self-love. This death of self hardly ever occurs without a deprivation of all things, and at the mere thought of this one's very nature shudders. It is then that one seems lost indeed, without any support, and left in the most cruel abandonment. 3rd. I am glad that God has lessened the fear of reprobation by which you were tormented. Now you can, without so much difficulty, abandon yourself, by making the following act. "May God do with me whatever he pleases, I wish to belong entirely to him by loving and serving him as well as I can. He is the God of my heart, the God of my salvation, and my salvation cannot be left in more secure keeping. I abandon it to him with the greatest confidence." Abandonment by itself can give us an assurance of security that self-love seeks unsuccessfully from creatures or from self. Our weakness and blindness are much more calculated to make us tremble; and, when we enter into ourselves we find what would cause us to despair unless we remembered with confidence the infinite goodness of God. Therefore we can only be reassured through Jesus Christ, in him; and we find him proportionately to the measure in which we abandon ourselves. 4th. The simple "Fiat" you pronounce comprises everything, and the feeling of your continual dependence is one of the greatest of God's graces. The thought of his paternal love and all-powerful aid is the reward of it. When the heart is animated by filial confidence it becomes easy to receive no matter what from the hands of this most merciful Father. 5th. Pure love without any admixture of interest or self-love can only come to you from God, but to acquire a gift of such infinite value the soul is obliged to endure many deprivations and trials. These are so many operations necessary for its purification, because we are always prone to become attached to the pleasure that God allows us unless taught by sad experience to love him even in the most terrible state of privation. I am delighted to hear that the interior spirit reigns in your community. If holy recollection does not comprise everything it is, at any rate, the way to acquire all. You are quite right to leave out all those compliments and ordinary good wishes for the New Year as far as I am concerned. God sees that they are in your heart where they form a continual prayer on my behalf, just as my wishes for your welfare are as a prayer in the sight of God. "Our desires", says St. Augustine, "are as regards God, what our speech and words are with regard to men." He hears them, and, we may hope, will answer them. ## Letter XXI. *Things Painful to Nature* To Sister Marie-Thérèse de Vioménil (1731). Things painful to nature are good for the soul. You need not remind me to pray for you. I never forget to do so, especially since I became aware that you are in a state so painful to nature, although so good for your soul. However, I assure you I have never thought of asking God to grant you anything but patience, submission, resignation to his holy will, and total abandonment to his kind providence; and I do this through the conviction I have of the great grace God is giving you, and of the great need you are in of these virtues; a need all the greater because you do not acknowledge it. When this storm is past you will understand these two things so keenly and distinctly that you will not know how, sufficiently, to thank God for having been so good as to put his own hand to the work, and to operate within your soul in a few months, what with the help of ordinary grace would have taken you, perhaps, twenty years to accomplish, namely, to get rid of a hidden self-love, and of a pride all the more dangerous in being more subtle and more imperceptible. From this poisonous root grows an infinite number of imperfections of which you are scarcely conscious; useless self-examinations, still more useless self-complacency, idle fears, fruitless desires, frivolous little hopes, suspicions unfavorable to your neighbor, little jokes at her expense, and airs full of self-love. You would have run a great risk of remaining for a long time subject to all these defects, filled, almost without suspecting it, with vanity and self-confidence without either power or will to sound the profound abyss of perversity and natural corruption that you had within your soul. It is this collection of miseries that God now makes you feel, not in particular, for if you experienced them in this way one by one, it would not affect you, but by viewing them in general, in a heap, and in a confused manner. This mass of imperfections is like an overwhelming weight. Do not search your conscience, therefore, for the great sin that you imagine must be there; what is actually there is still more alarming, and this is a chaotic mass of interior miseries, weakness, imperfections and little faults which are almost imperceptible and continual and are produced by that amount of self-love of which I am speaking. God has given you a great grace in giving you light to recognize this, for never would you have been able to discover it yourself, not even from its consequences, being in this respect as blind and callous as are vicious men in regard to certain gross sins the habit of which renders them hardened to their gravity. You also were unconscious of that leaven of corruption that was within you and which spoiled and poisoned all your works, even those which had their origin in grace. The heavenly Physician has therefore treated you with the greatest kindness in applying an energetic remedy to your malady, and in opening your eyes to the festering sores which were gradually consuming you, in order that the sight of the matter which ran from them would inspire you with horror. No defect caused by self-love or pride could survive a sight so afflicting and humiliating. I conclude from my knowledge of this merciful design that you ought neither to desire nor to hope for the cessation of the treatment to which you are being subjected until a complete cure has been effected. At present you must brace yourself to receive many cuts with the lancet, to swallow many bitter pills, but go on bravely, and excite yourself to a filial confidence in the fatherly love which administers these remedies. Humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, annihilate yourself without ceasing and allow this work to be accomplished. Do not lose sight for one moment of the contempt and horror of yourself with which your present state inspires you. Think only of your infidelities and ingratitude. When you look at yourself let it not be in the flattering mirror of self-love, but in the truth-telling one that God, in his mercy, presents to your eyes to show you what you really are. This sight so frequently presented produces a forgetfulness of self, humility and respect for your neighbor. "Come and see", the Holy Spirit says to you, which means, come to our Lord and behold by that new light with which he has enlightened you what you have been, what you are, and what you would, infallibly, have become. Be careful never to give up prayer and Holy Communion, for it is in these that you find help and defense. As for sin, you do not commit any, at any rate, none that are serious. As long as you fear, as you do now, to offend God, this fear should reassure you; it is a gift from that same hand which invisibly supports you in your trials. Have patience! you will be consoled in good time, and your consolation will last, while the time of trial passes very rapidly. Poor human nature in its dislike of suffering looks longingly for the end. The important matter is to gather the fruit of the Cross. Let us pray, then, and sigh for that power which we do not possess and should never find within ourselves. This is a fundamental truth of which you have an entire conviction based on your own experience; and it is for this reason that God prolongs your trial until you become so thoroughly convinced that the memory of it may never be effaced from your mind. You speak of pure love; no soul has ever yet attained to it without having passed through many trials and great spiritual labor. In order to arrive at this much-desired goal you must learn to love those labors which alone can lead you to it. The more generous you are the sooner the end of these trials will come and the more fruit will they produce. Continue your way, then, courageously. Rejoice every time you discover a new imperfection. Look forward to the happy moment in which the full knowledge of this abyss of misery completes within you the destruction of all self-confidence and foolish self-satisfaction. Then will it be that, flying in horror from the putrefaction of this tomb, you will enter with joyful transports the bosom of God. It is after having completely cast off self that God becomes the sole thought, the only joy; that on him alone you will rely, and that nothing will give you any pleasure out of him. This is the new life in Jesus Christ, this is the life of the new man after the old has been destroyed. Hasten then to die like the caterpillar, so that you may become like a beautiful butterfly, flying in the air, instead of crawling on the ground as you have hitherto done. --- ![[maps/bibliography#^biblio-adp]] > [[jpc-abandonment-08|← Previous]] | [[jpc-abandonment-toc|TOC]] | [[jpc-abandonment-10|Next →]]