by this fault I may see my Nothing my weakness my inclinations to evil more clearly than formerly I was miserable and I did not know it I was frailty it self and I did not perceive it but 〈…〉 acknowledge my vileness tho' I cannot 〈◊〉 â—athom the depth thereof 〈…〉 I am well-pleas'd that this fault happen'd 〈◊〉 presence of my Friends who will thereâ—â—â—◠〈◊〉 â—ow what I am It much displeases me to 〈◊〉 offended God by being so faithless to his â—â—â—ces but I joy in this that I am well-pleas'd â—â—th my humiliation 'T is a good hap to be deâ—â—â—sed in the esteem of others and does relish â—weet to such who desire to repair the injury â—hey have done to God by sinning against him To be powerfully convinced of our pure Nothing and great Frailty is the profit we ought to make of our imperfections How profitable is the discovery of my misery to me seeing it makes clear unto me all these verities This is the truth of it I am nothing but infirmity and corruption and more than I can comprehend And for the love I ought to have for Truth by a voluntary acquiescence I love and adore Divine Providence which has brought me to the sight of my own Nothing I acknowledge my self to be miserable and am pleas'd the world should know it and use me according to this verity 'T is true also that we ought not to complain of whatsoever injury is done us by word or deed for 't is always less than we deserve 'T is the Law of Christianity and a great truth that we ought to love abjection Jesus having loved it by his Father's order and he is the grand exemplar we must imitate 'T is true also that after our failings we ought to comfort our selves with the love of abjection and make use of our infirmity to please 〈◊〉 Just as when a Ship is broken by a Temâ—â—â— we get some shatter'd Plank to save us 〈◊〉 perishing 'T is true also that since this lapse I perceâ—â—â— better than ever the Bounty the Power anâ— Mercy of God towards me and all the Divine Perfections appear unto me beaming forth more splendors of Glory Just as the Moon never makes more evident the dependance she has upon the Sun than in Eclipses 'T is true also that a Soul sensible of her infirmities is content with her Talent without disquieting her self to attain the perfections of great Saints whereoâ— she acknowledges her self unworthy And if God be pleased to communicate unto her great Graces she will not grow proud as well knowing her own weakness but rejoyce in this that God thereby may be more honour'd 'T is true also that being convinced of her own unworthiness she has no confidence in her self but in God alone to whom entirely she gives up her self to deal with her as he pleases in Mercy or Justice She wonders not to see her self left and abandon'd to sin because she knows she deserves no better and then blesses the Divine Mercy for not dealing with her according to her Merits 'T is true also that a Soul grieving to have displeas'd God would be content to be really reduc'd to her first Nothing iâ— such was the Divine pleasure For though she knows being so brought to Nothing she cannot be capable to please God or enjoy him notwithstanding such is the love she has for the Divine Will that she would have that done though she perish To acknowledge and be content with our own baseness is one of the greatest mercies God can do for a Soul For hereby she draws Salvation from Perdition as God knows how to advance his Glory by our sins A Soul thus enlightned is content to be set on the Dunghil of her miseries surrounded with humiliations for her faults as Job was with afflictions and beholding her self as it were the Queen of Infirmities and Abjections she 's pleas'd therewith seeing she may thereby honour and magnifie the Divine Goodness If a Soul be miserable by falling into sin she is rich in possessing the Treasure of humiliation after her failings But this is a truth hidden to most men who do not discover this advanrage They are poor and yet have a Treasure in their Field which they may have for digging Jesus poor and abject for love of me leave me not to my self lift up my Soul after her fall and gâ—ve her some of that Cordial Water which is call'd the love of Abjection that chases away the vain vapours of self-love by which the Soul is darken'd and loses courage Glorifie your power in my infirmities be pleas'd to condescend so far as to receive me returning into the arms of your Mercy and grant I may die unto my self that I may live in your Embraces Methinks dear Jesus I already feel your tenderness unto me your divine love vouchsafes me a relish of the sweets of Paradice my eyes are bath'd in tears of contentment my heart is dilated and love does firmly unite me to you Wherefore do you vouchsafe the kiss of Peace so soon to such a Wretch as I am Why do you not leave me in bitterness of Soul and trouble of Spirit as a just chastisement for my sins Your Mercy will not so deal with me but by wonderful preventions of love in the midst of my infirmities you redouble your favours and consolations O that I was all love to serve you wholly by way of gratitude I would have all the world to see my Infidelities to the end your mercy may shine more glorious I know that the sight of my sin had so frozen my heart as in a manner to make me liveless but O my Jesus you have provided an excellent remedy seeing the flames of divine love have set me all on fire to do your will 'T is a great favour to be in this temper of Soul but dear Jesus stay not here visit my heart again with the feelings of your humiliations that your inscrutable abjections may be its centre and render it in some sort conformable to yours and do this miracle of your Grace that this faithless heart may become a divine heart by the infinite merit of your most precious Blood CHAP. XVII Considerations upon the vileness of this corruptible body HOw is a Soul pleased to know that her body must return to dust This humiliation is the object of her complacency When the illustrations of a Divine Light clear up the understanding then she knows that perfection consists in a tendence to humiliation wherein she meets with the exaltation of God by the admirable contrivance of the Divine Wisdom O dust and ashes you may be terrible to worldly Souls but I am sure you bring joy to those who walking by the light of Faith and conduct of Grace love dearly the interests of God and life eternal The loss of worldly Interests Honour Contentment is painful to Nature too much attached to her self but a Soul elevated by Grace rejoyces at the loss of her own
gives her a right to the riches of Glory for Truth hath said it Blessed are the Poor in Spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven O how a Soul which once hath beheld the Beauties of Holy Poverty is ready to follow Jesus poor and abject and conform her self to his example She finds her self freed of her Fetters which keep men Captives and Slaves to the World and it seems to her to be depriv'd of all Creatures is the greatest Treasure upon Earth She growes rich by her losses and when God will have her to possess Goods and Honours 't is yet with a disposition to quit them and possess God alone She therefore only keeps them by a pure dependance on the Divine Will without an esteem or love for them but loves in them solely the Will of God These were the impressions my first Prayer made in me In my second Prayer I continued to consider the poor and abject states of Jesus Christ God in his Eternal Decrees had a love for the humane ways of the Word Incarnate Those Souls who are favour'd with Illustrations from Heaven are strongly carried the same way discerning clearly that they can do nothing better upon Earth than to tread the footsteps of God himself To this end the Divine Wisdom elevates them above themselves and their natural inclinations to conduct them solely by the instincts of Grace whereby they make a glorious conquest over the weakness of Nature Self-love and Carnal Prudence which stand in the way to Christian Perfection and hinder us from following Jesus in his Abjections It highly concerns us to die daily to the World that we may attain to the Purity of Divine Love that is Possess and Love God alone The Pride of Adam will not die in us unless we be content to follow Jesus in his Abjections O my Soul let us fall in Love with this state of Jesus Christ which is little known to the World and take it for a Soveraign favour from Heaven to become so contemptible for Gods sake as to pass for one hardly good for any thing O Jesus how few Companions have you of your extreme Poverty Many Honour this Virtue in you but few practice it They must be Faithful Friends indeed who follow you in these ways so bitter and distastful to Flesh and Blood O Jesus be Merciful unto me and grant me this Fidelity that I may never forsake you in Life nor Death My third Prayer was taken up with a general view of the Humiliations of the Son of God for which I felt my Soul had much Love and Respect These Divine Humiliations did ravish me beyond comparison and I discover'd such wonderful Beauty in them that I could not be satisfied with beholding them I was deeply possess'd with a desire to conform my self to Jesus in his Humiliations and to spend my days in his imitation and I was much troubled I could not yet quit all things to live a poor abject retir'd life 'T is no less the work of Grace to bring us to relish the Abjections of Jesus Christ as to be taken with his Grandeurs His Grandeurs are incomprehensible but nothing in my eyes seem more great and rich and precious than his Humiliations The unspeakable Love that Jesus Christ has for Souls does manifest it self by making them partakers of his Humiliations Be content O my Soul with what part he shall give thee For it seems to me a punishment to abound with Riches and Honours whereby we become unlike to Jesus and march on in ways contrary to his practice and example When I reflect upon my sins I cannot sufficiently admire the great Graces God is pleas'd to vouchsafe me A strong argument to convince of his Infinite goodness and affords much matter of Humiliation considering how unworthy I am of the least favours But for me a poor wretch to have a call to solitude to converse only with God and his Holy Angels what a Mercy is this It came into my mind that Moses who had been a Captain of Thieves was afterwards a Holy Hermit and I had a special Devotion to him desiring him to help me by his Prayers O the wonderful effects of Grace that a Robber should become a Hermit I have a Devotion to Saints that have been great sinners methinks they are Powerful with God to help sinners to be converted This view of the extreme humiliations of Jesus yet continuing was the subject of my fourth Prayer And I found in my self great desires to begin a new kind of life to give my self absolutely to God as a Sacrifice by dying to all things of the world by a vow of Poverty But I being not yet in a condition to forsake my temporal affairs I resolv'd to make such a Vow when all things were settled and I took care that my affairs might be so regulated as to put me in a condition to comply with the call of God Having taken this resolution I found my heart inflamed with desires to be wholly for God and to conform my self as much as possible to Jesus in his humiliations Nature felt some afflicting resentment hereat and furnish'd me with arguments to divert me from it But the light of Grace scatter'd these thoughts and taught me to neglect the help of Creatures by casting my self wholly into the arms of his Providence O my Jesus the only love of my Soul though the most despised of men your Divine attracts and inspirations do so powerfully invite me to follow you in your ways of poverty that I shall never soon enough see the happy moment to engage my self thereto by a Vow never to be recalled Fourth Day Jesus the Fountain of Grace and Piety IN my first Prayer God gave me to see the infinite grandeurs of the Sacred Humanity united to the Divinity in the same person This ineffable union was the general and amorous object of my regard which wrought in my Soul a very great esteem and singular love and union with Jesus Christ This state of Jesus rejoyced my heart and I dwelt upon it my Soul being satisfied with wonderful contentment I had interiour assurances and very great certitudes of the Divinity of Jesus nothing in him seemed dark unto me though all surpassed the strength of reason I beheld him as the Principal of Grace and Glory This manifestation was in me by a Divine light and I found it filled my heart with most pleasing impressions The small conviction we have of the Divinity of Jesus makes us such cold Christians and that we walk so slowly in the ways of Grace For who firmly believes that Jesus is God will have a singular esteem of his Doctrine of his Counsels of his Proceedings and think it his Glory for to follow him The perfect belief of the Divinity of Jesus carries a Soul to real endeavours after perfection to despise the world to take up the Cross and follow Jesus in his abjections This is to be the Image of Jesus Christ
he ought nor lov'd with thankfulness He loves us so as to die for us and we make no reciprocal returns O the prodigious insensibility of men Is then Jesus Christ a stranger to us and not our God and Saviour Does the History of his holy Passion pass with us as a profane or indifferent thing Ought not the bloody Tragedy of Calvary fill all Christian hearts with love and sorrow For my part I could hide my head with shame that I have so little compassion and love for Jesus dying on the Cross for our Salvation O my Jesus I confess my fault in that I have so little known my infinite obligations to you But seeing your Grace discovers now to me more clear than heretofore what you are I will never more lose sight of you I will love nothing more than You and esteem nothing more than to do you honour You are my true Father my true Brother true Friend true King true Redeemer O how great a truth is it that you are all in all unto me O that I have been so long without knowing you aright O Jesus how Happy am I that I have found you O let me never so much loose my self as to forsake you For my fourth Prayer I stood at the Sepulcher of Jesus and seeing his precious Body dead and covered with Wounds I made this Epitaph Here lyes Love Yes yes here lyes Love indeed for his excessive Love to us brought him to this state and condition A state full of horror and wounds Blood and Infamy But a state well pleasing to God as satisfying his Justice for mans Redemption I embraced his precious Body and kiss'd his Sacred Wounds I adored Jesus in this state and said O my Soul we must either cease to Love Jesus or die with him seeing Love equalizes Lovers and makes them alike My Soul then chose to die with Jesus and after many sighs and desires to please her Beloved she died with Jesus never willing more to live a Natural and Humane Life but a Life Divine and Supernatural as that of Jesus And I made for her this Epitaph Here lyes a Soul dead of Love Behold in what consists the death of my Soul 't is to live no longer according to the natural Inclinations but according to the motions of Grace which are the Love of Poverty Contempt and Sufferings While these dispositions live in a Soul she is dead to Sensual desires and lives a Life of Grace a Life Supernatural Therefore for the future I will never hunt after Honours or Pleasures or Riches willingly and by Election but I will either heartily forsake them or if I use them it shall be upon Divine Motives for the good of my Neighbour or for pure necessity seeing That is the Will of God the surest rule of all our Actions Tenth Day Jesus risen from Death and Glorious IN my Morning Prayer I consider'd the Glory of Jesus Christ in the state of his triumphant Resurrection O Jesus how Glorious are you How well does this become you Verily 't was a strange state whither your Love had brought you A state of Misery Shame and Sorrow This was well for us Criminals but in no sort agreeing to you who are Innocence it self For what belongs to you is Majesty and Glory What joy did swell my heart to see Jesus Glorious My Tongue cannot express what my Heart feels This great Feast of the Resurrection is to be celebrated by all Creatures seeing 't is the day wherein Jesus appears as God O Feast of the Glory of Jesus O Feast of the Glory of Mary 'T was a Miracle she did not die of Sorrow at the Death of her Son and 't is another Miracle she did not die of Joy at his Glorious Resurrection O my heart be thou enlarged with Joy for 't is a general rule without exception that the Interest of the Creator is to be preferr'd before all Creatures And therefore O triumphant Jesus I more rejoyce that you are Glorious then that I hope to be Glorified with you Yea though I should never be raised your Glory does ravish me It glads me when I consider that damnation only concerns the Creature for the Interest of Jesus suffers not thereby seeing God is Glorified by the Reprobates as well as by the Saints in Glory 'T is also a certain rule that the Elect O Divine Jesus are Images of you and so necessarily must resemble you in your Sufferings if with you they will be Glorified 'T is a folly to think not to suffer here some way or other more or less seeing the way to Glory is by Sufferings O my Soul be thou united to Jesus Crucified and then thou shalt have part with Jesus Glorified To this end thou must love the Cross and desire of Jesus to die or suffer O World thy way is meer folly and nothing else In my second Prayer I was taken up with these words of Divine Jesus Ought not Christ first to suffer and so to enter into Glory I discover'd how all the Divine Perfections did wonderfully shine forth therein But above all the Wisdom of God doth ravish those hearts which contemplate the works of Grace and Mercy O Divine Wisdom how well is the Oeconomy of your Mysteries order'd to work our Salvation and bring us to Glory Every Mystery which I consider'd did raise a new Fire in my breast to inflame my affections with the Love of Jesus Sometimes they altogether did as with so many arrows pierce my heart and made me languish with Divine Love For seeing my self so Belov'd of good Jesus how could I but Love him again O Infinite Love of Jesus for whom shall I have a heart if not for thee O Love 't is for thee my heart is reserved Thy attracts are powerful enough do not redouble them so sweet and charming 't is enough my heart is for thee O Love except thou wilt have me die do not wound me any more Yet I will die willingly if thou wilt have it so on the Cross of Interiour and Exteriour Suffering that I may be conform to my Loving Saviour My third Prayer was a continuation of the Sentiments of the Love of Jesus I made use of the words of great St. Austin in his Confessions O my Jesus you have wounded my heart with the arrows of your Charity and I have devoted it to your Love Since that you have scatter'd my Darkness and made your self known unto me I have not forgot you Since I had the Happiness to know you I have imprinted you in my memory there I find you and I tast perfect Delights and receive extreme Joy and Contentment when I remember you My Soul feeling Divine Fires within her which did fill her with Pleasures I did sing extempore Canticles to my Beloved and though not methodical yet they better express'd her amorous languishings Though alone in my Chamber I spake of Jesus aloud as if I had had many Auditors to be partakers of my
I quite forget my self and be no more and act only in you and you in me in me manet ego in eo and continue thus Absorped in you all the days of my Life Being thus united with you I shall learn your secrets discover your purposes and see with you and your Lights the ways that you take to Love Honour and Glorifie your Father which he revealed unto you at the instant of your Incarnation Ever since that Happy minute you are become the Light of the World he that will follow you shall not walk in Darkness Who can know the Secrets of the Father better than the Son or his Designs and Thoughts than he who being equal to his Father is privy to all the Sacred Councels of the Divinity These he teaches us by word of Mouth he opens them to us by the comportment and examples of his Life Let us see approve imitate Herein consists the right Transformation The Grace bestowed on us in the Holy Communion principally tends to annihilate in us all inclinations of Nature and in their place introduceth others most conformable to those of Jesus Christ according to the measure that a Soul conforms to Jesus Christ proportionally she becomes more capable of Divine Communications For a Soul grows not more pure but in as much as she participates of the Spirit of the word Incarnate whose whole aim is to Crucifie us to all that is meerly according to the Inclinations of Nature How different is the judgment and discernment of true Christians from those of Worldly men How quite another thing are the Thoughts and Convictions of an Illuminated person and those of one who lives only according to Reason There are Souls upon which Jesus entring into them by way of Communion makes such admirable impressions that Lead turned into the finest Gold by the Philosophers-Stone would not be more changed than they are For in effect this Sacrament is the Mystery of the Omnipotence of God where the words of Consecration by a Miraculous Power change the substance of Bread and Wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ By which mutation we are instructed that under the weak and common Species lyes a secret Virtue which is able to transform the most Imperfect Souls into the greatest Servants of God One of the things in the World that most astonisheth me is that when we receive Jesus in the Holy Communion we are so little changed and his Presence so un-active in us We experience none of his wondrous operations He ought to be to the Soul a grain of good Seed that makes very great productions Jesus ought to do admirable things Jesus ought to form Jesus in us and produce by his Grace all his own Sentiments and fill our Life with all the States of his Yet he makes no change in me he does not strip me of my Humane Inclinations that I may live the Life of Jesus A thing which frights me very much and gives me reason to fear that I do not approach unto him with all the preparation requisite Whereupon I flee to the Mercy of God and beg it with all instance for in that alone is my Hope CHAP. X. The third Effect of Communion which is the Perfect and Consummate Vnion THe design of our Lord in giving us the Blessed Sacrament is layd open to us in the Prayer he made to God the Father while he was actually Instituting it Rogo Pater ut sint unum I ask you That they may be made partakers of the Vnion that is between us Wherefore the Union he enjoys with God the Father is the model of that which he desires we should contract with him by means of this Divine Sacrament Now He is so much one with his Father that whosoever sees Him sees also His Father And if we were transformed into Jesus Christ according to his intention in the Communion whosoever should see us would at the same time see Christ But this Consummate Alliance with God is not discernable in the most of those that receive the Communion Because that Consummation pre-supposes another which fails in the greater part of Communicants viz. The Consummation of the Soul in Jesus Christ which is then obtained when by the attractions of Grace she is wholly annihilated as to her Natural Inclinations and the Super-natural succeed in their place being cleared from all dispositions but those of the word Incarnate A Soul in this state receiving the Holy Communion ought to remain simply united to Jesus present and receive in quietness and tranquility such effect of Grace as he works in her which are to live no longer to or in her self but to enter effectively into the poor and abject state of Jesus to live like Him to live by his Spirit to live no longer as the World nor by the Spirit of the World Moreover the Union of the Divine and Humane Nature in the Person of Jesus Christ is another most expressive Image of the Union he assumes us to by the Virtue of this Sacrament For we assuredly believe that his Sacred Humanity is wholly absorpt and plung'd in the Divinity after such an unspeakable manner that there is no comparison which can be drawn from any Created thing may serve to illustrate it To compare it with the Stars which are lost and drowned in the Light of the Sun is a too weak and imperfect similitude and falls infinitely short for there is an immense distance and disproportion between Divine and Created things But the Soul needs not such allusions she is contented to behold it in God by the obscurer Light of Faith and thereupon falls into Acts of Admiration Adoration and Love and discerning that the intention of Jesus Christ by uniting himself to her in the Blessed Sacrament is to perfect her in himself she accepts of it joyfully and resigns her self entirely to the Divine operation and wishes she could say with St. Paul Vivo ego jam non ego vivit verò in me Christus I am no more I live no more but Jesus Christ is my Life and my Being Now it is evident that this high and Consummate Perfection is the effect of an eminent Love and that it cannot be raised to such a degree without destroying in the Lover every thing that is not God and by consequence it costs Nature dear and requires a firm and generous Soul and very Faithful to the impressions of Grace Light and Knowledge are ineffectual of themselves to this great work Nothing but the real and earnest practice of pure Virtue in the full extent of the Grace given us and as occasion shall afford the exercise can bring a Soul to this eminent Perfection Such a Soul cannot be more charmed and delighted than to observe the amorous inventions of the Wisdom and Mercy of God in deriving upon Christians the Fulness of his Divinity by means of the Blessed Sacrament where Jesus Christ presents us his Humanity to draw us into partake of his
THE Interiour Christian OR THE Interiour Conformity WHICH CHRISTIANS Ought to have with JESUS CHRIST Divided into Eight BOOKS which contain most Divine Meditations Extracted out of the Writings of a great Servant of God of this Age. Non magna loquimur sed vivimus St. Cyprian Not our Tongues but our lives speak the Excellency of Christianity Translated out of the 12th Edition in French Antwerp Printed in the year 1684. THE EPISTLE TO THE READER Christian Reader IN this unhappy Age of Contentions about Religion wherein the heat of Controversy hath so much cooled the fervour of true Devotion among us that even some great Pretenders to Piety have only an outward form of Godliness without the inward Power like guilded Sepulchers full of dead-mens Bones it cannot but be very seasonable to teach all those who believe in Jesus how to be real and Interiour Christians Now in my Judgment this Book written in French and often Printed for its Excellency has so well presented to the eye this Heavenly Lesson that I would not let so precious a Treasure lie hid to the greatest part of our Nation in an unknown Language but have taken Pains to expose it to the publick view for a publick Good and God give a Blessing to my Endeavours If you ask me What is it to be an Interiour Christian I 'le briefly tell you An Interiour Christian is one who being well grounded in Faith walks with God in simplicity of Heart and Purity of Intention loves him above all things serves him Faithfully endeavours to please him constantly and had rather die than willfully by mortal Sin break friendship with him There 's no Devil he hates worse than Hypocricy his chiefest care being to be really in the sight of God what he appears to be in the eyes of Men Yea he is more inwardly then he seems outwardly as well considering that God who sees our hearts will reward us accordingly We may say of the Interiour Christian what our Blessed Saviour said of Nathanael Ecce verè Israelita in quo non est dolus Behold Joh. 1. a true Israelite in whom is no deceit And he may truly say of himself with good Hezekiah O Lord I have walked before thee in Truth and with a Perfect Isa 38. Heart and have done that which is good in thy sight And he may say also with St. Paul Herein do I exercise my self to have a Conscience Acts 24. void of Offence towards God and towards Men. And therefore may safely say with the same Saint else-where Vivo ego jam non ego vivit verò in me Christus 'T is not so mueh I that live as Gal. 2. Christ who lives in me Making me a new Creature by Internal Sanctification whereby I become Crucified to my Lusts and dead to the World that I may live to him who died for me Now we must know that there are infinite degrees of Internal Sanctification and the least degree is sufficient to put us in Gods favour and the state of Salvation and make us really Interiour Christians As the least Pigmy is as much essentially a man as the greatest Gyant This I mention least some timerous and well-meaning Souls who really endeavour to please God in sincerity of Heart reading in this Book and other Spiritual Authors more sublime and elevated wayes of advancing our union with God then they experience in themselves or perhaps ever shall in this Life should he discourag'd and tortur'd with scruples as if they did not serve God as they ought and were not truly Interiour Christians I must put such Souls in mind of what St. Paul tells us That there are diversities of Gifts but the 1 Cor. 12. same Spirit dividing to every man severally as he will and pleases Some indeed are wonderfully elevated Saints rapt with St. Paul into the third Heaven ravish'd in an extatical manner with the Glimmerings of Glory and those joyes which may be felt but are inexpressible Such Contemplations and Unions with God are rare and admirable Others in their Re-collections and mental Prayer receive from Heaven Divine Visits and wonderful Illuminations which direct them how to purifie their Hearts more and more and to advance in Piety and Godliness These are great Proficients and walk in a region of Light above ordinary Christians But if Gods Holy Spirit has not vouchsaf'd us these special Gifts and Graces we ought not to be discourag'd in our Pious Endeavours but rest contented with our present state in the course of our Devotions if upon severe examination of our Conscience we find that with Zakariah and Elizabeth we really endeavour to walk in all the Commandments of God blameless and dayly make it our work to conquer our selves to mortifie our Passions to kill our Inordinate Desires and to make a progress in the wayes of Holiness This is sufficient to entitle us to Heaven and make us Interiour Christians though without raptures and extasies without visions and unions extraordinary without wonderful irradiations in mental Prayer which God only vouchsafes to some special Favourites Think upon this and be content with what measure of Grace Heaven bestows upon thee walking with God in true Humility of Soul and Spirit 'T is not much material good Reader in what order thou readest these excellent Instructions every Treatise containing a Compleat Subject independent on each other But my advice is to make those more familiar to thee wherein thou findest most gust and Spiritual profit to thy Soul This I am sure of whatever order thou observest they will highly conduce to the end they were written namely to withdraw our hearts from the Love of the World and to advance our Union with God by taking up our Cross to follow Jesus This is the Spirit and Soul of this Book and I heartily wish it may work these effects in every Reader In the perusal whereof Remember in thy Prayers Thine in Christ Jesus A. L. ADVERTISEMENTS I Thought good Courteous Reader to explain some terms frequently occurring in this Treatise to prevent mistakes in such who are not accustomed to such expressions The word Annihilation is not to be taken Physically but Morally Now a Moral Annihilation is to acknowledge our selves as St. Paul tells us Not able so much as to think a good thought as of our selves But that all our sufficiency is of God for whom is both the Will and the Work in Meritorious Actions Gratia Deisum id quod sum By Grace we are saved Our nothing our ruine self-destruction Poverty of Spirit are terms which for the most part signifie the same thing as Annihilation So that to ruine or destroy our selves is to bring our selves to this Annihilation Annihilation in some places signifies to be content to be thought of by others as of no worth or good for nothing an unworthy person of reputation And in this Sense 't is often applyed to our Blessed Saviour But that the Reader may the better
understand the Spirit of the Book by the Spirit of the Author I have describ'd as much of the Qualifications of that Excellent Person as I could collect from the French Preface the perusal whereof I assure thee good Reader is worth thy pains and consideration THE Author's Life Extracted out of the French PREFACE THE worthy Author of this Excellent Treatise was a Person whose Life was answerable to his Writings a true Interiour Christian elevated by God's Holy Spirit to Sublime Contemplation making it his Business to have his Conversation in Heaven while he was upon Earth 'T is said of Moses that after he had Conversed familiarly with God and descended from the Mount that his Face did shine with an extraordinary Glory So this excellent Christian came from his Prayers as it were from Heaven all enflamed with Divine Love raising a holy Fire in their Breasts who enjoy'd the Happiness of his Conversation But his Goodness was more Diffusive for many of his absent Friends received wonderful Benefit and Advancement in a Spiritual Life by his Heavenly Instructions and Divine Letters Which were so many as that from those Writings was extracted this Interiour Christian not long after he had left men to live with Angels by a Person of Worth and Quality who was so touched to the heart by reading some of his Letters that he thought himself oblig'd in Charity to make them Publick for the Common Good Especially in this Corrupt Age wherein alas we find more Formal than Interiour Christians And doubtless it was the Will of Heaven this Treatise should not lie hid but be expos'd to the View of the World having in a short time enriched the Hearts of many with inestimable Good who entertain it with great Joy and Satisfaction He was in the right who said Loquere ut te videam If once I hear you speak I shall know what you are For 't is impossible to read this Book without some Knowledge of the eminent Perfection of the Authour for what Soul unless irradiated with extraordinary Beams of Heavenly Light could make such Discoveries or give such Directions in Spirituality It was from hence that the Humiliations and Dolorous Bloody Sufferings of Jesus Christ so terrible to Nature did appear to him with a Ravishing Beauty being taken with nothing more in his Devotions than Jesus Suffering For he had a singular Devotion to the Humiliations of Jesus and thought himself a Person cull'd out by Providence to honour his Sufferings He did much affect to lead his Life in Abjections and yet notwithstanding his profound Humility he was much esteemed and admired by all who had the Happiness to know his Virtues Though he lookt upon himself as an unprofitable Servant yet God was pleas'd to treat him as a faithful Friend Though he desir'd the Bitterness and Rigour of the Cross yet God did oftentimes so visit his Soul with extraordinary Consolations that sometimes he would cry out When then good Jesus shall I suffer for you Though he desired to follow Jesus on Mount Calvary yet God was pleased to lead him to Mount Tabor and vouchsafe him the Glimmerings of Glory on this side Heaven Though too many make it their Business to find out wayes to please their Sensuality he made his Body a Continual Victime of Mortification hardly abstaining from Austerities when his Weakness required a Relaxation He earnestly desired that after the Example of Jesus he might finish his Life on the Cross and on the day the Church celebrates the Invention of the Cross God was pleased to rob the World secretly of so great a Treasure lest if his Sickness had been known publickly the holy Importunity of many Prayers might have prevailed with Heaven to defer his Happiness He wanted no long Preparation for his Death by a Languishing Disease but being Fruit-ripe for the Harvest of Glory by the constant Dews of Heaven and Fervour of Charity upon short warning with wonderful Content commending his Soul into the hands of his Saviour he joyfully embraced Death to live Eternaly This shew'd the extraordinary Triumph he had made over the World and Himself by the Power of Grace For though some even Great Saints who had left the World for Christ's sake to avoid it's Contagion seem'd timorous at their Deaths yet He with an invincible Generosity contemning the World without forsaking it did conquer Satan in the midst of Temptations and smile on Death as a Friend to his Happiness Though he chang'd not his Secular Habit yet he had fully banisht the World from his heart and without engaging in any other Profession than that of a perfect Christian he spent his dayes in the Exercise of the most Austere Religious And this was more admirable in him than in those Fountains which conserve their Sweetness in the midst of Salt Waters because he did not only keep the Purity of the Spirit of Christianity among the Infections of a Corrupt Age but without any great noise he made notable Conquests over the Powers of Darkness seeing by his Pious Endeavours he chang'd many Carnal Men into Spiritual Christians We may say without Vanity that the World never had a more Dangerous Enemy He stay'd in it the better to discover its Designs and convert Worldlings exposing himself to combate its Allurements that their Weakness might be known and to testify to the World that one may be a Perfect Christian in despite of this great Enemy of God and Godliness His Example hath made it manifest to all Persons of Quality that one may live like a Hermit in the midst of a City and may love Evangelical Poverty though not practise it in the Possession of Riches and that true Self-contempt is not impossible to such whose Birth or Imployments have advanced them to Honour and that without being an Apostle or Preacher one may be an Evangelist And lastly that throughly to establish the Maxims of Christianity solid Practice is more efficacious than thundring Eloquence And though the Graces which beautifyed his Soul did most incline him to deep Retirements and Contemplation yet he was so wonderfully dexterous in the affairs of God's Service abroad that his Eyes fix'd on Heaven did not hinder him from affording a Helping hand to the good of his Neighbour neither was his Zeal herein confin'd to one onely Kingdom His Piety was so ingenious that he found out wayes to be at the same time one of the greatest Solitaries and yet much ingaged in the Labours of them who endeavour'd the enlargement of Christs Kingdom His way of expressing himself is conform to his Thoughts and both of them to the Gospel where such who chiefly hunt after Eloquence and vain Curiosities will find nothing that will please their Palate But a Soul which relishes Evangelical Truths cannot but find a Gust in the Expressions of this Book which breaths forth nothing but the Spirit of Christianity And God grant that they who take it into their hands may find it working
too much rely on the Creatures that is on the means we use for our proficiency as the reading of good Books Conferences Sermons Meditation c. All these are very good when they are done with great confidence in God and fervent Prayer for nothing but an Almighty hand can pluck us out of the depth of our Miseries and crown us with Glory God is an infinite good in whom all fulness dwells and whatever good is in the Creature are but emenations from Him the Creature of it self being but a meer Vacuum and privation of goodness As we cannot conceive a greater fulness than is in God so we cannot imagine a more extreme indigency than is in the Creature 'T is the same thing to be God and all Goodness and to be a Creature and Nothing the One is all Abundance the Other all Poverty Every one grants this truth but without serious reflection which is the cause we have no true self-denial and diffidence in our own abilities and as much as we rely on our selves we hinder the operation of grace in us O my God! I am content with my Poverty because it brings me to the knowledge of your Riches I should forget what I am if I were not full of wants and imperfections I am well pleased that you are All and I am Nothing but what you vouchsafe to bestow on me The three Divine Persons can only proportionally communicate to each other their infinite Perfections I poor Creature can give nothing to God nor do any thing for him The best I can do is to acknowledge my inability and weakness neither can I do this without his grace which also he gives unto me There is so infinite a disproportion between God and a Creature that if I should lay down my life for God's sake it would be less than if a Pismire should die for the greatest Monarch Whatever the glorious Angels or Saints in Heaven or his Servants on Earth can do for God adds nothing to him We cannot dive into the full depth of our Nothing God only knows it and what we discover by it is by the illuminating Rays of his Grace and Mercy To understand this well we must know that God is not glorified by our good actions but inasmuch as they are agreeable to his will from whence they receive the tincture of goodness and he magnifies his bounty and mercy by accepting and rewarding our small performances So that the graces and favours he bestows upon us in this life and the glory of the other are the effects of his pure goodness 'T is very advantagious for a Soul thus to know her own Nothing for it makes her a Martyr of Love and loving God will do any thing for him and by this knowledge sees that of her self she can do nothing So that hanging as it were between will and weakness she breaths forth such desires as did St. Austin If I was God and you a Creature I would willingly become a Creature that you might be God But perceiving this to be an impossible imagination this poor Soul increases her Martyrdom and dies of love because not able to do any thing for her Beloved Yet this one consolation does revive her in that though she can do nothing her well-beloved can do all and taking delight in what he is and that he hath no need of any thing she reposes quietly in the bosom of God who is her all and final happiness CHAP. VII That God is glorified by our annihilation NOthing but Divine Faith can teach us to love mortification and the annihilation of our selves Natural and worldly wisdom cannot relish it and therefore are not to be consulted or hearkened to being but blind guides in the practice thereof The sin of pride has ruin'd the Glory and Kingdom of God in our Souls and that cannot be re-established but by our ruine and by how much the more we are mortified and dead to our selves by so much the more God is revived in us Poor Creatures as we are we afflict our selves because we are so weak and good for nothing without talents without knowledge that left to our selves all things go wrong with us O that we would learn to be content with these miseries that we might thereby arrive to the happy state of annihilation we might then bring as much glory to God as by great performances for in all these privations the Soul finds no relyance or consolation in her self or in any other Creature but in God alone Holy Job never brought more glory to God than when he was plung'd in the Abyss of humiliations on a Dunghil God glorifies himself in Heaven by the exaltation of his Creatures here on Earth by their humiliation Do we not see that the Wisdom of the eternal Father did prescribe to his Son this way of honouring him on Earth Hath not our blessed Saviour taught us by his words and actions in the constant practice of self-denial And think we to find out a better way to glorifie God than what our Divine Master hath set before us There 's nothing wherein a Creature can more purely glorifie the Creator than by a willing submission to that self-destruction which God works in us for where there is the least of the Creature there 's most of God But in this God does in a manner work all and the Creature yields obedience to his operations To bear patiently the deprivation of light and sweetness and sensible influences in Heaven in our recollections may do us more good than the most illuminated and gustful Prayer To be abandon'd and forsaken by our Friends and bear it with patience and resignation may more profit us than their friendship and services And so it is in the loss of other things because in derelictions and deprivations we seek God with a more purified intention there being less of self in it having not the satisfaction to act but only to receive the loss of what is dear to us meerly because it pleases God thus to deal with us for his greater glory 'T is a sad thing to consider the blindness wherein I have lived O how hard a thing it is for human reason to apprehend the Doctrine of the Son of God! 'T is true it teaches us to crucifie and deny our selves which is what naturally we fear and dread The measure of God's love to a Soul is to be judged by its degree of humiliation which is a way without all exception seeing the Gospel tells us that whosoever does not deny himself and all worldly things cannot be the Disciple of Jesus Christ O dear Jesus humbled for us I see the way wherein you have walked and that I must take up my Cross to follow you I am content to accept it and am willing to be your Disciple Be it then that my Body be afflicted with sickness my Goods lost my Honour in the dust and I become as I deserve of little or no esteem and repute Be it
that you withdraw from me your Divine Illuminations in Prayer and Recollection so as to be in a manner void of understanding sicut equus malus quibus non est intellectus Provided dear Jesus that I be but content with these humiliations it is sufficient I shall be happy Let others ask of you what they please as for me my desire is to be entirely annihilated and that my portion may be to honour your Divine humiliations We are not couragious enough to fight as we ought to destroy in us our sensual inclinations for we are too feeble against our selves and too indulgent to our defects in this spiritual combat But O my God put too your helping hand and work in us your will that we may be humbled and contentedly submit to your operation CHAP. VIII That the Soul is Rich when she possesses the love of self-contempt GOD has infus'd this thought into my Soul that the love of self-contempt and the desire of humiliation may be that hidden Treasure mention'd in the Gospel Thesauro abscondita in agro Matt. 13. 'T is really a great Treasure to love abjection yea a Treasure that contains abundance of inestimable Riches but they appear not outwardly being hid on purpose to preserve with more security And he only has this Treasure who keeps well hidden what he possesses 'T is a Treasure hidden and unknown to the world For who would imagine that there should be any thing so rich and precious in Sufferings and Humiliations Should our senses or carnal prudence or human reason make enquiry would they search here to enrich themselves and satisfie their desires We could never have thought that a hidden Treasure was here enshrin'd if Jesus Christ who put it there himself had not reveal'd this great secret to our Souls by his peculiar favour and merciful illuminations If we will have this Treasure we must buy it and give for it whatever we possess that is to say we must lay down our whole Patrimony the fatal Inheritance left us by our first Parents namely affection for Honours for Pleasures for Riches too much seeking our selves and our own interests the love of our own excellence and all the other wretched movables which we possess by being conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity If we will not be content to part with all yea the utmost farthing we cannot be enriched with this Treasure O how rich and happy is he who does possess it For it is a Treasure which as the world cannog give so it cannot take it from us and as long as we are in quiet possession thereof we find God in our Souls and such a profound peace as passeth all human understanding When one has purchas'd a good Estate in Land we are ready to say He is in a good condition what need he fear now having a sure foundation of subsistence If a War happen the Enemies can't carry that away with them they may indeed deprive him of his Money and Goods but for his Land that is fix'd and immovable 'T is the same case with this precious Treasure when once the Soul hath it in possession and will not part with it she need not fear she has sure hold of subsistence for her spiritual life Neither the World nor the Devil nor all the Enemies of our Salvation let them make never such furious on-sets can rob her of it it surpasses their power and belongs not to them 'T is true they may deprive her of some moveables as sensible consolations the love of austerities the desire to undertake brave actions for the Glory of God as to go to Canada or England for the conversion of Souls to the Catholick Faith in a word all the fair Idaea's of Spirituality The Devil the World Nature has a mind to these movables and a Soul that possesses only these has nothing but what may be taken from her but whosoever possesses this Treasure of the love of abjection and self-denial is rich for ever And when God is pleased to discover to a Soul the value thereof Prae gaudio illius vadit vendit universa quae habet emit agrum illum she joyfully parts with all she has to get it in possession We have a double right to pretend to the possession of this Divine Treasure The first is our natural inability to good the second is our criminal sinfulness These two lay upon us a continual obligation to endeavour after self-denial and annihilation and this endeavour is very pleasing to God who delights to see a Creature acknowledge what is due to it self and render to him his deserved Glory The Son of God began as a Gyant to run in this way of self-contempt by his Incarnation for 't is a wonderful humiliation for God to become Man and he finished this course by his Death on the Cross which was as low as humility could descend For God-Man to die an infamous death between two Thieves as a Malefactor and his whole life besides was but as one continued humiliation and yet alas we pass away our days in vanity calling our selves Christians tho' all for exaltation of our selves destitute of self-denial and true humility O wonderful blindness O Jesus poor and abject when will you draw me after you by the powerful attracts of your mercy Your ways are pure and pleasant and odoriferous to those whose Souls are enlightened with the Rays of Grace You O Jesus establish your Empire in humble hearts and reign there in peace as the Devil sets up his Kingdom in proud Souls and there domineers with intolerable Tyranny CHAP. V. What profit we draw from humiliations PAins and Miseries humble the body Poverty Riches Contempt Reputation and Honour Death Life aridities in Prayer spiritual Consolations all these conduce to purifie Virtue and sacrifice man wholly to God Some glorifie him by action some by suffering others by privations and humiliations and these last are the greatest Saints though here despis'd and known to God alone We ought to resign our selves to the conduct of God's spirit but if it was left to our own choice the way of abjections is best and safest Job did more glorifie God on the Dunghil than in his Palace Happy is he who in glorifying God follows the call of his holy inspirations in a way which the world neither does nor can well understand 'T is a great misery not to be willing to acknowledge that human wisdom is but folly before God which continually eggs us on to get out of the happy state of abjection upon the fairest pretences imaginable as the salvation of souls to help our Neighbours and the like Notwithstanding 't is safest to yield our selves up to the sole conduct of God's holy Spirit the order of whose providence we cannot shun God glorifies himself in Heaven by the exaltation of his Creatures on Earth by their Humiliation Let no person complain then that he cannot be instrumental to the glory of God for
and of little understanding by worldly persons thou ought'st not to be discourag'd at bad successes and thereupon drink deep of the Cup of humiliations whether thou be in fault or not to be content to see others advanced and willingly embrace a low condition O my Soul this engagement may terrifie thee but take courage thou canst do all things through Christ strengthening thee Jesus Christ was praedestinated from all Eternity to sufferings and abjections by the Decree of his Heavenly Father to satisfie for our sins And 't is certain that all the Friends of God are praedestinated to be conformable to Jesus Christ and so are praedestinated to sufferings to satisfie God offended and repair his Glory Whosoever therefore refuses sufferings and humiliations forsakes the way of the Praedestinate for doubtless by how much the more a Soul participates of the states of the life of Jesus so much the more is she in God's favour being more conform to the great Exemplar of those who are praedestinated to Life eternal Crosses and humiliations are best for Christians and nothing does them more hurt than temporal Prosperity O my God! burn kill mortifie disgrace debase crucifie me otherwise I shall not have your face and favour nor be numbred among your Friends Make me wise in good earnest to the end I may walk in your ways that I may have a love for crosses and humiliations that my heart may not be at rest till it rest there as in a Centre I should never have believed if experience did not make it evident that a Soul can be brought to such a state by the conduct of Grace as to rejoyce exceedingly to be plung'd in all sorts of miseries But these joys are so pleasant and so sweet that after a relish of their goodness all things upon Earth seem nothing to them A Soul then much wonders at her self to be terrified so much with the sight of abjections seeing now they seem to her a Coelestial Paradice and next to Heaven she desires no other for she knows that Jesus Christ enjoy'd on Earth both these Paradices that of Glory in Heaven and this of Humiliations on Earth She knows that in the Paradice of Glory she shall be glorified of God she knows that in the Paradice she conceives to be in Crosses and Abjections God is glorified by Her This is that which makes her have such an esteem and love for sufferings She thinks it a punishment to part with this Paradice and she cannot sufficiently lament the blindness of men who hunt after Honours and Preferments of which she has no small abhorrency She sees clearly that those advanced to Honours commonly seek their own Glory but by self-denial and abjections we aim at the Glory of God And therefore laying most to heart the Glory of God she falls in love with humiliations A Soul once enlightned with these irradiations if she refuse abjections and sufferings is very faithless and deserves to be in the world without crosses and humiliations which is the most formidable chastisement that can happen to us upon Earth CHAP. XV. That the experience of God's goodness to us does annihilate us powerfully LEt us not imagine we have the Spirit of suffering and true humility because we are affected with the thoughts and sentiments thereof for we can only know it assuredly in the effective occasions O how rare a thing is it to be wholly crucified to the things of this life Nature must pay dear to purchase this Jewel 'T is not because the fruits are not sweet which are indeed so ravishing that no other sweetness in the world may be compared to it insomuch that those Souls who have once tasted thereof are as I may say daily mounted on the Cross as a Tree of Life Search for sweetness where you please you will never find it so full as in the bosom of the Cross all other sweetness is but superficial and fleeting this is solid permanent and efficacious But this a Soul cannot know by thoughts only and sentiments thereof but by the real effects of suffering Some Souls are as St Cordula in whom the weakness of Nature was so strong that she hid her self to escape Martyrdom but the power of Jesus Christ made her a little after discover her self and lay down her life for his sake There 's a wonderful frailty in human Nature but the power of Grace in man is marvellous the sight of One makes us tremble for fear but beholding the Other we are encourag'd by hope Humility and confidence in God are two Virtues very necessary to man who left to himself is all weakness and is not strong but by the Grace of Jesus Christ in whom poor humble Souls arrive to their Crowns of Glory and he is also crowned by them for they cannot conquer the World and Nature but by Him and this puts eternal Crowns upon his Head The Crowns which the Saints wear on their heads belong not to them as if they had gain'd them by their own abilites but to Jesus Christ the Crown of the Blessed in Heaven Jesus Corona Sanctorum omnium O dear Jesus I am well pleas'd with your sweetness and consolations and with the moderation you use towards me in trying me only with small afflictions as well knowing my weakness would be over-whelm'd with a torrent of sufferings I am pleas'd with those sensible influences you infuse into my Soul in Devotions for though they be evident signs of my weakness yet they are assured effects of your amiable Providence to strengthen my frailty against temptations Glorifie then in the depth of my Misery the riches of your Mercy When a Soul calls to mind her imperfections and inclination to evil God thinks upon her and supplies her with his assisting Graces When she forgets her miseries and corruptions God also forgets her for he loves not Vanity but Verity For this reason the most usual exercise of a Soul ought to be to endeavour for a perfect sight of her imperfections This is an Altar on which we sacrifice all self-conceits and desire of our proper excellence to do homage to the sovereign Perfection and infinite Majesty of God This Altar ought to be every day prepared What corrections and reproofs we may receive from others are not to be thought full of passion and exaggeration yea they come from our greatest Enemies for they are less than our sins and corruption the source whereof is so profound that no Creature can fathom it but God alone O what a blindness is it then to complain CHAP. XVI To be content with abjection after our faults repairs the injury to God and makes up our ruins YOu know my last inconsideration This fault has made me see very well my extreme misery and the little strength my Soul hath on such occasions I see methinks the depth of my weakness and know how little I am mortified and how active my passions are yet in me God of his mercy grant that
to their substance is to keep our selves in the bounds of human reason to which they are conformable but to observe them in an elevated manner so as our obedience may be meritorious to follow Divine Inspirations in loving Contempts Poverty Mortifications and embrace Evangelical Counsels To do this we must be elevated above our selves and live a Supernatural Life See then what I understand by a Supernatural and Christian Life To live Christianly is to live according to the Spirit of Jesus according to the Grace of Jesus the New Man A Grace far different from the Grace given to old Adam in the state of Innocency A Life more holy and more eminent and which carries along with it different effects and contrary proceedings The Grace of Adam did enable him to use the Creatures virtuously and by the holy use of Pleasures Honours and Riches to arrive to his final happiness This was the way of the state of Innocency from whence being fallen the infinite Wisdom hath found out another way quite different which is the way of privations of the Cross of sufferings of humiliations in which Jesus Christ marched from the first moment of his Incarnation to his last breath on the Cross This is the true foundation of the Christian Life this is the true Principle this is the only way out of which there is no Salvation or Perfection Worldly men and too many Christians are ignorant of it and not knowing supereminentem Scientiam Jesu Christi this supereminent Science of Jesus Christ they know nothing as they ought because they know not Jesus crucified This Doctrine is harsh to flesh and blood and wholly contrary to the Spirit of the World But the Saints have practis'd it and I must walk the same way except I will be very faithless and renonnce the Spirit of Jesus Christ O my God! I will become a New Man in my Understanding Will Life Proceedings and to this end I will change my Doctrine my Principles and Maxims I will deny my self and take up my Cross to follow Jesus I will be content with Poverty Contempt and Mortifications my inclinations shall tend this way for the future and sufferings for your sake shall be delights unto me And if I do otherwise it shall not be through wilfulness but human weakness O good Jesus give me to live with you a crucified Life on Earth that you may make me partaker of your glorified Life in Heaven There is a time for all things This is a life of Sufferings the other of Enjoyments O blindness of Christians not to see the excellency of the Christian Life Some are busie to make themselves fit for worldly Employments some are all for Science others for War c. but few make it their chief work to become good Christians as being of little value with them O the ignorance of Christians not to see that all things besides are pure vanity CHAP. II. Of the high esteem we ought to have of the Christian Life JESUS on the day of his Ascension was elevated to the highest Heavens where he sits at the right hand of God upon which my Soul rejoyc'd with her Saviour in admiration of his Tryumphs and breathing out after him a thousand Praises and Benedictions with all Saints and Angels found motions in my self to follow him not to Heaven but to Mount Calvary not in his Tryumphs but Humiliations O my Jesus said she that I was elevated above my self that I could so keep Nature under as to live a supernatural Life and tryumphing over human Reason and natural Maxims I may repose quietly in the Bosom of your Cross and there live happily in that content the world knows not with that peace which passeth all understanding I know that all the Patriarchs which you led in tryumph were justly ravished with joys unspeakable But if you please to raise me by Grace to a supernatural Life I will not envy their happiness They are elevated to Enjoyment but as for me I am for Privation for Contempt and Miseries which seem to me being suffered for your sake dear Jesus more delicious than Paradice If I persevere with Fidelity in a crucified Life I will not trouble my self about the life of Glory But alas my frequent falls and failings by reason of my weakness and inconstancy make me desire that Life where is no fault or imperfection The ascension of a Soul to Heaven O how delightful is it the ascension of a Soul to a supernatural Life O 't is admirable How happy are they who are acquainted with it O my God! clear up the eye of Faith in me that I may behold the wonders you work in Souls in this valley of tears What if I say That a Soul is as happy and tryumphant in going out of her self for the love of the Cross to embrace abjection as in going out of the World to possess Heaven So many sallies as she makes out of her self for the love of the Cross are so many glorious ascensions which delight even God himself the Saints and Angels beholding it with admiration The same Faith which opens my eyes to see Jesus poor and abject does assure me that the triumph of a Soul in humiliations is no less admirable than in Glory What can be done more to make us have the highest esteem of this supernatural Life when we see God the Father among so many possible ways hath from all eternity chosen this for his Son while he liv'd upon Earth How did his well-beloved Son who is infinitely wise leave the bosom of his Father with joy to embrace this life with love and affection How did the holy Spirit who reposed in his breast as the centre of his more noble sentiments carry him on by most powerful inspirations to the Cross Contempts Poverty Humiliations during the whole course of this mortal life What other way can those who belong unto Christ take to make themselves conformable to him but by treading in his steps But when our blessed Saviour liv'd in the world this wonderful life Mundus eum non cognovit the world knew him not because he lay hid in poverty pains and sufferings In like manner those who live a life most conformable to him the world knows them not for we must have eyes cleared by Divine Irradiations to discover the excellency of this state And yet so much Glory and Grandeur is enveloped in the shadows of this Life that they who live it do most glorifie God and exalt his Honour Take courage then and let us tend to the perfection of Divine Love which we shall find in the solid practice of this supernatural Life Let others do what they please we will follow the conduct of God's holy Spirit and march stoutly after Jesus Christ abject and crucified O what happy advantages enjoys that Soul to whom God is pleas'd to give a view of this supernatural Life a Life hidden and unknown to worldly men 'T is of more worth than all
hath espoused the folly of the Cross and 't is his will I shall do so likewise and shall not I do his will O my God! I am content to be depriv'd of what the world loves and desires leave but me the folly of the Cross I shall be rich enough O amiable folly he who knows thee cannot but love thee What a fool have I been to embrace thee no sooner Behold my Soul thou art engaged and this engagement makes thee fearful Quare tristis es anima mea quare conturbas me But why O my Soul art thou disquieted 'T is true for the future thou must suffer injuries affronts pains of body troubles of mind be content with annihilations and abjections be pleas'd with disgraces be the play-game of Worldlings and esteemed as a Fool yea to be ill spoken of by some Devotes Thou must not be cast down with ill successes whether thou be in fault or no Thou must drink deep of the Cup of humiliations see others exalted and love to be humbled yea though by spiritual Desolations Take courage O my Soul we can do all things through Christ strengthening us I confess the greatness of my engagement would have quite cast me down being sensible of my own wonderful weakness if I had not been supported by the infinite mercy and goodness of God Wherefore I must love the Cross which I have espoused for ever I shall find my self well enough in this alliance if I do but continue faithful for the more I converse with it I shall the more discover its Beauty my fears will vanish my passions will be appeas'd and being in peace my Soul will be enlarged and melt in love towards this Spouse which tho' black is wonderful comely If I love the Cross it must needs be an effect of pure Grace my own frailties bearing witness but at present I find my self in great disposition of love O how weak is my Soul when left to her self O how strong is she when supported by Grace O my Jesus 't is your love and your example that makes me love the sacred folly of the Cross which you have so dearly loved as to die in its embraces When I consider a God crucified methinks I discover certain rays of Beauty which make the horror of Mount Calvary seem wonderful amiable and I can hardly be satisfied with looking on this lovely object and say O my Jesus how delightful is it to see the beauty of a God dying for men This beauty indeed is not in his sacred visage for that was all disfigured with blood and buffettings but in that God was pleased to die on the Cross for men and the eternal Father took complacence in this beauty I cannot explicate what is this beauty unless by the effect it produces in me for verily my Soul sees nothing besides this to captivate my sight Jesus only in his humiliations and sufferings on the Cross commands my eyes and my heart When I consider the other states of the life of Jesus his Incarnation Nativity Solitude Conversation and the like I find in them a beauty invites me to behold them with delight because I discover certain irradiations to beam from the obscurities and humiliations of these states which are very ravishing I often say with my self How lovely is the abjection of this state How is the poverty of that admirable And in all I perceive the beauties of a sacred Folly which the infinite Wisdom would make use of to confound the false Maxims of worldly Prudence O what a favour have you in mercy done for me O my God to discover to me the beauty of this Divine Folly which to worldly men seems nothing but deformity But what abundance of Grace do you vouchsafe me by enabling me to make so strict an alliance with it I have espous'd it I will live with it I will die with it and nothing shall ever divorce me from it CHAP. V. How we ought to conform our Interiour to that of Jesus Christ. OUr Interiour ought to be conformable to that of Jesus Christ that as his Members we may be governed and animated by his Spirit that having part of his Grace as Christians part of his light from his Doctrine part of his inclinations to put us upon practice we may be so transformed into Jesus as to have a perfect union with him And this is that wherein lies the excellency of a Christian this is that which makes Christians indeed and to do and suffer as becomes Christians 'T is a strange thing to see what little knowledge we have of the Christian life Some who have left Nature to follow Grace suppose it consists in doing much for God and for the good of our Neighbour by preaching instructing giving Alms and such-like charitable exercises This is good indeed but we must form the Interiour Christian and then we shall do best for others what God calls us to undertake The Interiour consists in Illustrations inward Teachings Sentiments and affections of the Soul If those be high and elevated the Interiour is so likewise But the Soul of Jesus had the most elevated illustrations possible of the excellency of Self-denial Poverty Pains Abjections and the Cross and from thence a singular love and esteem for them These irradiations and affections were infus'd into his most beautiful Soul the first moment of his Incarnation and continued to his last breath on the Cross The eternal Father who by this New Adam would repair his Glory which was obscur'd by Old Adam's fall amongst the infinity of means which lay treasur'd up in the bosom of his Omniscience and Omnipotency chose this of the Cross which his Son made Flesh embraced cherished loved and put in execution all his life-time esteeming Contempts Crosses Sufferings as things great and excellent preferring the interest of the Glory of his Father before the satisfactions of his sacred Humanity which had a natural repugnance to them By how much the more then that a Soul is partaker of the Divine Spirit and Interiour of the Son of God by so much the more she esteems and loves the Cross and consequently does more glorifie God the Father For to suffer is to make a continual Sacrifice of our Pleasures and Interests uniting our selves to the design the Son of God had by suffering to repair the Glory of his Father Wherefore when a Soul ceases to value and love the Cross and Humiliations she is no more conform to the Soul of Jesus and so does not glorifie God the Father in a high manner but when she feels in her self a high esteem and love of the Cross she highly glorifies the eternal Father who takes great delight in her in that she resembles his well-beloved Son When a Soul is enlightned with these irradiations she sees her Glory is to be despised because her Glory is to procure the Glory of God which she does most by humiliations She finds her delight to be in suffering because her
according to Nature and must employ all means and Motives to this effect I will set down some of them 'T is a good Motive or means to renounce all Creatures and our selves by a spirit of denudation saying with great fervour and affection Away Creatures get hence from me and leave a place in my heart for God alone 2. 'T is a good Motive to do this by a spirit of Poverty for it is not possible to follow Jesus poor and abject unless in due circumstances we be willing to leave all things for Jesus sake and become poor to follow him Let us therefore be content to quit all things joyfully and be glad to have nothing to possess God himself alone 3. ' Tisae good Motive to die to all things by a spirit of abjection What greater happiness is there O my Soul than to live in humiliation seeing this was the life of God upon Earth To be despised with Jesus is a state of beatitude Worldly Prosperity is a hindrance to our happiness 4. 'T is a good Motive to abandon all things by a spirit of oblation sacrificing and annihilating our selves sincerely to pay homage to the Infinite Majesty of God with such a confidence in him so as to rely never more on any Creature Quid enim mihi est in Caelo aut à te quid volui super Terram Deus cordis mei O my God! shall any Creature take part of my heart with you when all is yours If it was possible to love you too much I might give place to something else but seeing I am infinitely below my duty in that particular what Creature can pretend to have the least part with you CHAP. IX Of the liberty we enjoy by the exercise of the Supernatural Life 'T Is wonderful to see the great liberty which a Soul enjoys by the exercises of a supernatural life When the illuminations of this state irradiate a Soul throughly she enters into a new region of light full of Peace and Love marvelous large and spatious in which she lives in high union with God A union which is not so liable to vicissitudes and disturbances as formerly because accidental occurrences as sickness disgraces c. do not hurt such a Soul by reason they make no strong impression in her and by consequence being become less sensible she is not easily diverted from the supernatural Object of her love Yea such a Soul improves hindrances and divertisements to her greater recollection and increase of Divine Love because in this state she is dis-engag'd from the Creature and so freed from fear of miseries which she can chearfully embrace as the occasions of her happiness whereby she enters into a perfect liberty and great purity of Virtue I could never well understand what that is which is called Purity of Virtue but now I see 't is the state of a supernatural life wherein the Soul lives no more in her self and of her self and for her self but in God and of God and for God being wholly separated from the Creatures and united to God Alas how is this poor Soul afflicted to do things so much below her self in this high condition For oftentimes she must act according to her natural inclinations and the dictates of pure reason which affords her matter of sighs and languishings after her Beloved This is that which kindles in her breast an ardent desire to be dissolved and leave this earthly Tabernacle wherein by the common misery of mankind she lives a life displeasing to her self for being not wholly for God as she desires it seems to her a kind of death And seeing she cannot continually live this supernatural life without vicissitudes it is as it were a death unto her A Death unknown to sensual men but such that are spiritual are very sensible thereof O Jesus deliver me from this life of mortality seeing here I cannot live your life of purity in comparison of which all other lives are but death and corruption To see so clearly the excellencies of a life so lovely and not to be able to live but little of it considering my frailty makes me resent my misery and acknowledge dear Jesus how necessary your Grace is for me O how great is the dependence which my Soul hath on your mercy 't is so mighty and essential dependence that words cannot sufficiently express it However this comforts me herein that it gives you all the Glory of the Interiour beauty in the Soul which is a work more magnifies your Power Bounty and Wisdom than the whole outward work of the Creation Your greatest wonders dear Saviour are secret and hidden A Soul that lives this supernatural life above her inclinations does more set forth the great power of God than to elevate the Heavens above the Earth for this is as miraculous as to elevate the Earth above the Heavens This makes me O my God desire to live this blessed life that I may thereby bring greater Glory to your Name Assist me powerfully with your Grace for if I be once left to my self I shall relapse into my natural weakness which is but a meer Nothing and Infirmity Some trouble themselves too much in philosophising on this spiritual life which is needless it being enough to say The Spirit of Jesus must be the Spirit of my Interiour 't is He by whom I must live this life and act accordingly and so free our selves from other considerations which may hinder our liberty to follow this light and fall faithfully to practice on the occasions of Crosses Contempts and Disgraces which happen to us in this life I ought daily to endeavour after purity although I cannot attain the highest practice because the course of my life wherein God has placed me will not permit it nor does exact of me to attempt of my self the grand effects of purity lest I should be discourag'd by failing in the enterprize This is only the perfection of the greatest Saints and herein we must give our selves up to the conduct of the Spirit of Jesus Christ who being infinitely wise we need not fear having him for our Leader But as we ought not to be too rigorous so we must not be too faint-hearted in the ways of perfection but apply our selves with love and resolution to all occasions by suffering peaceably and with contentation whatever injuries we may receive from others in seeking too much their own interest All sufferings are to be entertain'd with love but especially what we suffer by Injustice For is not this that which the Son of God hath done principally upon Earth by suffering innocently Do not therefore say I would suffer this injury if he that does it had the least reason for it for this proceeds from self-love and passion It may well be that he has no reason to do you this injury but Divine Reason and the spirit of Christianity teach you to bear it patiently 'T is good to suffer thus and in this to imitate Jesus is
pleasing to him And seeing this exercise of the supernatural life does bring with it a universal Peace and this Peace cannot be preserved without suffering contentedly all injuries whatsoever this excellent life does teach us holy Patience Now this Patience preserves this Peace and this Peace brings with it an admirable Liberty and Resolution to mind principally the One thing necessary which is to give up our selves to God and his direction CHAP. X. Our greatest happiness on Earth is to profess the way of Christianity I Have a great resentment of joy and thankfulness to see my self a Member of Christ's Church and in the number of the Faithful I have a sensible taste of this happiness which is incomparable O my God! what shall I return unto you for having prevented me with this signal mercy why have you chosen me out among so many thousands Alas this is the excess of your sole bounty to me To be a Child of the Church O what a happiness is this 'T is of more worth than to be Monarch of the whole world The Church is the Congregation of the Faithful that is of those who believe and confess Jesus Christ and have no other Maxims nor Sentiments than his O my Soul let us then live as becomes our Profession that Jesusmay live in us according to his holy will and inclinations To be a Member of Christ's Church is to be a person who ought to have an affection for humiliations and crosses to be well content not to thrive in the world and to advance in Virtue by opprobrious usage and contradictions What a misery is it to see us live so little in the exercise of Christianity We account it an honour to be in authority to be well descended to have a generous spirit but to be a Christian we are affraid to own it by our actions O the beauty that adorns our Christian Profession How wonderful is it and yet how little esteemed by us I shall be very honourable and happy to keep that with me when other things are gone and vanish'd O how amiable are the Maxims of a supernatural life in what an excellent order do they put all things They give to every one what is their due to God all Honour and Glory and to me a wretched sinner Contempt and Confusion For I ought to consider my self as a centre of all miseries and deserved punishments God is the Centre and Object of all the adorations of Men and Angels Glory is his just tribute but to me belongs confusion If I should be beaten disgracefully I ought to take it with contentation to see Justice so well done to me on this occasion And if I was truly animated with the spirit of Christianity I ought as much desire to be humbled as worldings thirst after Honours Praises and Preferments 'T is a supernatural disorder not to love Ignominies and not to endeavour the destruction of our corrupted Nature Jesus hath built his Mystical Body on the ruins of our Natural Body and we cannot form in us the same life of Jesus without the ruin of ours that is to say our natural life according to our depraved inclinations Poverty Pains Contempts your dear Companions good Jesus make sometimes my heart ake and then again they refresh me breathing forth such sweet Perfumes as chear my spirits A Perfume that purifies and calms my Soul into a fit temper to converse with you I will now wonder no more that your Spouses run after you in the Odour of your Perfumes A Perfume that doth strengthen me to accomplish the desires I have to be conformable to you My heart dilates it self with hope to see that happy day in this life when I shall be free from all molestation of Creatures and have some participation of the poverty and abjections of Jesus crucified We cannot live here without some Director or other for either the Humanity of Jesus will direct us or the Humanity of Adam will govern us If we live the life of Christianity the First will conduct us and impart to us such directions as his holy Soul receiv'd from the Divinity which are all for the Cross and humiliations If we love only a human life the Other will guide us in the ways of self-love 'T is as great a miracle for a Soul to live a supernatural life as for a stone to elevate it self into the air because the corruption of sin hath made the Soul so heavy that of her self she cannot but tend downward to sin and misery This is that which magnifies the power of Grace in us So that it is a prodigious vanity to boast of our good actions when being done by the supernatural power of Grace they are not the fruits of human Nature If a Soul loses the sight of the light of Faith she will soon lose her self in the Mist of self-love If she does not live in a continual mortification by curbing her natural appetites she must needs fall into superfluities and imperfections The sweetness and joy that a Soul receives from austerities crosses poverty denudation of Creatures makes her spiritual peaceful chearful and affords her solid content and satisfaction The content and delights she receives from sensual pleasures though lawful as Meat and Drink temporal successes Reputation c. make her carnal and afford her but a false peace and vain joy and instead of elevating her to contemplation do more or less depress her to sensuality CHAP. XI That Truth is only found in the Spirit of Christianity the rest is Vanity WHen the beams of the light of Faith are darted into a Soul they discover to her that there 's nothing true indeed but the verities of Christianity which Jesus came from Heaven to teach us and all the rest but deceit and vanity O what happiness is it for a Soul to be thus irradiated Then she begins to know how she hath been enveloped with darkness and dwelt in obscurity O what joys do now refresh her How rich and glorious is she in perceiving that what she thought to be true Riches Glory and Joy is false and counterfeited and in reality but poverty infamy and sorrow These heavenly Illustrations do open her eyes to see perfectly the vanities of this world which now she values not but Jesus is her only joy her life and verity Whatsoever is not Christian that is to say according to the Maxims of Christianity she esteems now as folly death and perdition and what to the world and the flesh is folly death and perdition she accounts to be wisdom life and the greatest gain O when the rays of this light do pierce a Soul how on a sudden becomes she knowing content and elevated 'T is hardly credible how much such a Soul is alienated from her self and whatsoever is not God She sees so much wisdom in the folly of Saints and so much beauty in their miseries that all the allurements of the world cannot win her affections For having been taken
Desarts This makes one a Citizen of the whole world every place is indifferent to such a Soul for being not attach'd to any Creature God alone is what she desires whom she knows is all in all and his presence alike in every place When we are sad for the absence of any Friend 't is for want of light from Heaven seeing our greatest Friend is continually with us And indeed 't is injurious to God present in us to be troubled at the absence of any Creature and it is as much as if we should say to God You alone are not sufficient for me 'T is an excellent means to bring us to a denudation of all Creatures to be willingly content with their absence yea hardly to think upon them by reason of the veneration we have of the grandeurs of God who being infinitely present with us we cannot voluntarily be taken up with any thing else without some sort of injury to his infinite Majesty 'T is a great Mercy when Divine Providence orders our affairs so as to bring us off from vain occupations seeing we can never possess God fully unless we be dead to worldly things As long as they flatter us and go on as we desire they take us up too much and we easily forget God but his amiable Providence has a thousand ways to make them disgustful to us by losses by maladies by falseness of friends by ill success of affairs by the substraction of sensible favours and by a distast and bitterness which at last we find in all worldly contentments We who understand not his amiable designs do oftentimes our utmost endeavours to shun these things as no small miseries and yet this is indeed the Paradice of holy Souls whereby they find God who is most present to that heart where no Creature finds entertainment And when such a Soul tasts the sweetness of God she disgusts the Creatures and though they importune her she generously contemns them and 't is a punishment to give any attention to their allurements When a Soul does not engage her self in worldly affairs but by the order of God her Interiour will receive no prejudice for she is always in a state to return to God whom in a manner she does not leave in those employments And the same light which discovers to her the intime presence of God makes her see also the orders of God in respect of external affairs to which she yields a peaceable and ready obedience For she is for doing what God would have her though she must lose for some time that sweet repose which she possesses by the enjoyment of God What makes her retire into her internal quiet is not the quiet it self nor the sweetness thereof but the order of God who is pleas'd to unite a Soul to himself by intervals and gives her a gust by his presence that he is her centre and final happiness But when God will have it so she changes also her operations and leaves God in a manner to converse with Creatures She is so dis-engaged that she willingly moves not but by God's motions which carry her whither he pleases either to enjoy him or do good to others all is indifferent to her because she seeks nothing but to please God Nevertheless 't is true that a poor Soul enamour'd of the sweetness of God's presence and of the internal peace of this enjoyment does not without some regret return to exteriour Objects and sensual Functions She then neither speaks nor hears nor takes refection without some reluctance because being sensible of this infinite Good present with her and finding nothing in the Creatures but misery and dissatisfaction she cannot well quit this excellent Object to turn to the deceitful figure of sensual things Her Treasure being within her all her thoughts and her affections are there also I have sometimes felt in my self desires to be blind deaf and dumb to the end I might be more entirely separated from all Creatures and more intimately united to the Creator present in me experiencing with grief that my Soul oftentimes forgets this Divine presence when she makes sallies out upon the Creatures by the Gates of my Senses Well then I must keep them shut that my Soul being cloister'd up within her own walls may be wholly taken up with God alone CHAP. IV. That the presence of God is clearly seen in a purified Interiour THe Idaea of a Looking-glass is very pertinent to explicate this matter For God makes himself sometimes to be seen in the Interiour of the Soul as in a well-polish'd Glass in the same manner as the Sun or rather its figure is visible in a Fountain of pure Water The Soul sees not the face of God that is the priviledge of Glory but she beholds him there more clearly than elsewhere God painting his resemblance in her in the same sort as the Sun shews his visage in pure water But the purity and peace must be very great in the Interiour of such a Soul to present the impression of this presence For as the breath darkens the Looking glass in like manner voluntary imperfections sully the purity of the Soul And as the least motion that troubles the Fountain makes it lose the Image of the Sun so the extroversions and sallies out towards Creatures makes the Soul lose the sight of the Divine presence in her When God manifests himself so present to a Soul she must regard nothing but him otherwise she loses her happiness it being not possible to behold the Image of the Sun in the Fountain together with those that pass by the way We must let them pass without gazing on them whatever Friends they be otherwise we shall find that our Beloved will veil his face from whom we our selves have turned our eyes There is a time to speak and a time to be silent Let us therefore in this happy moment speak to no Creature and give this reverence to the presence of God in us as to regard It only and nothing else It sometimes happens that God permits the Devil to shew his visage in his place This is when the Soul is molested with black thoughts wicked representations foul temptations fond imaginations and then she must guard her self with patience in the acknowledgment of her unworthiness and confess that she deserves to be continually banish'd from God's presence But if our fidelity be great in this state of darkness and interiour disquiet it will not be long e'r God shew his face and make fair weather There be some who loved others so passionately while they were alive that they go to Magicians to procure a sight of them after death and are ravish'd to behold them in their enchanted glasses A Soul passionately enamour'd on God is ravish'd to behold him though but for a moment in her Interiour and fears no Motifications nor the loss of all Creatures if they do but purifie the glass to shew God to her According to the degree of
thee That is to say let thy care be to be lost in me and I will take order for thy affairs Such a Soul does not spend much time in the things of this Life but in the praises of God Her exercise being a pure consideration of Divine Providence in whose arms she quietly reposes her self fearing nothing but infidelity CHAP. XIV How the perfect abandon of our selves to God makes us find a Paradice upon Earth SO much as a Soul is faithful to this abandon so much doth she abound with consolation For she is content with the state wherein Providence has put her and is well-pleased with all God's Ordinations concerning her self as are most for his Glory and has a tender love for the Decrees of God's will who from all Eternity has determined to conduct her in this way which she would not change for one more elevared though one sigh would gain it Moreover such a Soul takes much delight in knowing that many Souls are conducted by more excellent ways whereby God may be more glorified For seeing she desires purely the Glory of God she is well-pleased that God is glorified by others and rejoyces at it saying with great resentment Omnis spiritus laudet Dominum Let every spirit praise our Lord every way every state This resentment somewhat resembles that of the Blessed in Heaven where the Angels rejoice more at the Glory which the Seraphins render to God than at their own service And that great difference which an Angel sees between himself and a Seraphin does not raise in him the least desire to be a Seraphin and his joy is greatest in that the Divine will has made him only in the Order of Angels Thus it ought to be with holy Souls on Earth who participating of one anothers good are content with the graces God bestows upon them and sees no good dispositions in themselves or others which does not comfort them O what profound peace is here There is but little difference to be in the state of blessedness or in a perfect abandon to God's good pleasure because there is nothing can afflict such a Soul and she can want nothing that contents the heart Great Saints do not wait for Paradice with impatience having in a manner found it upon Earth by a perfect abandon to God's good pleasure O holy Virgin how were you content that your Son should ascend into Heaven without your company Had not you as much right to follow him as the holy Fathers detained in Limbo They were his Servants only but you his Mother also and yet you remain upon Earth to partake of Miseries and they mount to Heaven to possess Joys eternal and a Crown of Glory How different is this distribution Your own dear Son holy Virgin vouchsafes to go to Limbo to assist the holy Fathers and carry them from thence with him and you who are so near him who have serv'd and accompanied him during his mortal life even in his Passions and Ignominies now he is full of Glory leaves you here And what I more admire you amorously acquiesce in this abandon and are content to want his corporal presence with spiritual joy O what marvels do pass in your Soul O admirable Mother which transcends our understanding All that we can discover is that you are as well content with the privation as presence of Jesus to remain in Jerusalem among his Crucifyers as the company of Angels who sing his Praises when 't is the good pleasure of God and the Eternal Father has so ordained O my Soul when shalt thou be perfectly abandon'd to God's good pleasure Dost thou find thy self as equally content in privations as enjoyments When wilt thou be satisfied with all events dis-engaged wholly from what is not God and value nothing but his good pleasure Seeing that the Mother of God is content to be deprived of the visible presence of Jesus because he will have it so oughtest not thou to desire solely the will of God with an indifferency to all things else If thou might'st choose thou ought'st rather to embrace Desolations than Consolations Neglects and Contempts than Honours and Endearments seeing Jesus and Mary have most loved a suffering life But this perfect abandon this holy indifferency to any state this union with the good pleasure of God is yet a Mine of greater Treasures 'T is the sublimest purest perfectest disposition that can be in the Soul 't is of more worth than other dispositions and they without it are of no value yea in some sort are but imperfections Contemplation a desire to be charitable a will to help our Neighbours in spiritual things are good and holy disposition however God does not always require these of us When God is pleased to leave a Soul in aridities poor and desolate she would be unfaithful if then she should attempt such matters but union to the good pleasure of God can never lead us to imperfection but always elevates us in grace and therefore ought to be permanent in us When a Soul has lost all she may believe she has lost nothing so that she lose not this disposition of union with the will of God which indeed cannot be lost if our hearts be elevated above all earthly things Such a Soul can say truly with some great Saints Deus meus omnia O my God! you are my all in possessing you I have all things else How ignorant are we in complaining of the loss of whatever this world affords seeing the loss of them if we be not our own Enemies may make us find a more pure union with God's good pleasure For we never advance more in Virtue than in a state of denudation And if we desire nothing but the will of God and are content with that whatever it be we can want no disposition to perfection Every state every gracious disposition hath its proper worth they are good and pleasing and ought to be valued though some have more excellency in themselves than others But we must be content with those God is pleased to vouchsafe us in peace submission humility and indifferency to every state reposing our selves in the will of God as in our center A Soul in this state somewhat approaches to the Peace and Felicity of the Blessed in Heaven CHAP. XV. How the Beauty that is in the Order of God contents a Soul I Never yet have well understood this verity so often repeated Not one hair of your head shall fall to the ground without the will of your Heavenly Father The clear and full understanding of which will make a Soul happy on earth and the crosses which before did afflict her Spirit will be a joy unto her and cordial comfort For then she tasts the wonderful sweetness contain'd in the order of God to bring her to Happiness so that Paradice without this order would be as a hell unto her and to be in a suffering condition with this order will become a Paradice The order
vast spaces of nothing 't is by It the Heaven and Stars observe their motions without deficiency the Elements and Plants and Animals are constant in their Productions Without the influence of this Omnipotency no Creature could subsist one moment or have any operation In a word so great is this Power that in an instant it could by one silent word produce a thousand new Worlds out of nothing O Divine Omnipotency how little art thou considered and yet how able to ravish all considering hearts O my Soul let us consider that we are always in the hands of an Omnipotent God Shall we then be discouraged with the difficulties we meet withall in this Life of Miseries Shall we be afraid of our own frailties and weaknesses and the Power of our Adversaries Is not Omnipotency able to uphold us Who can pluck us out of our Heavenly Fathers hands If God be for us who can be against us This is our hope this our comfort O my God I am very sensible what a weak Creature I am and how Potent are my enemies but this does not terrify me because You my strength and supporter are Omnipotent in whom only I put my trust Omnia possum in eo qui me comfortat I can do all things as St. Paul assures us through Christ strengthning me The third Day Of the Wisdom of God O My Soul let 's this day contemplate the Wisdom of God which is able to ravish us if we consider a right the beautiful order of the Vniverse O what admirable Oeconomy is there in the order of Nature of Grace of Glory O how all the dispositions of the Divine Wisdom do appear therein most wonderful We cannot seriously reflect or meditate on any of Gods works but we shall find his Wisdom to be incomprehensible and this does ravish a devout Soul and makes her often cry out O my God how well is this done how wisely is that ordained If my Soul fixes her thoughts in Heaven to contemplate there the admirable order of that Holy City in the various ranks of Angels the several Glories of the Holy Patriarchs Apostles Martyrs Confessors Virgins who are themselves transported in admiration of the Divine Wisdom herein can we but cry out O infinite Wisdom how profound art thou in thy dispositions If from Heaven we descend to Earth how is the Soul ravish'd to observe the unspeakable bounty of Divine Wisdom in the order of all things bringing about the great work of mans Salvation so infallibly and sweetly To see God himself in a manner annihilated to purchase for sinful Creatures Infinite Grandeurs by his Humiliations to behold the triumphs of the Cross of Jesus Crucified over the World sin and hell and the powers of darkness to see and consider these things must needs make us cry out in admiration of the Divine Wisdom incarnate O sapientia quae de Caelo ad terram descendisti O Wisdom which descended from Heaven to earth what wonders have you wrought for mans redemption What Praises what Thanksgivings O my Soul wilt thou render what returns wilt thou make to God for all his benefits and ordinations concerning thee We must conform our selves to the Divine Will and say O my God righteous are you in all your ways 't is well done because so order'd by your Infinite Wisdom Do we live or die are we afflicted or comforted Sit nomen Domini benedictum Seeing God will have it so his Name be blessed The consideration hereof O my Soul will teach us patience and resignation in all the events and changes of Mortality The fourth Day The Patience of God O My God how long is your Patience how profound and unsearchable Who but a God of Infinite Patience could suffer daily such provocations and contradictions from mortals and yet continue to do them a thousand favours to perswade them to amendment O patience of God how art thou unspeakable how art thou unconquerable O my God you know those who will hate and Blaspheme you eternally and yet you bear with them vouchasafing them your Sun and Light and daily Mercies still calling upon them with your holy inspirations to return unto you for their everlasting good Sustinuit in multa patientia vasa irae Your patience is wonderful to sinners we must blame our selves when we perish eternally On what side soever I cast my eyes from one Pole to th' other I see God every where offended contemned contradicted provoked blasphemed and in all the infinite triumphs of his patience sweetly working the Salvation of Sinners O what a long series of patience do I observe in the course of my Life To bear with me so many years wallowing in the mire of my sins when I deserved by Justice to have been cast into Hell To pass over all the resistances I have made to his holy inspirations To have waited and conducted me by his mercy to repentance O ye infinite Patience of God towards me 'T is to you I owe my Salvation or else I had been long since a lost creature for ever Are we not ashamed to see our passions and impatience with others when God notwithstanding our manifold provocations is so long-suffering towards us A single word and sometimes our sole imagination does put us in choler and we contend in heat without containing our selves 'till our anger be over O my God of Infinite patience if you should thus deal with us what would become of us poor creatures The fifth Day Of the Love of God COme my Soul let us walk this day in the pleasant and vast extensions of Gods love the holy love of our merciful God a love incomprehensible which is from eternity to eternity as large as his Essence and the self-same thing with it where ever I am I find my self surrounded with the effects of this infinite Love O my God I sometimes contemplate you as good to us and consider you as in your Creatures which you vouchsafe me for my use and delight But now I have an eye to you as you are in your self and I find my self so in you that I cannot go out of you for you environ me on every side you are in me and out of me and I cannot go from you but I must go to you How art thou beloved O my Soul how art thou beloved of God with an affection surpassing the love of a Mother to her Children The most she can do is to carry them in her bosome with a tender affection which is sometimes wanting But God does lodge thee in the midst of his heart and will never forsake thee O what benefits and mercies dost thou receive from this Infinite goodness Alas when shall I live in God alone and not in my self that he may only reign in my heart O my God I confess and acknowledge that you have the sole right to possess my heart entirely and 't is most mine when 't is wholly yours but be pleas'd dear God to defend your right
which the World would take from you against my will O how miserable am I if I set my affections on any thing beside you knowing that this is my duty and my Happiness O my God from this moment I for ever forbid any Creature to possess my heart Hark hither my will I now give thee this express command that thou open not the door of my heart but to my Well-beloved whose infinite love has prevented us from all eternity The sixth Day The Justice of God TO take a prospect of the Divine Justice is not less pleasing to good men nor less admirable Thou wilt see it O my Soul governing the whole universe The throne of this Divine Justice is establish'd in Heaven the arrests are pronounc'd on earth and the execution thereof in the regions of darkness 'T is Divine Justice that sets a Crown upon heir heads who have fought the battles of the Lord of Hosts with courage and fidelity And for these momentary and light afflictions rewards them with an eternal weight of Glory O Justice crowning and glorifying us how lovely art thou 'T is Divine Justice that thunders Comminations against sinners on earth to bring them to repentance by the terrours of everlasting sufferings and sometimes chastises them with temporal afflictions that they may not be tormented to all eternity O amiable Justice that treats so here poor sinners as to make them Penitents and not miserable But O how terrible is the Divine Justice which in hatred of sin does punish eternally those who will not be brought to any amendment O how does a severe but just Sentence condemn such to everlasting flames always devouring and never consuming them which the breath of Gods anger has kindled and shall never be extinguished O my God you did not spare your own Son taking our sins upon him to show us the better how to detest sin O who can but tremble considering your severity O who dare provoke the Almighty to anger Quis novit potestatem irae tuae O my God I do consider this and flie for refuge to your Mercy The seventh Day The Mercy of God O Divine Mercy how dost thou ravish my heart 'T is to thee my Soul will sing eternally Miserecordias Domini in aeternum cantabo In my retired thoughts I look upon this World as a great Hospital fill'd with some sick some maimed some lame some blind some languishing some incurable and Divine Mercy goes a visiting of them These she encourages those she comforts binds up the wounds of others and offers remedies proper to each misery not absolutely abandoning any one though never in so desperate a condition O amiable Mercy of our God into what corner of the World dost not thou go to exercise thy goodness Are there any miserable Sons of Adam who have not tasted the sweets of comforts Who ever made his addresses to thee that hath not found most tender compassions in thy bosom O my Soul what must we pant after but the more then material embraces of this adorable Mercy In what canst thou put thy hope and confidence except in the source of this inexhaustible goodness The whole World is full of the Mercy of God and wilt thou O my Soul afflict thy self and be discourag'd with temporal miseries and momentary sufferings It is the work of Mercy thus to punish thee Do not the Sufferings of this life work for us a far more eternal weight of Glory Art thou O my Soul terrified with the remembrance of thy sins Consider God is a God of infinite Mercy and desires not the death of a sinner He who refuses to throw himself into the arms of Gods Mercy is ignorant or else layes not to heart that Mercy attends the greatest sinners to the last moment of Life for their Conversion Miserecordia tua subsequetur me omnibus diebus vitae meae O my God as your Mercy has prevented me so grant that it may follow me all the days of my Life Soli Deo sit Gloria The End of the Third BOOK BOOK IV. Of Solitude and the practice of two excellent Retreats of ten Days CHAP. I. Of the Beauty of Christian Solitude WE ought to have an esteem of all sorts of Professions whereof God is the Author who though he be but one doth nevertheless afford to his Church different states of living It concerns us therefore to think very honourably of them all and manifest as much by our words but to betake our selves only to what God calls us The excellency of other ways ought not to withdraw us from our proper Vocation A Soul then may delight her self in beholding the Church as a most beautiful Medow replenish'd with great variety of Flowers of singular virtue and so taking complacency in all states of Life to apply her self only to that which she has a call from Heaven and this also because God requires it from her A Solitary retired life is so beautiful and has such charming attractives that when the Soul has once experience of it she finds there her Heaven upon earth Being to take a farewell of one of my Friends who was returning home and having parted with him this thought forthwith strongly ceaz'd my imagination Alas my God! when shall I return home to my self that is to you Seeing your goodness is more manifest in affording me a place in the Idaeas of your understanding from all eternity before time gave me an existence among created entities now I am your Creature let me consider my self daily as in you who are my inheritance and everlasting possession To be be at home O my Soul is not to be with thy self but with God thy Creator O how great is the blindness of men not to understand that they have no other Country but the Divinity from whence they proceeded by their Creation Inconsiderate Creatures whether are you going For my part I will return home to the Fountain of my Being my true home who is great beautiful admirable eternal and incomprehensible O what joy is it to consider that my true home is such as he is Is it possible O my God that you are the home and center of my Soul Why do we not readily go out from the clogging crouds of Creatures where we are in perpetual banishment to return to our home the bosome of our Creatour What can I desire in Heaven or in Earth besides you my portion and Inheritance for ever Comfort thy self O my Soul considering that thou shalt return to the Divinity thy glorious home and in the interim rest content with Jesus thy crucified home and repose O how amiable also how great and admirable is Jesus crucified My Soul can find no Peace but by resting in him where nature tasts a bitterness a thousand times more sweet than all Worldly delicacies Without him all other pleasures are but dreaming fancies O Jesus crucified the World knows not your sweets the beauty of your sufferings is hid from their sight they
behold you on the Cross with carnal eyes else next to the Divinity they would discover nothing more sweet and lovely Do not therefore stay me up with Flowers but with Thorns do not encompass me with Apples but with Nails because I languish with love The beauties and sweets of Jesus pierce my heart and I cannot suffer more than to be without suffering in the sight of my suffering and crucified Jesus But some say to suffer much is hurtful to us Alas do we find it hurtful to us to love much Wherefore will ye that love crucifying shall be more moderate then love-enjoying which too often weakens the Soul and sometimes wounds us to death A too great solicitude about corporal health is a sign we do not take up our abode in the wounds of Jesus crucified We are never better then when sighing under the burden of the Cross God beholding himself takes infinite delight in his own perfections out of himself he is alike pleased to see those Perfections crowned in his Creatures His mercy does triumph in the Blessed Saints and Angels and his Justice in Hell A Soul introverted in solitude with God alone finds sweetness unspeakable in considering these marvels She feels also an excessive joy to see that the travels and sighs and sufferings and blood of Jesus are crowned with a Glory by the Elect on earth whether it be by suffering or enjoying When they conquer a temptation the blood of Jesus is crowned When they practise heroick acts of Virtue the blood of Jesus is crowned All glory be to him both in Time and Eternity O Mortals come and see if there be any beauty goodness and perfection comparable to that of Jesus our God and Saviour O how lovely is he and yet how little is he beloved How great and yet how despised How infinite in his Perfections and yet how little known O the only desire of my Soul discover your self somewhat more clearly to me that being ravish'd with your Beauties I may be solely taken up with your Perfections Shall any creature after this oblige me to regard it No my eyes shall be fixed on God alone Farewell then poor Creatures I am above you you shall never more amuse me I leave you to place my thoughts on my Well-beloved Methinks I feel his powerful attracts drawing me out of my self to possess him alone My Friends do not molest me any more leave me in my self to possess my God and admire his Perfections You may serve him by helping others but leave me to serve him in himself I desire none but him nor to be taken up with any thing but him seeing he is pleas'd to let me know it is his pleasure Farewell Creatures farewell Friends farewell Devotes farewell World I am going to God to unite my self unto him by a constant retreat that shall never suffer a separation CHAP. II. Of the necessity of Solitude I am resolv'd on the Vigil of All Saints to mount up to Heaven to congratulate their Happiness and beg their Charity for surely they will be very liberal on their general Festival and my Soul hopes for great succours from them in her miseries However I will chiefly sollicit the Blessed Hermits and Solitary Monks whose habitation in this Life was in Desarts and Monasteries I have a call from Heaven to address my self to them to beg their Intercession for some part of their Spirit of Introversion retirement from the World and Interiour poverty which is the true life of Holy Recluses being in a profound solitude of Soul by a denudation of all Creatures while their Bodies inhabit the most secret Desarts Great Saints what do you here upon Earth You labour not to help others being far remov'd from the company of Men so that you seem to be but unprofitable servants Alas how ill do sensual men judge of the Interiour of Saints I tell you these are the great Servants of God who in their Desarts offer up continual Sacrifices to the Grandeurs of an incomprehensible Majesty by profound poverty of Spirit and annihilation of themselves And being in a denudation of all Creatures their desires are for God and him alone This is the Happy state this is the Paradice my Soul sighs after at present to live so sequestred from Creatures as if I were in the Desarts of Lybia Good Jesus there 's nothing impossible to your Grace grant me this poverty of Spirit and if Exteriour poverty be necessary to possess this Interiour whereof I speak make me as poor as Job if my Friends must leave me I will freely part with them and be content to be forgotten in their affections for ever O my God estrange me from all Creatures give me that profound poverty of Spirit which methinks I understand though I cannot express it Thus dead to the World I shall enter into the joy of my Saviour for there 's no enjoying of God without a perfect denudation of all Creatures But how shall I get this Treasure who have the dominion of Temporal Possessions I must either really quit them to gain this Jewel or possess them as if I possess'd nothing The examples of the Blessed in Heaven afford me both comfort and satisfaction The Saints are rich for they want nothing and notwithstanding they are poor in Spirit because they continually annihilate all the riches of their glory in the presence of the great God being ready to part with their Felicity and to be annihilated if such was the Will of God In this manner I must possess what I have being prepared to part with it when God will have it so I observe that for want of Solitude the Soul does not discern the more subtile workings of God in her interiour which afterwards she discovers by experience These are great Graces but come to no effect for want of introversion and attention I know well enough that Faith is sufficient to direct the Soul to attain to the knowledge and love of her Creator But 't is true also that the God of love has more secret and in-time ways wherewith the Divine Wisdom works the Soul into a temper to make her sensible of his amorous embraces O my God how are you hidden in the fund of our Souls And you do not discover your self to us except in a perfect Solitude when we are out of the noise of Creatures God and the Soul being alone together O poor Mortals how long shall your hearts hanker after the things of this World Turn your selves perfectly to God and see and taste how sweet he is Happy are those moments although but short wherein we have a taste of the Divine sweetness and partake of the effects of his sensible presence Such a Soul will find in her self a certain aversion and disgust of worldly Vanities a desire to leave them a love of Solitude and Silence to be the more at liberty to attend to Gods Service all other things now appearing to her but as dross and dung and
of no value Speak to such a Soul of worldly affairs and you seem to cast dust in her eyes which hinders her from beholding the beauties of her Beloved and as soon as she can she clears her eyes to recover her Happiness This inconvenience makes her flee from the World to preserve her purity from being fullied with the dust of Creatures When we leave our Solitude by the order of God to converse with men we find our selves better dispos'd to the practice of Heroick Virtues to a perfect contempt of riches and honours to patience in cross affairs to the love of enemies to an affability condescendance and fidelity to our Friends Thus expressing in our actions the Image of Jesus Christ by faithfully complying with the occasions of Virtue Pure Mortification pure Virtue these are the delights of a Soul that hath convers'd with God in a holy retirement where she hath learn'd to love him purely and suffer for him CHAP. III. The difficulties of Solitude I find by experience that nothing more hinders our Salvation and Holiness than to overwhelm our selves with multiplicity of Affairs though lawful so as to loose thereby the times alotted for Prayer and Mortification the proper nourishment of a Spiritual Life A gracious Soul must therefore so comport her self in converse and action as not to engage at all her affections therein for God alone is the life of her Spirit without whom she finds her self both poor and miserable 'T is God only makes our Solitude amiable being a kind of participation of the Life of God which consists in knowing and loving This Solitary life is much endang'red and sometimes lost in a croud of Creatures nor can the Soul approach to them without some spiritual detriment She must therefore have a care not to leave her retirements to follow Worldly business unless it be by some inspiration from God or obedience to Superiours In which cases if she labours to do good to others it will be no prejudice to her self You may give them a hearing who tell you that 't is not well done thus to retire from the World for they may speak this out of Charity but yet without a true knowledge and understanding of your way To discern this aright we must have a care not to confound spiritual maxims some whereof are proper for a Contemplative others for an Active Life These are to be put in practice without partiality for otherwise we shall much disorder the ways of God and disquiet others Seeing the Active and Contemplative Life are different the practice must be different likewise The Active requires to spend much time to do others good both Spiritually and Corporally which cannot be done without abilities and possessions to relieve the poor These possessions cannot be kept without some care and trouble and this care of Temporals is suitable enough to the Active Life But damagable to the Contemplative which layes aside all Temporal Affairs least they should divert them from their principal employment which is the actual love of God and attention to his Divine presence The Active Life requires possessions to have wherewithall to give to the poor 'T is enough for the Contemplative to have himself in possession that he may give himself up wholly to God whereby he possesses him with great advantage Those that undertake this Solitary Life of Contemplation must expect sufferings on every side yea some spiritual men will account them Sycophants There 's little discourse of them because they live a hidden life and pass in a manner for unprofitable Persons They live unknown and die in abjection and living a despis'd life they are esteemed by too many but as the dust of the earth And which is the greatest cross of all if their Directors have not light and judgment in these matters they force them to an Active Life and so bring them off from their way and center with a continual rack and violence to their Conscience and Inclinations The Devil Persecutes them in their Solitudes endeavouring to divert them by disgusts or by Idaeas of great matters they shall do by helping others and that they ought to prefer the salvation of one only Soul before all their Prayers and Contemplations Notwithstanding all this they ought to continue constant to the Solitude to which they have a call from Heaven unless God give them different Inspirations to apply themselves to an Active Life Holy Abraham did quit his Hermitage upon these terms to search out his debauched Neece to save her Soul The truest Rule for Contemplatives either to continue or quit their Solitude is to observe the instincts and motions of God in their Interiour examin'd by skilfull Directors in those matters We must have a special care that in the eager pursuit of the things of God we do not withdraw our selves from the Divine Order concerning us in a course of spirituality Our great efforts must be not to do much but to please God And seeing God is pleas'd with a little from us though all we can do for his glory is always very little and almost nothing we must be content to do little since such is the order of his Providence Let every one go on in his own way with indifferency love and fidelity leaving others Peaceable in theirs with a great esteem of the Grace of God in them and continuing on our course 't is no prudence to discover the actings of God in us unless to such who are Practitioners in Contemplation Who has a call to Solitude and Contemplation must free himself from Creatures as much as possible shun discourses of News and reflections on Worldly Affairs unless constrained by necessity or Charity For a little matter will darken the Soul and hinder her from being elevated to God by Contemplation To conclude believe me a true Contemplation must be endowed with profound Purity of Virtue which cannot be attained by a constant Mortification of sensual nature which is no small and a lasting Martyrdom CHAP. IV. The Occupations of Solitude MEthinks for some days past I have had many inward motions inviting me to Solitude and Contemplation which notwithstanding did not relish with me because in such retirements we do little or nothing for the good of others But we ought to carry our selves above such considerations resolutely following the conduct of God with a firm adherence to his Orders In this faithful complyance with Divine Inspirations consists the Purity and Happiness of our Souls it being the principal work and most advantagious means to attain to Perfection and union with God O my God I am in a manner good for nothing you have not endow'd me with great Talents for the good of others But I must needs acknowledge your singular mercies to me in enriching my Soul with Divine love and continual aspiring after union with you Let others do what you have set them about 't is sufficient for me if the ardours of Divine Love inflame my heart To
a Hermitage The same may be said of our Memory wholly taken up with Idaeas of God and his Excellencies Of our Understanding and will imployed only in the knowledge and love of God If we would often put our Senses into this Solitude we should attain great Purity of Virtue A true Solitare does hardly touch the earth with his Feet that is all his stay with the Creatures is for pure necessity his Conversation being with God and Heavenly things I have Inspirations from God to Prayer and Solitude so frequent and powerful that my Soul takes pleasure in nothing else Methinks God speaks thus to my Soul Be thou Faithful to quit all Worldly things and I will conduct thee into an Interiour Solitude where no Creatures shall hinder thee and I will speak to thy heart which shall answer Of what will my Divine Bridegroom speak except of his Infinite Beauty and Goodness CHAP. VI. A Solitude or Retreat of Ten Days upon the Infallible Mystery of the Sacred Trinity ALthough every one who will seriously apply himself to the great affair of his Salvation ought to have an affection for Solitude as the proper School of Virtue yet 't is necessary from time to time to make some more severe retreats by seperating our selves from all business and company that we may converse with God alone in a more continual Prayer than ordinary I observe that there are divers manners to treat with God in Prayer and a devout Soul must conform her self to the measure of Grace bestowed on her co-operating therewith with all humility and dependance whether her Prayer be of higher or inferiour nature The first is when the Soul by the light of reason discourses on the Principles of Faith The second is when in converse with God she only beholds the proper objects of Faith by a simple view and apprehension The third is when a Soul receives Supernatural Illustrations in the understanding and extraordinary motions in the Will to know and love God by the gift of Wisdom And this passive and extraordinary Prayer hath many degrees of which I have nothing to say at present A Soul experienced in the operations of Grace will easily know to what sort of Prayer she has a Call from God and will betake her self to it with great sweetness submission and simplicity Spiritual Authors tell us there be three sorts of passivity The first not approved by them is when a Soul yet very imperfect in Prayer expects extraordinary illuminations from Heaven by neglecting to help her self with considerations suitable to her condition The second doubtful and call'd in question is when a Soul yet imperfect provides her self of no subject for Meditation and mental Prayer but expects that God should furnish her immediately with matter for it The third good and commended is when a purified Soul receives Divine impressions in her Spiritual Exercises 'T is also of high concern to observe well that a Soul may be Divinely inspir'd to this or that undertaking or kind of Life in such different ways that to discern perfectly the Call of God will be somewhat difficult 1. God sometimes works upon a Soul by his Grace joyntly with the Light of reason to move her to those things which do not transcend but are conformable to the dictates thereof 2. There are some things to do which we can have no motions but only by the Light of Grace and Instinct of the Holy Spirit But those whom we consult about them ought to be experienced in Spiritual matters and in whom the Light of Grace is more predominant than that of reason For if those instincts are purely from God the light of nature is no fit judge of Supernatural Inspirations From whence arise great troubles to persons so inspir'd by meeting with contradictions on every side A Director must be highly elevated in Grace to discern between the motions of Grace and reason And therefore 't is no wonder to see some good men of good judgment not to relish or approve of some manner of extraordinary Devotion Great resolution and fidelity is requisite to follow such Instincts of Grace for Sense and Reason and their Partizans who are no small number will mantain strong disputes with them I will begin my Exercises taking God for my only Conductor but nevertheless am resolv'd according to the method prescrib'd to me by a Friend on Gods behalf to take up my thoughts principally with the Infinite and Eternal Perfections of the Divine Persons of the most Sacred Trinity and set apart at least four hours a day for Prayer and Meditation First Day BE taking my self to Prayer the first day I was seis'd with astonishment that men so little consider'd this ineffable Mystery Yea great Devotes are much taken up with it but apply themselves either to the Saints or the Mysteries of Jesus Christ which is very well done however this grand Mystery ought to be the principal Object of their Thoughts and Adorations O Mystery of Mysteries foundation of all other Mysteries A Mystery not only Divine but God himself involv'd within himself A Mystery of Beauties and Eternal Grandeurs A Mystery of Eternal Ravishments in consideration of the Infinite Perfections of the God-head O Grand Mystery too much forgotten by us who think but little on these Infinite Productions The greatest of Mysteries and the most forgotten O my Soul let not this justly be charged upon thee but be often attentive to these eternal emanations adore them continually and sing on Earth the Song of the Angels in Heaven Holy Holy Holy Holy in Essence Holy in Attributes Holy in all his Ways and all his Works This present Retreat will work much good in me by putting me in mind of my Duty towards the adorable Trinity Hereafter nothing shall appear to me so great and beautiful as this employ about the most Sacred Trinity The application to Saints and Mysteries of Jesus must yield to this and not appear while this possesses my Soul nor take place 'till God is pleas'd to change this disposition In my second Prayer I consider'd that my Soul was created to be an express and excellent Image of the most Sacred Trinity God having made it Spiritual Intelligent and Loving to exercise in her his Divine operations which are the knowledge and love of God Entring into this Idaea I consider'd that the found of our Interiour ought to be a Pure Mansion for God himself and his Divine operations and that the best Prayer we can make and most acceptable to his Majesty is to annihilate all the Powers of our Soul in her operations that God may work in us who can only know and love himself according to his infinite Perfections That our understanding be not otherwise imployed then to adore God present in his operations and the will to consent thereto That the Soul wholly apply her self to Gods workings in us corresponding in all things to his good will and pleasure by a ready and faithful
co-operation O how did I discover clearly the abuses most men commit by profaning the Faculties of their Soul in employing them about Vanities and unprofitable Curiosities as are for the most part our Worldly Affairs We see not except in a Retreat and Solitude how Worldly business hinders the actual knowledge and love of God wherein consists the true Life of our Soul O the happy condition of true Solitaries O how great Wisdom is it to free our selves from Worldly Affairs the better to mind the one thing necessary that is to live a life Divine for which we were created Let us O my Soul flie from distractions and the amusement of Affairs which engage us in a thousand Discourses Vanities Extravagancies and Weaknesses Let us be Faithful O my Soul and give our selves up wholly to God that we may live up to the end of our Creation In my third Prayer this Truth made deep impression on me that the most Sacred Trinity made Man after the Image of God which afterwards being disfigured by sin the same adorable Trinity vouchsafed to imprint it anew and more exactly in our Holy Baptism when we are Baptiz'd In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost We owe our Christianity to this impression of the three Divine Persons We enter not into the Church but by this great and ineffable Mystery which is the foundation of our Catholick Faith I do not see that the Sacred Trinity brings forth any thing created of a more noble Production than a Christian the whole Machine of the World is less considerable for the order thereof is only Natural but a Christian is a Supernatural work wherein it seems the most Sacred Trinity takes delight to be born as it were anew by imprinting his Image in our Souls Shall we deface this Image to make our Souls deformed by some monstruous resemblance Yet this is that we do O my Soul when instead of carefully preserving the Image of the most Sacred Trinity imprinted on us by Baptism not considering the great Honour and Happiness we receive thereby we deform our selves by sin and deface this Image with unclean resemblances O my Soul when shall we be purified Flie from the World and betake thy self to a Holy Solitude For my fourth Prayer God was pleas'd to inspire me with this thought that my Conversation ought to be in Heaven already that is in God for 't is God is our Heaven and 't is in Him I ought to take up my Mansion seeing I was created to consider his Eternal and Temporal Affairs and to contemplate his Infinite Perfections I call the Eternal Affairs of God his Divine Interiour operations the generation of the Eternal Word the procession of the Holy Spirit and the Infinite Complacency which he takes in his incomprehensible Beauties and Grandeurs the Eternal Designs of the Mysteries of the Word made Flesh which was to be accomplish'd in the fulness of time in which however he took an Infinite satisfaction from all Eternity I call the Temporal Affairs of God the execution of his Divine Decrees touching the Mystery of the Incarnation and Passion of Jesus Christ the Creation of the World the Justification and Reprobation of Men God before all time having Infinite Sallies in himself by the Production of the Son and Holy Spirit hath in time had Sallies out of himself full of wonders and admiration O my God how a Soul enlightned from Heaven finds great joy and content in contemplating these Eternal and Temporal Verities out of which all is but deceit and vanity But how low Spirited are they who never attempt the knowledge of these Truths For my part I will never more stand in admiration to see the Holy Hermits forsake the World with intentions never more to return to earthly matters when once they have discover'd the Truth and Beauty of things Eternal and Divine O my God make me dead to the World that I may live to you alone and my Thoughts may be only taken up with your Perfections Second Day BEhold what suddenly comes into my mind about this great and incomprehensible Mystery I am wonderfully content to be in a state of inability to understand it in that the Powers of my Soul are led captive by Faith surrounded with Clouds This inability this obscurity this captivity are pleasing to me and for the future I 'll believe that there is no better way upon earth to please God then by submitting our understanding and will to his Revelations Yea I do more value this captivity to Faith in believing what I see not than all Splendours imaginable How is this submission of our Spirit naturally curious and inquisitive pleasing to God! How much hereby do we honour and glorifie him O glorious Saints with all due reverence I challenge you to be more in love with your Eternal Splendours than I am with these Clouds of Holy Faith If you be content I am no less to be so happy as willingly to captivate my understanding to the high Mysteries God has revealed And that which fills me with joy and makes me happy before I come to Heaven is to find my will in perfect submission to my God and to the meanest Creature for love of him O blessed Souls I am a little too bold with you yet I speak the Truth and ye well know it I aspire to Perfection of Divine Love and this submission is the way to practise it A way sure and excellent In my second Prayer I yet found my Soul taken up with the Grandeurs of this incomprehensible Mystery and being almost lost in this Ocean of infinite wonders was full of Faith and Sweetness at the sight of such adorable Perfections though all surrounded with clouds of darkness For as soon as this Mystery presents it self to the eye of the Soul her light is obscured and casts our Spirit into a thick darkness which yet brings with it a Light to see what reason cannot Nox illuminatio mea My night hath some day and I perceive the Infinite distance between the Creator and his Creature and being plung'd into the Abiss of my own Nothingness I acknowledge O my God and adore your Grandeurs and Perfections I admire I love I obey O my God I adore and believe stedfastly what you are pleas'd to reveal to your Church I neither know nor comprehend nor desire it but am content with my ignorance and submission Let us O my Soul abide as low and abject as Grace can make us for nothing renders us more pleasing to God than profound Humility and annihilation God who is infinitely delighted to dwell in his own Grandeurs is also well pleas'd to see an abject Creature content with its own nothing 'T is an error in Spirituality and savours of self-love to shun abjection under pretence to advance our selves in Divine Love O my Soul let us comply with Gods will and march on in the ways of abjection if God be pleas'd
to require it of us My third Prayer pass'd on in these Thoughts that the most Sacred Trinity being Eternally Knowledge and Love Substantial my Soul ought to endeavour to produce in her self an actual knowledge and love of God the better to resemble this adorable Trinity A Soul in the state of Contemplation renders this honour to God in a more peculiar manner enjoying God by the guift of Prayer in as transcendent a manner as Mortality permits 'T is true the prospect I have of this Divine Life here below draws my Soul Powerfully after it and I love it better than formerly But I see that to persevere therein we must be very poor in Spirit that is not only free from exorbitant Passions but all distracting Images which pass by the senses that are not Mortified News attended with curiosity or the eyes attached to sensible objects or such like immortifications fill the Soul with unprofitable Images which make her uncapable of Divine impressions by corresponding to which we most benefit our selves and most glorifie God In my fourth Prayer I was taken up with a view of those amorous complacencies and those Infinite joyes wherewith the three Divine Persons replenish the Souls of the blessed in Heaven It seem'd to me that the Happiness of the Saints was the clear vision of the Ineffable Mystery of the most Sacred Trinity and to be made partakers of that knowledge and love which is reciprocal among the Divine Persons To see God clearly is the Beatifical Vision Alas how ought we to be humbled to consider how Infinitely we fall short in our Devotions of the continual Hallelujahs of the Saints in Glory Yet this is the end of our Creation and our hope is at last to bear them company O how this life is poor and miserable where all is vanity and vexation of Spirit The view of my own weakness making me sensible that all I do for God is as nothing what shall I say at the sight of my sins and unworthiness I have nothing to say dear Lord but that I merit Eternal Confusion which must needs fall upon me unless your goodness have pity on me according to the greatness of your Mercies Can we imagine we can do any thing too much for God 'T is for the glory of his Bounty and Goodness that he is pleas'd to accept of our small service and endeavours and reward them eternally O how great a Truth is it that Grace and Glory are the effects of his pure Goodness and Mercy vouchsafed to us Blessed be his Name to all Eternity Third Day IN my first Prayer of this day I consider'd that the three Divine Persons were Happy in Contemplation of themselves from all Eternity When they created the World the Preservation and Government thereof does not at disturb their repose and Felicity The Father is the center of the Son and the Father and the Son is the center of the Holy Ghost Three in One and one in Three Infinitely Happy in each other before all Time and shall be to all Eternity O what ravishing Beauties do they behold in each other and what unspeakable Delights do they take in ther Infinite Perfections Nothing without them can interrupt their Joys or add to their Happiness Tho true Solitaries who live the Life of God in like manner repose only in him and being dead to themselves and all Creatures live only in him to him and for him O Divine Life of Solitude Thou art here begun on Earth and canst not be perfected but in Heaven A true Hermits life is not a Sensual but Divine Life God calling me to Contemplation I will repare to Church as to a Hermitage where I may live this Divine Life The Psalmody there much rejoyces my heart and lifts up my Soul to Contemplation Through Natural Considerations I have condescended to please others against my own inclination but now I have the Happiness to converse with the three Divine Persons I can no more relish the Company of my Friends and Relations except rarely to maintain Peace and Union or for some great necessity and if they be displeas'd I must not value it My second Prayer was an amorous attention upon what past Eternally among the three Divine Persons How the Father knowing his Divine Perfections did beget his Son and how the Father and the Son by an Infinite Love did produce the Holy Ghost The Father is an Infinite Ocean of Perfections by an Infinite Fecundity begetting his Son and they being absorpt in each other produce the Holy Spirit by an everlasting flux and reflux of Love This I did contemplate with great repose of Soul and yielded up the Intellectual Powers thereof to the obedience of Faith to receive some Rayes of Divine Light about such great and Incomprehensible Mysteries God then working in my Soul I became passive contenting my self to behold simply and sweetly the Infinite operations of the Sacred Trinity and said within my self Blessed Trinity know your selves for I can do nothing towards it 't is enough for me to contemplate that mutual Love which is among you which I believe and admire with adoration It seems to me that no other Mystery of our Faith can so take up and content my Soul nothing being more Divine than the Divinity No other practice is so charming to me we being created to know that Knowledge and to love that Love which God has to himself to all Eternity In my third Prayer I consider'd the Souls of Just Men and Blessed Spirits are as so many Sacred Vessels into whom God infuses his love and knowledge by a continual emanation Which love and knowledge returns to God its source as the water of a running Fountain rises as high as the Spring from whence it had its Origen This love and knowledge does establish God in us and also does firmly establish us in God So that God takes a delight and repose in the Soul and the Soul finds her center and rest in him Thereby faintly representing how the Divine Persons have a mutual repose in each other Empty Vessels are most capable to be fill'd And by how much the more our Souls are empty of Self-love and Nature by so much the more are they capable of Divine Love and Knowledge A Soul in such a state delights in Solitude and cares not to live in the thoughts and affections of men What most saddens our Spirits and retards us in the ways of God is a natural aversion we have from a hidden life For man naturally desires to be known and lov'd and thinks life is as nothing without repute And as long as we are full of this liquor we are not vessels proper to receive the influences of Divine Love and Knowledge Let us O my Soul empty our selves of Self-love that Divine Love may take place in us In my fourth Prayer I found an amorous complacency in my Soul in that God being but One doth subsist in three Persons knowing and loving themselves
wherein consists their Felicity The Father is the source of Being the the Son the term of his Knowledge and the Holy Spirit of his Love The Son and Holy Ghost are from the Father The Father and the Holy Spirit know the Son The Father and the Son love the Holy Ghost These are the wonders that make Heaven Happy Firmly to believe them is our Blessedness on Earth and to Contemplate them continually brings solid consolation to the Soul I saw clearly that to dispose my self for this incomparable Happiness I was to purifie my Interiour and to mortifie some natural resentments which yet live in me As namely too great a fear about the loss of Worldly things or to be despis'd by others or ill success of Affairs besides too great a sense of humane respects and a backwardness to follow the instincts of Grace for worldly considerations I know God sometimes suffers these Imperfections to live in us for the exercise of Virtue and the Tryal of our Fidelity However his will is that we strive to be dead to the World and our selves having our affections so fix'd on Heavenly things as to live a Divine Life in Mortal Bodies Believe me 'till our Interiour be throughly purified we shall not not be capable of high contemplation nor arrive to much knowledge in the secrets of God Fourth Day IN my first Prayer I was principally taken up with the adorable Person of the Eternal Father Methought I saw how he was ravish'd with Infinite Joy in Himself with the Son and the Holy Spirit And what complacency he also took in the Suffering of the Humanity of Jesus Christ though he loves him with the same love wherewith he loves himself And because these sufferings were pleasing to his Divine Father as satisfactory for our sins he did thirst to suffer more to fulfill his will And therefore after such variety of dolorous sufferings dying on the Cross he cryed out Sitio I Thirst It much rejoyc'd my heart to see what Infinite Complacency the three Divine Persons took in the Divinity and said within my self O Sacred Trinity enjoy eternally these Infinite delights But I desire as much as I can to add to your Exteriour Contentments by imitating the suffering of my Blessed Saviour And herein I will not have so much an eye to the reward to please the Sacred Trinity whom I adore Behold then what hereupon it seems to me God put into my mind 1. To eat neither Fish nor Flesh but in case of Sickness 2. To Discipline every day 3. To be pleas'd with occasions of Contempt 4. To despise all Temporal things to follow the attracts of Divine Love 5. To lie down upon a hard Bed 6. To cut off all Worldly Visits and retire my self into a Solitude where the World may despise me I consider'd in my second Prayer that the Son of God in the bosom of his Divine Father in possession of Infinite Delights and Joys unspeakable out of love to his Father did quit his bosom and cloath himself with Mortal Flesh to plunge himself in the depth of Miseries abjection and sufferings that he might glorifie his Divine Father by his humane and suffering Life and teach us Men his Brethren that the way to enter into the Love and Glory of his Father is by the gate of Sufferings Is it You O only begotten Son of the Eternal Father is it You born in a Stable working in a Shop dying on a Cross You that are all Splendor and Glory the Light of the World and the Delight of Heaven Is it You that are so poor and abject so void of Friends so full of Disgraces so scorn'd and despis'd Is it You whom they esteem as the out-cast of men and not worthy to live on the face of the Earth O the Love of the Son towards his Father O the strange invention of the Son to advance the Glory of his Father O my Jesus how admirable are you in your Divinity But how amiable are you in your Humanity I desire O dear Jesus to follow you all the days of my life and seek no other Glory than in your Cross and Poverty your Humiliations and Sufferings Absit mihi gloriari nisi in Cruce Domini nostri Jesu Christi The Cross of Christ is my Crown and Glory We ought not to possess Honours Riches and Worldly Preferments without Fear and Humility Have we not cause to fear that in a state of Worldly greatness Nature will seek her self and not follow Jesus poor and humble which ought to be done either effectively or in affection A state of Suffering under the Cross is truly Glorious and full of Interiour Consolation In my third Prayer I consider'd that the union of the Father with the Son and of the Son with the Father is by the Holy Ghost a union Infinite and adorable O Holy Spirit seeing 't is your property to unite unite my heart so intimately to the adorable Trinity present in me that I may never suffer a seperation and that this adorable union may be frequent in my Thoughts and Meditations Blessed be your Holy Name my God that you are pleas'd to be so merciful unto me as to take up my thoughts with this incomprehensible Mystery O how do I begin too late having been too long amuz'd with vain trifles My past Life displeases me and the course of the World is troublesome unto me seeing it hinders me from conversing with you as I desire Natural Necessities as to Eat to Sleep to Recreat are burdensom unto a Soul quickened with your Spirit strongly inclining us to live here on Earth as in Heaven in a perfect and perpetual union with your Goodness The consideration which took up my thoughts in my fourth Prayer was that the Eternal Son and Holy Spirit seem'd to have more commerce with men then the Eternal Father because they appeared to us by external Missions the Son being made Man for to die for us and the Holy Spirit taking divers forms for the Service of man and to enflame our hearts with Divine Love The Eternal Father seem'd always to remain in himself ravish'd with his own Infinite Beauties and Perfections O adorable Mansion of the Eternal Father within himself O wonderful Missions of the Son and Holy Spirit towards us Men and for our Salvation eternal matter of Adoration O my God when shall I go out of my self to elevate my heart to you and converse with you I see very well that to enter into a Spirit of Prayer Retirement is requisite Abstinence and Spiritual Exercises And to conserve the same temper of Soul we must practice silence as much as our condition and affairs will permit If the Son of God and Holy Spirit did appear here upon Earth only for our good certainly we ought to endeavour to have our Conversation in Heaven and adore the most Sacred Trinity for these Infinite Mercies Fifth Day MY first Prayer past in acknowledgment and admiration of the Fulness of
God An Infinite Fulness containing an Infinity of Perfections each of which hath an Infinity of Excellencies incomprehensible A Fulness which is the Source of all good in the Creature we being of our selves but a meer privation and pure nothing full of imperfections and lyable to Infinite Miseries Alas O my God I now see more then ever that you are all good Omne bonum you are the Source of our Being and Existence and without your continual influx for our preservation we should in a moment return to our first nothing The general Idaea of this Truth is in every understanding but well to consider it and lodge it in our Heart is very rare We believe this as many other points of our Religion but without deep reflection or correspondent actions Hence it proceeds that we are without perfect self-denyal and abnegation being not sufficiently perswaded that of our selves we are nothing And therefore God leaves in us many Imperfections unconquer'd that we may know by experience that we are of our selves nothing but weakness O my God for ever Blessed be your Holy Name for discovering to me your Fulness and my Poverty I adore your Infinite Fulness with a cordial affection because it shews your Grandeurs and I am pleas'd with my Poverty because it humbles me in your presence I am well content O my God to be nothing that you may be all Kneeling down to make my second Prayer I desir'd our Blessed Saviour to take up my thoughts with what he pleas'd And it came into my mind to consider the three Divine Persons as they are to teach other the center of all Happiness repose and Glory I beheld this fixedly and with an amorous resentment and complacency of mind it seeming to me that the repose the joy and the Glory that the Divine Persons have in the Sacred Humanity is infinitely below that repose and Glory they have in themselves And that delight they have in the Saints is much below that which they have in the Sacred Humanity I sometimes adored this Divine center in it self and sometimes I adored the occupations of the Soul of Jesus towards this Divine center and I endeavour'd to fix my thoughts with a complacency therein God then gave me to see that accidental occasions of Charity are not repugnant to my Solitude and designs of extraordinary Devotion But to take upon me the care of a Family and to have a continual eye over them as I had formerly was inconsistant with it For that engag'd me to many Conferences many Letters much care and Extroversion and for the present God does not require that of me but calls me to a retreat to Solitude to Exteriour and Interiour Silence to Mortification to converse with Him alone This is my present affair upon Earth In my third Prayer I discover'd how just and reasonable it is not only to adore the Divine Life of the most Sacred Trinity but also to Honour the Service which the Soul of Jesus render'd to his Father on Earth by a continual and ineffable application I observ'd that all the Mysteries of the Life of Jesus are honour'd according to the various applications of devout Souls as inspir'd from Heaven Some have a special Devotion to Jesus as regarding Mary Magdalen with an eye of Mercy Others are much taken with his Divine Discourses with the Samaritan Woman and her Conversion And shall we forget to adore the Divine regards and converse the Soul of Jesus continually had with the Divine Persons There 's nothing in God made man more worthy of veneration this being his most noble employment while he was upon Earth Let us therefore O my Soul according to our Duty set upon this work without delay Let our greatest care be to please Jesus and then many Worldly affairs will become burdensom unto us Let us recollect our Spirits and Affections from other things and place them wholly on God our final Happiness A true Christian indeed will be so generous as to esteem all things besides God not worth his labour 'T is true while the Soul is imprison'd in the Walls of flesh she cannot always soar up to Heaven on the wings of Contemplation but this she must sigh after and considering her present condition on all occasions exercise her self in works of Humility In my fourth Prayer God and his Perfections did possess my Soul rejoycing in that he was perfect and happy I had a mind then to take up my thoughts wholly with the Perfections of God without any reflection on my own Interiour or requesting any thing to supply my wants for 't is not seasonable to do this when God calls us to contemplate his adorable Perfections The Soul then forgets his own Interests to mind only those of God I then was pressed with a vehement desire to forget my self entirely and have God only in my remembrance I was then much pleased with the multitude that followed Jesus in the Desart taking no care for Bodyly Provision Their Divine Master provided for them being well pleas'd with their affection in being only attentive to his words What content was it to me to remember how Mary Magdalen forgot her self yea in some sort our Blessed Saviour in not serving him in her Castle at Bethanie by reason she was so intent on his Divine words O my Soul let us not be too Solicitous for the things of this Life if we think on God he will think on us and nothing necessary shall be wanting to us Sixth Day IN my first Prayer my Soul found her self much taken with the Beauty of those excellent words in the Gospel Be ye perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect I consider'd how impossible it is for Mortals even to conceive the Idaea of an Infinite Perfection and if we cannot conceive it how can we imitate it But God the Father has provided against this inconvenience in sending to us the perfect Image of all his Infinite Perfections his Eternal Son and exposing him to our view says to us Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect open your eyes and behold this Model here is the Perfection you must imitate let it be your care to conform to this Exemplar and you will be perfect as I am perfect 'T is hard to say to what sublimity of Perfection we are call'd by a Christian Life and how glorious a thing it is even to pretend to imitate God himself But alas how far are we from the Spirit of this grand Exemplar Jesus would have us to be annihilated poor despis'd living a hidden life in Solitude by dayly converse with God But just contrary we desire to appear in the World to be esteemed to have all things according to our hearts desire and enjoy the Creatures Alas we do not sufficiently endeavour to dive into the inclinations of the Spirit of Jesus to conform our selves thereto and annihilate our own The Science of Jesus is not well known there are few persons that study it
for ever-Blessed Eternity O my Soul let us not follow our own Fancy but serve God in what manner he will have us by a perfect resignation of our selves to his good pleasure The Eternal Song of the Saints in Heaven was the subject of my fourth Prayer I consider'd with great delight that all the Angels and Glorious Saints shall Eternally Glorifie the adorable Trinity with this Sacred Trisagion Holy Holy Holy Lord God of Sabbath Me-thought the first of the Seraphins began this Anthem with an admirable Air and all the Choirs of Angels joyn'd their Voices all Singing with a Tone more or less elevated proportion'd to the degree they possess in Glory And this innumerable multitude of Angelical Voices made a most Melodious and admirable Harmony wherewith the Divine Persons were much delighted It came into my thoughts that the Sacred Humanity of Jesus Christ the noblest of all created Entities the Sacred Virgin Mother of God and Queen of Angels with all the multitude of Holy Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors and Virgins did bear a part in this Sacred Harmony with great contentment And my Soul being much delighted therewith desir'd to Glorifie God as much as possible I saw that the Church Militant in a Holy emulation of the Church Triumphant did use to the Glory of the most Sacred Trinity a like Canticle repeating in her Divine Offices on all occasions Gloria Patri Filio Spiritui Sancto Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost And so Heaven and Earth did Eccho forth incessantly the Glory of the adorable Trinity I heartily wish'd that all Creatures had Voices to Praise God continually and with much affection I often repeated Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost Tribus honor unus Amen Tenth Day THis day beginning my Prayer I felt my Soul prevented with an extraordinary Sweetness I represented my God in the fund of my Heart as my Beloved and I return'd him Thanks for his manifold Visits My Disposition was then as a Spiritual Spring-time I scented the Odour of the Flowers of Virtue perfuming my Interiour and I made thereof a Crown for the Bridegroom of my Soul and set it on his Head and he seem'd to be much pleas'd with it and my Soul took great complacency therein I observ'd that when the Spiritual Bridegroom comes to Visit his Spouse whether it be in the Holy Communion or by any Visit extraordinary 't is with different effects Sometimes the Soul is as it were inebriated with Divine Love at other times she has a feeling of great variety of Virtues wherewith the Interiour is Beautified as a Garden with Flowers The Soul is is not then taken up solely with the Sweets of Love but being adorned with variety of Virtues sometimes she presents this sometimes that sometimes altogether to her Beloved My second Prayer was a continuation of the same Thoughts And I perceived that every step the Divine Bridegroom of our Souls made in the Garden of his Spouse gave a new Birth to different Flowers This is no small contentment to the Soul but what ought most to affect her herein is that her Beloved is pleas'd to take with her his recreation who delights to be sometimes with the Children of men Then 't is He refreshes us with the Perfumes and Odours of his Graces as Glorified and we must give our selves up to his Divine Will Other times he Visits a Soul in this Crucified state bringing with him nothing but Thorns and Nails and Bitterness and Sufferings But a Soul must not think that her Beloved is not then well pleas'd with her because of this rough usage for this is his Will and 't is best for her I was much astonish'd to see the excess of Gods goodness to me who deserv'd to have been treated as an enemy But he was pleas'd to unite me to himself with such ravishing transports as transcend expression O that I had a heart so full of love as might be answerable to the greatness of his Mercies vouchsafed unto me O Jesus the Love of my Heart if you continue thus I shall die of Love for you O amorous flames consume my heart to ashes that nothing may be found there but Love and Humility O my Friends come and see what great things God has done for my Soul My third Prayer was taken up with the amiable Communications that the most Sacred Trinity is pleas'd to have with our Souls The Divine Nature unites the three adorable Persons in the Sacred Trinity The Person of the Son unites two Natures in Jesus And Grace unites Jesus to purified Souls And this unions of Grace and Love is perfected by exercises of Prayer and wonderful communication in contemplation This union sometimes is so high and elevated that Jesus and the Soul seem to be but one thing one Spirit one Knowledge one Love and is in a manner the Soul of our Soul And in this state she Glorifies God in a transcendent way being wonderfully united to that Love and Glory Jesus renders to the Divinity and the Divinity to it self The design of the Son of God by communicating himself to us in the Blessed Sacrament is to augment this gracious union that as he Prayed to his Father we may be one as they are one By which wonderful union he gives unto us a fulness of Grace and Divine Love imprinting on us unless we be refractory the like inclinations he received from his Father to keep us continually united to him by Love and Honour him with the grateful Sacrifice of our Humiliations My last Prayer was an amorous repose of my self in Jesus Finding my self in this disposition I dwelt upon it knowing well that a Soul united to Jesus is transformed into him by amorous affections and so Glorifying God does Love and Honour and Adore the Divinity by the Love and Adoration of Jesus Christ The Soul in this amorous repose finds all her wants supply'd As Courage in Adversity Humility in Successes Perseverance in Good Actions and Grace to practice all those Virtues which God commands on all occasions By how much the more the Soul is thus amorously united to Jesus in Prayer by so much the more does she participate of his Spirit and Dispositions and consequently is more in love with the Cross and Sufferings To have union with Jesus Christ in Prayer and to be divided from him in our Life and Actions is an illusion for one principal effect of pure Prayer is to imprint in us a love to follow the Life of Jesus There now comes into my mind an excellent Observation of a Father of the Church That the Holy Spirit having visibly descended to us as well as the Son did not as the Son visibly return to Heaven but takes up his Mansion with us here on Earth to unite our hearts with our Heavenly Father as in the Divinity he is the union of the Father and the Son
The poorer we are in Spirit the richer we are in Grace the more a Soul is nothing in her self the more God is all in her and is pleased to work great things for her Jesus presented himself to my spirit in my second Prayer discovering to me in general the different states of his life passive in his Sufferings active in Virtues and how he is the Origen and Source of all purity to which we aspire by a spiritual life I conceiv'd first That there 's a purity of suffering which is great indeed when we suffer without seeking relief carrying this Cross for God's sake as long as he pleases There is a purity of action when we act not whether interiourly or exteriourly but by the motion of God's spirit with pure intentions Here arguments of humane reason are cut off and we stir not without some impressions of Grace working only for God by his working in us We must labour hard and be perfectly dead to the world before we can come to this state of purity There 's a purity of intention when we have only an eye to the will of God to do what pleases him without acting upon other Motives though good and laudable wherein seems to be some self-interest as fear to offend to be faithful to God's call to be more loved and rewarded A Soul in this state has no regard to her self but solely to the will of God her End and Object There 's a purity of imployment when a Soul will not divert her thoughts from God but by Order from God himself by some motion of his holy Spirit Hence we shun unnecessary visits unprofitable words superfluous occupations and that is superfluous to one Soul which is not to another by reason of the different degrees of Grace imparted to them We must suffer many mortifications to attain this purity and such a Soul must fear nothing more than Infidelity This is but a branch of the purity of action There 's a purity of Virtue when we practice only what God will have us to do There 's a purity of spiritual delight when the superiour part of the Soul receives no consolations willingly from any Creature or sensual things but stands upon her guard to keep them out And there 's a purity of Prayer when the Soul elevated above her self by the workings of God in her is in extasie of spirit and united to God alone by contemplation A Soul that once has had a feeling of God in her sees an infinite difference between Him and the holiest Creatures and entring into a great interiour solitude converses with God alone All these sorts of purity appeared to me in the Interiour of Jesus as in their Source In my third Prayer I came to know that the mysteries or states of Jesus Christ are not only the exemplar but also the efficient of our states so that we suffer not only to imitate Jesus in his sufferings but because Jesus by his sufferings imprints on us the virtue of his spirit to give us the grace to suffer for him When we pray 't is not only to imitate Jesus in contemplation but because he infuses into our hearts the gift of Prayer by his holy Spirit And if a Soul arrive to that heighth as to possess Jesus Christ in an extraordinary manner he then does all in her and for her she being only pliable to his Divine Operations We cannot continue in this state without wonderful purity the least sally of immortified Nature will much endamage it How often has God been pleas'd to give me experience of this when Jesus uniting himself unto me in the holy Communion annihilates all my thoughts words and affections to become to me all things in me He is my Thankfulness my Offering my Humility my Charity my Prayers and I do nothing but remain united to him who works all for my Soul as it were annihilated in his presence Words as well as thoughts fail us in the presence of the WORD who pleads to his Fathers for those Souls he possesses in such a mysterious manner What marvels are there hidden beyond expression In my fourth Prayer I consider'd that being a Christian I had a strict obligation to follow Christ but besides that general tie I had a special vocation to imitate Jesus in his humiliations To follow him in this way with purity I must forsake all grandeur and be content with poverty and objection and labour stoutly for a perfect abnegation of my self Since God has given me a generous resolution to sacrifice my self wholly to his service I will follow his call though I die for 't Methinks I am enabl'd to do it with great peace and liberty of Spirit What evil can happen to me if I die for God who died for Me Those who choose to be poor out of desire to follow Jesus are peculiar Objects of God's care and providence which extends it self to all men but especially to those who are the lively Images of his Son He is their Father in a peculiar manner and sets a watch about them more than others For is it possible he should not give Bread to them who leave all their Temporals to serve him better and love him purer Let us stifle all humane reasonings on this subject let us go whither Grace calls us and fear nothing If we die in the service 't will be happy for us 'T is a great favour from God when we breath out our Souls in the flames of Divine Love Fifth Day Jesus Zelator of Souls IN my first Prayer I apply'd my self to Jesus as Zelator of Souls for whom he gave his most precious Blood I beheld what I could not comprehend that this Zeal of Jesus for the good of Souls was infinite It seemed to me that my Soul receiv'd some small portion of this holy Zeal and I was powerfully inclin'd to lay out my self for my Neighbours good offering my self to God to do and suffer what he pleased But I perceiv'd this Zeal for Souls must be infused into us we must not run before we be sent otherwise we shall neither do good for others nor our selves but disturb our Interiour and commit many disorders When this Zeal is kindled in our Souls by the breathing of God's holy Spirit it puts nothing out of order but we go in Perfection and advance in Prayer However all must be regulated by Prudence lest we out-run our call and hurt our selves while we would do good to others For our care must be to procure the good of others according to the grace conferred upon us Some in an active life by Preaching and Instructing some by works of corporal Charity others by offering up to God their contemplative life their Solitudes their Austerities their Sufferings their Prayers There are many ways to be instrumental for the good of others Let every one imploy his proper talent Our blessed Saviour being near his Passion left us as a Legacy this divine Commandment Love ye one
he is her repose and true Felicity Alas when shall it be that Jesus possesses my Soul so as never to leave me This is what I sigh after and I will purchase it at any rate So to possess Jesus is a Heaven upon earth and all we have is too little to gain it Come O dear Jesus and make my Heart your Mansion for ever Of all your Graces and Favours I only desire you to be always present with me and that I make it my business so to serve you as in some sort to be made partaker of those admirable disposition of your contemplative Life I then had a sight of the Infinite difference between the service of Jesus between the Sensual and a Spiritual Life This cannot be discerned unless Jesus imprint his Maxims his Spirit and Sentiments in our hearts which will enable us to Crucifie our Sensuality and obey his motions I observ'd that my Devotion to the Sacred Humanity increas'd daily and felt in my Soul such Powerful attracts that no sooner was I in a Praying posture but Jesus possess'd my heart and discover'd something of his Grandeurs to me This Grace I received from his goodness in my third Prayer After which me thought I knew Jesus Christ in a new manner who though inaccessable to the Creature by reason of his Divine and Infinite Perfections yet sometimes he does most clearly manifest himself to special Favourites Such a view of Jesus is more to be valued than the whole World and a Soul that once has been vouchsafed this Grace esteems her self so rich that she looks upon all Worldly things as dross and dung adhering close to Jesus as her only Treasure We can never know what admirable effects this sight of Jesus works in a Soul but by experience 'T is true there 's a great deal of difference between the Visions of Jesus A Soul in the beginning of a Spiritual Life is taken up with the sensible part of the Sacred Humanity but in the progress she receives such pure discoveries of Jesus that she only relishes Jesus wholly Divinized but cannot express what she sees in him Souls thus dispos'd receive much of the Spirit of Jesus Christ and his humane states seem to them so elevated and transcendent that they find nothing more beautiful more precious or more charming to win their Affections O that we did know Jesus as he ought to be known O that we could see the inestimable riches the rare and precious Treasures contained in him My fourth Prayer was only to open the eyes of my Soul to see Jesus Christ as we behold any Object with the eyes of our Body to consider it attentively He was pleas'd so to manifest himself to my Soul as my joy was superabundant and I was dead to all things and my self to live in Jesus and love his Beauties I found my self in a manner like a drunken man who is not himself but as a dead man he knows not what he says nor is capable of any business nor can govern himself his drunkenness has possess'd him and made him fit for nothing else Enjoyment for the time it continues has the like effects in a Soul she is then capable of nothing but this enjoyment which is all in all unto her Such Souls are now and then put upon the rack by themselves or their directors fearing least this may savour of idleness They think it may be better to suffer and more profitable to help their Neighbour and that self-love may creep into this enjoyment This sometimes brings a Soul to quit this enjoyment so as to put her self out of the way where God has plac'd her except some particular Grace preserve her in the performance of Gods will A Soul capable of this Grace must be in a state of great Purity disengaged and dead to all things Exteriour and Interiour indifferent to all Divine Ordinations whatever and be in a perfect disposition to adhere to God and his Divine operations in what manner he pleases O how great is our humane weakness O how often do we resist the Designs of God by our Imperfections Seventh Day Jesus our Exemplar and Guide IN my first Prayer I consider'd how Jesus was a scandal to the Jews and to the Gentiles foolishness that the same Person should be God and Man and die upon a Cross to save the World the belief of this seem'd a pure extravagancy to poor blinded Creatures I consider'd also how a true Supernatural Christian Life seems but as folly to Worldly-wise-men who cannot understand it being elevated above sense and humane reason wholly Spiritual and repugnant to the Inclinations of depriv'd nature Alas how the practice of the true Christian Life is rare To love crosses and contempts and poverty and humiliations and to rejoyce in Persecutions by preferring the Maxims of Faith before humane Wisdom is a proceeding very extraordinary to Carnal men who in a manner are wholly guided by their Senses If Grace do not open the eyes of Faith in us our poor Soul has no director but Reason which casts a mist before us to hinder our sight from Christian Verities The same Grace also discover'd to me that as Jesus lived a Suffering Life we likewise should conform to his states and be content with crosses and contrarieties pains and deprivations and be pleas'd with whatsoever comes from the hand of God The poor retir'd abject Life I resolv'd to lead answerable to my Vocation without doubt will be accounted a folly by Worldly men and may sometimes so seem to my self But take courage O my Soul a lively Faith will discover the deceit by a Light from Heaven The Proceedings of a Spiritual Life are not govern'd by Humane Arguments but Divine and Supereminent Motives For we must suffer to do Penance and we must love Poverty to advance pure Love which despises all things to have God in possession In my second Prayer I clearly saw that Jesus took no pleasure without necessity to prescribe such rough Maxims to us He knew that the corruption of our Nature was great our inclination to things of this World was continual and therefore to live in his Love requir'd constant Mortifications and Contradictions to Nature And the degree of Love is according to the degree of Self-denyal and Mortification Jesus hath founded Christian Perfection upon two high Mountains Calvary and Tabor on the one we learn Perfection and Mortification on the other the Perfection of Prayer and on both the Sublimity of Divine Love To follow Jesus Christ upon one or th' other mountain we must die to the World and never let the love of the Cross and Mortification to languish in us Solitude must be dear to such Souls and they must take no imploy but what God will have them least interessing themselves and spending their Spirits in other matters they make themselves unable to follow vigorously the works of their Vocation My Soul would it not be a sad thing to quit thy Creator
gracious look from Jesus does easily scatter these clouds appease this storm and brings a calm and serenity to my Soul Methinks I see clearly that diffidence in our selves and confidence in Jesus to keep our selves at his feet in Prayer or any other manner near him as Grace shall suggest is an excellent means to Pray well and to receive from the Father of Lights what is necessary to advance us in our way to Perfection We must well observe that what Light and motions we have from Grace do more unite us to God by proficiency in Virtue but Natural Lights and Sentiments do not produce the like effect For example I may see my frailty and weakness by knowledge acquired by experience of the Miseries of this Life I may know the same also by the Light of Grace Grace with knowledge gives me also strength and courage to humble my self to confess my frailty to have recourse to God for his assistance A natural light has not the like effect but leaves a man in his pride and miseries or what is worse in sadness and disconsolations Our blessed Saviour in my fourth Prayer gave me a sight and sentiment of his adorable Person above all expression The eyes of my Soul being fix'd to behold the Beauty the Goodness the Grandeurs and Perfections of that admirable Compositum my Will could not be satisfied with those pleasures and contentments she then received O what great happiness does an enlarged Soul receive when the Veil is a little drawn from these Divine Mysteries Methinks I could have stood beholding this Divine Object all the days of my life I consider'd chiefly that the holy Soul of Jesus was enlightened with the Divinity to know what measures he ought to take during his mortal life to fulfil the Decrees of his eternal Father his wonderful Wisdom in choosing an humble poor and suffering life to instruct us Men and give Us Example and that worldly Wisdom is but meer Folly false and pernicious to her followers In this view of Jesus every thing in him seemed to me charming and admirable not the least glance from his eye or word from his mouth or sigh or tear from him but at present was to me an object of infinite delight and seemed to me sufficient to take up a Soul for ever with contemplation But the contemplation of God must be accompanied with imitation and by the conduct of his Grace we must enter into his states poor abject and suffering 't is in vain to think to attain to perfection any other way The only imitation and conformity to Jesus makes the Soul capable of pure contemplation and contemplation will preserve her in this conformity Ninth Day Jesus Suffering and Dying JEsus in the Idaea of Ecce homo crown'd with Thorns clad with a Purple Robe in derision buffeted mock'd spit upon and scourg'd was the object and subject of my morning Prayer I took great gust though full of compassion to see him in this posture because he himself was never more satisfied in that he could never better satisfie his Father And presently I said O my Jesus you were never thus array'd before now all the Glory of Mount Tabor did not cloath you with such Beauties doubtless the eternal Father takes infinite complacency to behold you in this state for you are a Holocaust all surrounded with dolours and deaths with contempts and annihilations In this entertainment I communicated and receiv'd my Jesus in this state who spoke in this manner to my Soul I come to thee to make thee like my self Thou wilt be never wholly acceptable to me or my Divine Father till thou become like me I then found in my self a great desire to be so and that I might take contentedly all disgraces and losses that any accidents brought upon me as so many advantages to make me like to my Saviour Ecce homo I then remain'd much comforted and fortified and very devout to Jesus in this state In my second Prayer I found my Soul attracted with a wonderful gust to behold Jesus crucified a spectacle pleasing to the eternal Father the comfort of Heaven and the terror of Hell I discover'd a certain way of beauty which cloathed the horrors of Calvary with wonderful comliness O my God! said I what pleasure is it to see the God of Beauty die for man upon a Cross This beauty is not in his visage now all disfigur'd but in the goodness of God which is here all in splendours and in the tryumphs of an incomparable love which sacrificed his most precious life for our Redemption The eternal Father was much delighted with this Beauty The Bruises and Wounds and Blood upon his sacred Head and Face did not make him disfigur'd in my eyes because the beauty of Divine Justice which was thereby infinitely glorified gave him a grace which is unspeakable Speciosus forma prae filiis hominum In this state Jesus appeared to me the most beautiful of men And my heart was so taken with Jesus crucified that I could not but love him in the state of his annihilations The Grace which this view left in my Soul was a particular esteem and love for sufferings I saw nothing more beautiful seeing they were a kind of Ornament to God himself and rendred him an object of singular complacency to his eternal Father Jesus hath sanctified the states of poverty contempt and sufferings through which he passed to make them sources of grace to such Souls as love them for his sake If the holy places where Christ was on Earth are in singular veneration much more ought the states of Jesus Christ If the men of the world think it a great honour to participate of the grandeurs of their Prince how happy and Honourable ought a true Christian to think himself to be if he be partaker of the humiliations of the King of Glory The Crown and Scepter are the glory of a King Poverty Contempts and Sufferings are the glory of a Servant of Jesus Christ In my third Prayer I was pierced with a wonderful feeling at the sight of Jesus suffering and dying on the Cross Being not able to comprehend how the infinite Majesty of a God should condescend so low I said O my Jesus why did you not rather let all men perish for 't is more just beyond comparison that men should be lost being Guilty than you suffer being most Innocent But in this tryumph of your love you have no regard to your self but to satisfie Divine Justice and that Infinite Charity you have for your poor Brethren in their miserable condition Suffer then even the death of the Cross seeing dear Jesus it is your pleasure I consider'd the eternal obligations we have to Jesus Christ in that he died for our Salvation It seem'd to me that hitherto I had been as in darkness in regard to this incomparable benefit Jesus Christ is our true and faithful Friend indeed and yet alas he is neither known nor regarded as
Happiness I make Colloquies among many Lovers of Jesus I think I hear St. Romuald say My dear Jesus my sweet Love the inestimable Object of my Desires the Delight of Saints the Joy of Angels who will give me to Love you as much by my Self as they do altogether Another answered Seeing your Perfections O good Jesus have no limits the Love which all hearts have for you ought to be Infinite Another said O Saviour the Fruits are Testimonies of true Love your appear to me admirable in the effects of your Sufferings and that bloody Death you endured for me But what have I done as yet to testify my Love or make you Love me Another concluded and said Let us Love and Suffer and let us die by the hands of the same Love which made Jesus die upon the Cross O Sacred Love how kindly cruel art thou to those who fall into thy hands For thou dost cut and mortifie and humble and annihilate All thy Servants more or less carry the marks of thy Severity St. Philip Nereus in his Ribbs St. Francis in his Hands and Feet and very Heart But O Divine Love I fear not thy Cruelty Mortifie me Crucifie me Burn me Alive I desire to die by no other hand The conclusion of all the Prayers of my Solitude was an absolute abandon of my self to Jesus Christ to whom I gave my self up in a new manner irrevocably to live or die to act or suffer to be in such a state as best pleases him Ardently desiring that his Sacred Love would make me die to all things but himself The Martyrdom of Love is longer then that of Tyrants and sometimes more tormenting fighting against all our natural Inclinations breaking through all oppositions whatsoever to practice the virtues of the Word Incarnate Without doubt we suffer much to follow that Grace which calls us to die on a Cross poor contemned and abandoned But he that Loves finds sweetness in these Sufferings 'T is a great wonder to make a Creature of nothing But 't is a far greater to make a sinner a Saint And this O Jesus is the only work of your Grace 'T is you that are victorious and triumphant in all your Elect over the corruption and malignity of Sin O Jesus how great is the Power of your Grace How is your right Hand glorified by working wonders O Jesus the Infinite source of Power and Virtue of Grace and Sanctity of Beauty and Perfection O that I have as yet so little known you In Heaven they only see you clearly but yet 't is a Favour and Happiness beyond expression to have some knowledge of you in this Life When I behold Jesus my Soul wants words and can say nothing but Jesus and in saying Jesus it says all it would though it be ineffable O Jesus vouchsafe me some little sight of you in this banishment that my Soul may be comforted Jesus God and Man the eternal Splendour and Crown of Saints be you hereafter the only Object of my Desires and Love that I may be so united to you as never to suffer a separation When Jesus once possesses a Soul her Thoughts are on him her Words are to him and her Love is for him She then lives in a region of Light Beautiful beyond all expression and in her ardours of Love she seems wholly Passive to the operations of Jesus in her Jesus is enlightning enflaming Piercing and Consummating Jesus is more in the Soul then her self and lives more in her then her self all is converted into Jesus by a co-operation of Love which she feels but cannot explicate It seems to my Soul that hitherto she has been but in continual amusements How many vain Idaeas have taken up her Thoughts But at the sight of Jesus all Creatures appear'd but as Dreams and they fled before him as Owls at Sun-rising I know you then O amiable Jesus I see that you are Verity and all the World but Vanity O Divine Jesus reign for ever in my Soul establish your Empire in my heart and be absolute King there for it is yours Let all the Blessed Angels and Saints in Heaven and all Creatures Bless you and Praise you and help me to return you Thanks for all the Favours your Infinite Goodness has vouchsased me in this Retreat Add this also O most Merciful Jesus to your other Graces that I may have a perpetual dependance on your Holy Will and live in you and for you who lives and reigns World without end Amen The End of the Fourth BOOK BOOK V. Of Communion and its Effects CHAP. I. Of Preparation before Communion A Person that often receives his God in the Holy Communion ought to direct all the Actions of his Life to that end and render them a Preparation to it And as those Acts whereby we prepare our selves ought to be most Holy most replenished with Grace so by consequence the Life of one that does often frequent the Sacrament ought to be a continued exercise of Holy and Supernatural Acts. We ought to lead a Life worthy of the Divine Bread which is given us in this adorable Sacrament A common and material Bread supports the Life of Nature But he who is himself the Bread of Graces bestows on us a Life of Grace a Life Holy and Divine and Infinitely rais'd above the Humane Life And therefore is little known little sought by such as lead a common Life and are unwilling to leave themselves and their Temporal concerns to live to Jesus Christ who to that end gives himself to them that he may be their Life O my God how Ignorant and Earthly has my past Life been since I am so little acquainted with this Life more than Humane But now out of your Mercy you vouchsafe to bestow on me such Sentiments as incline me to enter upon this Life For I plainly see that a Soul well settled in the state of Grace ought to live no longer according to Nature but according to Grace The Motions Maxims and Designs of the Supernatural Life take their Original from Grace and are of a very different relish from such as affect Souls which move only by the impressions of Nature For the Soul actuated by this Life embraces Contempts Sufferings Abjection and her delight is to be annihilated in the esteem and love of Creatures so far it is from seeking those things never so little To live this Life is to live the Life of Jesus and to become one and the same with him and it is an excellent Disposition to live by him while the Soul receives him as its proper nourishment Qui manducat me vivet propter me Your Delights O Lord are to be with the Children of Men But these Delights ought to be Reciprocal that is to say That Souls ought to take their Delights in you in your state of Poverty and Abjection that so you may take your Delights in them What an excess of Goodness is this O Lord that being so
great so full of Glory you come to humble your self and to annihilate your self in a Soul so Criminal so Unfaithful 'T is true Abjections were not inconsistent with the condition of your Mortal Life But since now you are in Glory methinks you ought to be exempt from them If my Soul had any Love for your Interests she would not procure you such Humiliations and therefore she would do better not to Communicate so often for then she would not be the occasion of humbling you so often This Sentiment joyned with the knowledge of my own unworthiness would make me abstain from Communicating if I did not know withall that your Delights are to be with such Souls as desire likewise to take their Delights in you and that you have said in St. John That if we do not eat your Adorable Flesh we shall not have Life in you When I consider my Indignity and yet present my self to Communicate with a Soul that is an ever-flowing source of Vices and Sins I should be very much afflicted to see Jesus Christ so ill lodged in the midst of my Imperfections not knowing in what part of my Soul I might place him Where he might not see things unworthy of his Presence This sight would doubtless cause me a great deal of pain if another regard did not encourage me I consider that when the Sun enters into a stinking and and offensive Dungeon he is received there more in his own Brightness and Lustre than in the Dungeon it self and that so he is there without prejudicing his Grandeur or Purity When I have this Idaea before my eyes I say to my Lord 'T is true you enter into me all miserable as I am But it is true also that you are more in your Self in your Glory and in your Brightness Be therefore received in your Self O Divine Jesus in your Beauty and in your Grandeurs I rejoyce that the offensiveness and streightness of my Dungeon cannot prejudice your Beauties or your Greatness Enter therefore into me without going out of your Self Be received in me but more in your Self O bright Sun of Glory Live for ever in the midst of your own Splendours and Magnificence but do not cease to live also in the middle of my Obscurities and Misery Convert me unto you wholly and without reserve CHAP. II. To Communicate worthily we must put our selves in a state conformable to that of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament JEsus Christ chose to give himself to us in this stupendious Mystery in the state of Death as to any thing that concerns the life of the Senses but as a Fountain of Life in regard of the Interiour Life a Divine Life a Life of Grace a Life of Contemplation and of continual application of the mind to adore the Majesty of God his Father A Life I say poor and nothing to the Exteriour but shining with the Divinest and most awful Lustre and Infinitely rich under the vails of the outward Species that hid it from the eyes of the World Thus and with these dispositions he presents himself to us requiring that we likewise present our selves unto him with dispositions conformable to his His Sacred Humanity that he gives us in the Holy Communion was rais'd to a Divine Life by the Hypostatical Union So also must we be by Grace viz. Our understanding must be elevated above it self by a high illustration of Faith and our Will inflamed by a sublime Sense of the Love of God and so in fine our whole Soul must be animated with the Life of Grace O the Sublimity of the Life of Grace How Admirable art thou how High how Ineffable Thou raisest man from Earth to Heaven thou makest him live in God I and of God too since thou dost prepare him to live in this World upon the same Substance which nourisheth the Blessed in Heaven O great Life of Grace thou art poor to the Exteriour but most rich to the Interiour Thou appearest low but art most high I am ravished with thy Beauties I cannot live a moment without Thee who makest us live with a Life Divine who placest the Soul in the heart of God and disposest her to see God placed in her own Heart When the Charms and Beauty of this Life have once discovered themselves to the Soul she willingly quits all other things to imbrace them and whatsoever else seems to her no better than Death and Corruption she renounces the World Pleasures and Riches she condemns her self to Pennances Mortifications and Poverty to obtain this Divine Life and feels a Sacred hunger after this adorable nourishment that is her only support O that I did throughly know that I did Faithfully pursue this Divine Life a Life so little known so little practis'd in the World where People do not thirst after the Living Waters of your Eternal Fountain O my God! O Jesus draw me after you through all the Actions and Duties of the Life of Grace which is at its greatest height among Injuries and Miseries Draw me O Lord and I will run after you in the Odour of your Perfumes What a pleasure is it O my Soul to see you march like a Gyant in the ways of Grace nourished and strengthened in your course with the Bread of Heaven Ambulavit in fortitudine cibi illius usque ad montem Dei To live in Death as Jesus seems to do in the Blessed Sacrament to change Glory for Contempt to be most delighted when one is annihilated and even Sacrificed is the true Character of the Life of Grace It makes all things die to the Exteriour and live only to the Interiour and above all things it confers the Spirit of Prayer keeping the Soul almost in a continual exercise and elevation by fixing its regard upon that Infinite and incomprehensible Being which she adores and is not able to understand and therefore annihilates her self in his presence suspended with admiration of those Divine Grandeurs which she sees annihilated in the Holy Eucharist O my Soul how great is thy Vileness how extream is thy Poverty What is man that thou O Lord art mindful of him Dost visit him and takest pleasure to come and dwell personally in him His Soul is drawn out of nothing his Body is but a piece of Clay and still you vouchsafe to set your eyes upon him How can a Creature so filthy so wretched so gross receive within it the Infinite Majesty of God Sink and humble your self to the very center of your Nothing and confess your Indignities O my Soul Cast down your eyes and acknowledge that you are unworthy so much as to lift them up towards this formidable Grandeur and more than all be penetrated with the deep sense of Admiration Gratitude and love of this excessive Goodness which condescends in this incomprehensible Mystery to annihilate it self to come and give it self to you even in the state of your own Nothing We must needs be very much in Love with our
Comformity to all his States This Divine Light discovered to me a great many Verities very important for my direction and conduct 1. That we are never to be without Sufferings For the Spirit of Christianity is the Spirit of the Cross The Grace that feeds and supports it is the Fruit of the Cross and the adorable Bread so full of Delights inspires no other Sentiments then those of the Cross Venite mittamus lignum in Panem ejus 2. That as Jesus manifests the Purity of the Love he bears us by dying for us upon the Cross so ought we to prove the Sincerity of ours by nailing it to the Cross 3 That he worked our Salvation by the only means of Suffering Therefore it is a manifest deceit to hope that we can co-operate towards our Salvation by any other means than that of Suffering 4. That we must attend and harken very diligently to the Spirit of Jesus within us which of it self sometimes furnisheth us with Crosses of Providence or else inspires us to seek them of our selves We must embrace them all cheerfully or search them amorously 5. That no other Soul but what is in Love with Crosses can tast the ways of the Spirit and its Heavenly Sweetness For God who mixes the Pleasures of Worldlings with wormwood and Gall does often sweeten our Sufferings after an admirable manner Moreover I was taught in the Holy Communion that Jesus is a Sun which was Eclipsed during this transitory Life but now shines in Heaven full of Lustre and Glory And according to the measure Souls partake of his Eclipse and Darkness they shall proportionably share of his Splendours in Glory Why then flee we Poverty Contempt and the Cross For that which Eclipseth a Soul with Jesus Christ is the Seed of an Immense Glory in Heaven What is the reason that we see nothing but Crosses in Churches All the Altars are adorned with the Cross the Priest going to Celebrate weares the Cross in his Vestments while he is saying Mass while he is saying Mass he makes a great many Signs of the Cross when he is about to Communicate to us he first gives us his Benediction with the Sign of the Cross even the last Action he does holding the Blessed Sacrament in his Hand and ready to present it to us is forming the Sign of the Cross with the Sacred Host We are told also that in Antient times when Christians received it in their Hands they placed them in form of a Cross laying the Right Hand a Cross over the Left What can we learn from all this but that the Christian who Communicates ought to be Crucified and that as he receives his God among Crosses so he should take delight in passing his Life amongst Sufferings My Soul when shall I begin the practice of a Life wholly Crucified a throughly Christian and Supernatural Life When shall I love Poverty Contempt Affronts Injuries O my God that I might begin this very day to serve you and trample upon all the Sentiments of Nature which ought to be continually upon the Cross And therefore I ought not to be troubled at such things as impoverish and ruine me The more poor the more dead one is to the World I ought even exteriourly if People would believe me to live poorly and become vile and contemptible in the eyes of men following the example of Jesus Christ who lived thirty years in a Shop like a Servant Therefore it is my Duty to tend contrary to all that which the World with its Wisdom of the Flesh esteemeth And that suddenly for I am already grown Old and have not yet begun In becoming wretched according to the opinion of the World I shall answer the Grace of my Vocation who am called to Poverty and a Solitary Life I shall obtain Peace and become a man of Prayer Assist me with your Powerful Graces O Jesus and grant me Perseverance Let us follow Jesus O my Soul He from the very first instant of his Life walked like a Gyant in the ways of Humiliations and Sufferings the ways that his Father appointed him All his concern was to co-operate with his Fathers Eternal purposes which regarded himself Let us walk couragiously in the rough and Holy Paths which Jesus has traced out Let us not fear our Natural Weakness since he did not fear his Humanity but shew'd himself obedient even to Death and to the Death of the Cross Let us count every thing Folly that is contrary to this Wisdom and let us quit one for all every thing else to follow none but him CHAP. IX The second Effect of Communion is to Transform us THe following consideration after Communion entertained me long and continued a whole Morning That the principal Effect of Communion is to produce in us an intimate Union with Jesus This Union is a perfect Assimulation to his States and Mysteries And this Assimulation is the same thing which they call a Transformation into God and renders a person wholly Divine and devoted to the Interests of God insomuch that by Grace he becomes Divine as having no other Inclinations then those of God living by the Life of God and desiring nothing but the Love and Glory of God In this sight which appeared to me very clear I beheld the lowness and imperfections of such Sentiments and Actions as are meerly Natural I wondered at the blindness of men who set such a value upon an operation of Nature though it be of it self so infinitely vile and contemptible It seems they never understood the importance of advancing towards Perfection with all their sorce nor the miserable condition of an imperfect Soul This Light wonderfully separated me from Imperfection and I am now as full of Horror of it as I was formerly full of Sin It seemed to me that Jesus who so prodigiously debaseth himself in the Blessed Sacrament by a Miracle of Love of Mercy and of incomparable bounty did thus excite me to rise from Nature to Grace and and from a Humane to a Super-natural Life Towards which I felt in my self such strong Inclinations and such powerful Obligations by my frequent Communions that I had rather have died than have passed one moment of my Life in the state of Nature We ought to tend incessantly to the Purity of Jesus and if to enter into it more readily and more perfectly one must quit Honours Goods and Friends let us quit them my Soul and take in their places Poverty Contempts and Pains The Purity of Virtue charms me and animates me to pursue it I do not find any Creatures that I do not willingly abandon nor any difficulty that I do not easily conquer O my God separate me by your Holy Grace from every thing which hinders this Divine Transformation and grant that I may cease to be what I am according to Nature that I may become what you are by the power of Grace When shall I be wholly united and transformed into you When shall
Divinity O how great is the dignity of pure Souls when they Communicate O how low and abject are all the Grandeurs of the World They are a meer Nothing compared with this For what Glory is comparable to that of a Soul intimately united with the Supream Being My God how delightful and transporting is the sight of the Wonders and profound Secrets wrapt up in your Mysteries how they penetrate the Soul you disclose them to This Union with Jesus in Communion is inessable For as the Father and the Son are one in Unity of Essence the Word and Humane Nature one in Unity of Person so the Soul that is one in Jesus partakes of both the Unions Divine and Humane Jesus is in her according to both his Natures and she is All in Jesus and while she does all things in him he works all in her he Prayes Adores Loves Suffers Labours insomuch that this perfect Union produces a certain Unity between God Jesus and the Soul and between all their operations It settles a kind of Partnership and Community of Goods and Possessions between them In a word it imports more than can be expressed Now this condition must needs be most Holy and Divine where God works in the Soul and the Soul in God In me manet ego in eo And the Alliance between them grows continually streighter and closer proportionably to her increasings in Virtue in this Life and receives its ultimate Perfection only in Heaven O amiable Jesus with what a profusion of Goodness and Love you entertain our Souls in this Sacrament You conceal your Presence under the External Species to give us occasion and advantage to exercise our Faith which beholds you so much more clearly as you are more secretly and obscurely present Again on the other side you manifest and shew your self by innumerable effects of your Grace and Divine Sentiments which you breath in the Soul to excite and exercise our Love What can a Soul do when she sees her self so prevented so convinced so pressed by evident instances and experimental proofs of your endless and unwearied Bounty What can she do but Love Love without stint render Love for Love how many excellent things might be said upon this Subject But how can those Sentiments be expressed that can hardly be conceived CHAP. XI The fourth Effect of Communion is to Confer the highest Love OFtentimes before and after Communion I was taken up with Contemplating the Perfections of God Which being one and the same in themselves yet they are different in our manner of conception and the verity of their effects Now when any one of them discovers it self it appears in full Beauty and Majesty and all the other seem to sink in to it and lend all their Ornaments and Excellence to increase its Lustre An instance hereof we have in the Blessed Sacrament where the Divine Love displayes all its Magnificence and the other Attributes contribute to that design the brightest of their Charms and Perfections Eternity Immensity Wisdom Omnipotence Justice Mercy and whatsoever is most eminent and adorable in the Divine Nature are present there and attend upon the triumph of Love Each of these Perfections espouse the Interests and put on the Inclinations of Love which are Liberality and Magnificence and accordingly operate in a Soul when Love makes his triumphant entry at the time of Communion For Love as its proper effect produceth in the Soul a reciprocal Love Eternity imprints continuance and perseverance Immensity spreads the Affection and gives it an unbounded extent wisdom sheds round about a Super-natural Light to guide its good purposes and illustrate the ways of Virtue Omnipotence inspires an invincible strength to surmount all difficulties and obstacles Thus in Communion a Soul does not only receive the impressions of Love but of Love attended with the Lustre and Excellencies of all the Divine Perfections It is observable that Jesus Christ together with his Eternal Father sent the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles to replenish them with Love in the same place where he had given them Himself in the Sacrament So that this Divine Sanctuary was chosen two several times to be the Theater where the two greatest Actions of Love were represented that ever the goodness of God exhibited out of himself The first in giving us his Son to reside in our Hearts who from all Eternity rests in his own Bosom and thereby enabling us to live Divinely by him as he lives by his Father The second in sending on us the adorable Spirit of the Father and the Son to be the knot of the Eternal Espousals of the Soul with her God to Beautify her with his In created Light to warm her with his Sacred Flames to animate her with his Heavenly Force and Virtue and in a word to render her entirely Spiritual And both these Actions are perpetuated in the Holy Church when at the same time we are Feasted with the precious Body of the Son of God and inebriated with the Spirit of his Love O who can conceive the admirable Commerce and Caresses that are interchanged between Jesus Christ and pure Souls in this Divine Sacrament The World which discerns nothing but by meditation of the Senses is too gross and stupid to comprehend them It thinks that Souls which are escaped from its snares and dis-engaged from its business lead an idle and unprofitable Life it fancies they do nothing because their Actions are not seen that their Fire is extinguished because it does not blaze in the eyes of Men. But on the contrary they resemble those Mountains full of Sulpher which carry vast Globes of Fire in their Bosomes though they break out but at certain times and then they are not only seen but whole Provinces feel the Conflagrations Towns and Villages are Burned and Fields covered with Ashes In like manner those retired Souls which burn inwardly with Divine Love and for the most part shine only to God and themselves yet when the command and service of the Lord excite them to External Duties they produce such extraordinary Effects that numbers of Souls are set on fire with their Virtues Example and Instructions In this kind we have had many great Servants of God who having conceived a thousand good desires in their retirement and inflamed with Heavenly fire by the frequent use of the most Holy Communion issue from their retreat and this Sacred Table like Lyons breathing nothing but flames and setting all on fire about them Such have made the great Conversions of Sinners changed the face of whole Provinces and Kingdoms and all this performed only by one or a small number of such Servants of God who appeared so powerful in Works and Words that all their Actions seemed to be so many Miracles Here we must observe that this Interiour Fire in a person not sufficiently retired within himself or that from time to time is not careful to lay on more Fewel to nourish it I mean to
elevate his Heart by frequent Prayer to God and Contemplation of his Divine Perfections or that dissipates his Spirit abroad by the impulses of Nature engaging himself in Temporal Affairs without being called thereto by the Inspiration and guidance of Grace though something of zeal appear in the thing and as one thinks a good intention I say this Interiour Fire in such a Person is to be compared to these Meteors or Lambent Fires which are carried about with every motion of the Air and shine but do not burn CHAP. XII The fifth Effect of Communion is to give Strength and Perseverance in the Service of God ONe day as I entred into a Church I heard them sing these words in Honour of the Blessed Sacrament Ambulavit in fortitudine cibi illius usque ad montem Dei He walked in the strength of this Bread even to the Mount of God These words affected me and made me Hope that notwithstanding my Miseries and continual weakness I might be so strengthned by receiving this Divine Bread that at last I might arrive to the Mount of God might raise my self above the low inclinations of Nature and mount to the participation of the Spirit of Jesus and Perfection of a Super-natural Life which Life is a high Mountain which no body can climb by the meer strength of Nature I observed before that the peculiar intention of Jesus in Instituting the Holy Sacrament was to give us a foundation to Life and Strength and for that reason 't is the only Sacrament that is given in the form of Nourishment The rest are prescribed by way of Remedy to purge the Soul from Sin or conferr'd by Ceremony of Cousecration to dedicate the Person to the peculiar Duties of Religion and Holy Things and so others respectively But this is the only one given by way of Heavenly nurture to enable us to live by the Life of Grace a perpetual Life over which the death of Sin has no power For Jesus Christ among other effects of this Divine Food assures us that it bestows Eternal Life Qui manducat hunc panem vivet in aeternum And it seems very reasonable and conform to the Infinite Goodness of God that the most excellent of Sacraments should confer the most excellent of Graces which is that of Perseverance A Grace so Sublime so Divine so precious that we cannot merit it by any or all the good Actions we can do But how rare and how noble soever it be we have much subject to hope that the Father of Mercies and God of all Consolations will grant us it since he has already enriched us with that which is Infinitely more than this Grace the Prefence of his only Son in the Blessed Sacrament Corporal Nutriment is Elementary and Material and therefore no better than Corruption Yet if the Body could take it always in a just proportion and were perfectly well disposed to draw the strength it affords it would continue our Natural Life and we should never die How much more would the Heavenly Bread the Living Bread which contains in it self the ever-flowing sources of Life confer a perpetuity and infectibility of Spiritual Life by Grace if the Soul duly used and were disposed to receive the abundance of Graces Virtues and Super-natural strength that this adorable Food brings with it When we Communicate we drink of the same Fountain the Blessed do in Heaven But to them it is the Water of Life Everlasting and what else can it be to us but that of the Life of never failing Grace which is the pledge and assurance of the Eternity of Glory O my Soul dost thou think that any of the Blessed in Heaven after they have tasted the Delights of that Torrent of Pleasures can be oloy'd with them or be contented to be deprived of that Divine and Happy Life How then canst thou be so unconstant and irresolute in the way of Grace and unfaithful in the Union thou hast contracted with God who hast drank the Waters of Joy from the same Fountains of thy Saviour When he presents himself really and in Person and demands to be admitted into thy Heart say not to him as St. Peter did Retire from me O Lord But breath out the Sentiments of perfect Love saying with the Spouse Tenui eum nec dimittam I will never abandon him O what a pleasant Society how profound a Peace does the enjoyment of the Soveraign Good bring to the Soul But both imperfect till they are finished in Heaven The fullest possession thereof she can acquire on Earth serves only to inflame her thirst more the more she tasts God the more she desires him and since there is no possibility of satisfying her desire in this Life she suffers a continual Martyrdom that makes her both die and live together Her pain is full of sweetness and that sweetness begets a languishing and longing after her Beloved She is disgusted with all created things and forceably drawn off from them Nothing pleaseth her in this condition but that which augments her flame She cannot read with satisfaction unless there be some mention of her Beloved All Conversation and Discourse are burthen some and tedious unless the subject be his Love My God you see the bottom of my Heart I conceive things that I cannot utter 'T is true I suffer but I would not but suffer I can do nothing but aspire to a fuller possession of your Infinite Goodness 'T is very much that you vouchsafe to give your self unto me in the adorable Sacrament with such an immense Love but still you give me only a hidden Treasure I possess you indeed but do not enjoy you to my hearts desire I am in the condition of Holy Simeon who held you in his Arms in the Temple and yet dyed with a desire to see you It is time O Lord now permit my Soul to depart in Peace and quit this Mortal Life because I receive within me the Spring and Source of Immortality I know for certain that in Paradice I shall obtain the perfect accomplishment of all my Desires yet I do not desire it till it be your good will and Pleasure Your Love makes me press forward and tend incessantly to the Beatifical Union but 't is your Love too that stops my course that draws me back inspiring me with the highest indifference and absolute dependance on your Divine Will O Jesus how admirable is your Providence you open my eyes to see the comfortable and Blessed sight of the Power and Purity of Love which ought to possess the Soul that has the Happiness to receive you often in the Holy Communion I relinquish and resign my self more than ever into your Divine Hands guide me as it shall best please you There is nothing left to ask you more since you have unasked bestowed your self upon me and crowned me with Mercies even beyond all my Hopes My business is to remain annihilated in your presence and quietly receive your Divine
In-actions and fulfilling your merciful intentions upon me which are very great and above the comprehension of him that receives them For who can comprehend how the Infinite Majesty of God should lodge and be received in so vile so streight so unworthy a place as the Heart of Man The coming of the Kingdom of God into a Soul Sounds very delightfully and seems sweet I but the poor heart must first prepare to suffer the violent pains of a continual Agony The heart where God Almighty reigns must bid adieu to all Humane Life She dies to all Pleasures to all Consolations even Divine She has no more support no more relyance upon Creatures even the most Holy The bent of Nature and all Humane Inclinations are extinguished in her she has no more a mind for one thing than for another unless it be for a Supream Indifference nothing but Abjections Annihilations Poverty De-reliction are her Portion She is not capable of any other knowledge than that of Jesus Crucified and her Wisdom is Folly to this World This is the manner I ought to depend on your Grace O Blessed Jesus and have continual recourse unto you For you are my Father who nourish me with your own Substance you are my strength and support my weakness You are my Center where all my Agitations and Inquietudes rest and are at an end You are my End and utmost term of all my Desires At present I have no clear sight of the Purity of your Love but only feel in my self forceable Instincts that incline me to desire the Purity of Love and make me frequently break out into such Expressions as these O pure Love O durable Love Happy is he that seeks thee more Happy he that has found and possesseth thee But ah incomparably most Happy Happy beyond measure he that Perseveres with thee and Dies in thy embraces The End of the Fifth BOOK BOOK VI. Of Interiour and Exteriour Crosses CHAP. I. That we must have a high esteem for Crosses I Esteem it a great Happiness when we suffer any thing for Gods sake there being nothing on Earth whereby we can better testifie the Honour and Love we have for him 'T is in this state we are in a capacity to offer up to the Divine Majesty excellent Sacrifices and render to him most signal Services We cannot do more for a Friend than to procure his Glory by our own Destruction and make our selves nothing to make him All. Hence it is that Saints have set up a higher value upon their Sufferings in Prisons and Chains for the Name of Jesus than to be wrapt up with St. Paul into the third Heaven by Contemplation Be comforted then O my Soul in the different states wherein thou findest thy self so it be that thou dost suffer something for God it is enough If thou hast not the gift of Prayer but art in in aridity of Spirit suffer and be content there is more merit in this than in the most ravishing Contemplation Art thou afflicted with Sickness and so deprived of hearing Mass and receiving the Blessed Sacrament Suffer and be content for 't is better to be in the rigours of the Cross than in the sweets of Spiritual Exercises If thou canst do nothing for the good of thy Neighbour suffer and be content for 't is less meritorious to act for God than suffer for him If thy Exercises of Devotion and good Designs do not succeed as thou expectest suffer and be content for 't is better to suffer then to have all things according to thy desires If thou hast any deformity of Body or no great Parts of Mind provided thou suffer this Patience no Person can do better for this pleaseth God Believe me the best Science in the World the best Prayer the greatest Happiness is to know how to suffer for Gods sake We have a very great esteem for the Wood of the Cross of Christ we search after it with no small diligence no person can present us with a more precious Relique We Enchese it in Gold we keep it near our Heart we have a Veneration for it and preserve it Religiously and not without reason because 't is a small Relique of the true Cross of Christ In like manner true Christians the Children of Light do highly esteem those little Mortifications whether active or passive they undergo finding nothing more precious upon Earth and a greater guift cannot be presented to them then the occasions to suffer and mortifie themselves which they embrace with Joy and Love and with great respect cherish them not near but in their Heart considering that the state of Suffering is most agreeable to the dispositions of Jesus Christ and some small participation of his Sufferings 'T is as a little Parcel of the true Cross and the most precious Relique they can carry about them Let 's never be without having with us some of the true Cross let us make much of what afflicts us and we have Reliques thereof before we think on 't When we examine our Conscience let us ask our selves this question Hast thou O my Soul any parcel of the true Cross Any Reliques of the Sufferings of Jesus Christ Happy are those who have some part of them for they enjoy the occasions of the great tryals and proofs of their Love to Christ as can possibly happen The flames of Divine Love burn brightest in the furnace of Affliction St. Paul had a good piece of the true Cross when he said He carried in his Body the Marks of the Lord Jesus Christ for his Sufferings were indeed for Jesus's sake The most noble and glorious thing that Christ did upon Earth was his Dying for us on the Cross a Death most Painful and Ignominious that his Heavenly Father might thereby be Infinitely Glorified and he being thus exalted might draw the hearts of Believers after him and more powerfully engage their Affections to love and adore him A Soul that beholds Jesus on this Throne of his Ignominies which indeed is the Throne of his Grandeurs desires here on Earth to be united to Jesus Crucified as the Saints in Heaven enjoy him Glorified And thus she breaths forth her Desires True it is I cannot have a full Fruition of my Well-beloved in this Life however this is my comfort I can suffer for him Enjoyment is more sweet to the Creature but suffering is more lovely to the Creator and so I find enjoyment of the Miseries of my Banishment When a Soul has no mind to suffer in this World she has no mind to belong to God For seeing in this exile we cannot be his by enjoyment or but very little and being not willing to appertain to him by Suffering we cannot possess God And being without God we adhere to Creatures and loose our selves in disorder and vanity God finds not out of himself a more pleasing Mansion than in a Soul and Body Mortified with Sufferings there it is he takes his complacency and delight The
Divinity repos'd with Infinite joy in the Humanity of Jesus Christ in his Suffering state And a Soul never loves more nor renders a greater homage to the Divine Perfections than by the Cross and Sufferings Sacrificing her self to Gods Interests and Glory This then is the Motto of a loving Soul Aut pati aut mori Jesus let me suffer or let me die CHAP. II. That we must have a Love for Crosses A Life without a Cross is a Life without Love This Saying too common among us That we must live an easie Life does not become the Lips of a Christian for 't is all one as to say We must live a Natural Sordid Life Next to the Divinity nothing is more amiable than the Cross of Christ We must either enjoy with the Divinity or suffer with the Humanity and the more we suffer with the one the more we shall enjoy with the other A Soul conducted by enjoyments must also participate of great Sufferings for these make those more sweet and pleasant We find by experience that the least contentment taken in Creatures does diminish Divine enjoyment and therefore the Saints have been severe to themselves so as to allow Nature only what is purely necessary by a resolute denyal even of Lawful Pleasures We too often enlarge the Law of necessity and indulge our selves in our Refections and Recreations and Accomodations Nature is content with little but the clamours of others and the fear of prejudicing our Health does us no small hurt in our way towards Perfection 'T is a sign we march couragiously in the way of the Cross when we find in our Souls such a Peace and Serenity that does not indeed hinder Nature to feel the bitterness of Sufferings but inspires with a generous resolution to embrace and cherish them looking upon them as special favours from Heaven notwithstanding the regrets of Nature to prove our Fidelity and advance our Glory It comes into my mind that to take away the bitter tast of Crosses we must sweeten them with several Sauces that is with different confiderations Sometimes by accepting from Gods hand with a Spirit of Pennance Other times with a Spirit of Sacrifice And then again with the Spirit of pure Love Sometimes to be conformable to Jesus Christ in his suffering state and besides to do the Will of God and submit our selves with all Humility to the Orders of his Divine and Sacred Providence Thus the Soul may make use of several considerations to sweeten the bitterness of Sufferings and so preserve a Love of the Cross among all the repugnances of Humane Nature When God designs to advance Divine Love in a Soul he affords her great occasions of Suffering by the order of his Providence and she contentedly embraces them though very bitter to sensual Nature Such favours are precious and we ought to manage them with Prudence and Councel 'T is very true what our Blessed Saviour says in the Gospel Multi sunt vocati pauci verò electi Many have calls to Perfection by Inspirations Lights and Motions of Grace And yet they arrive not to it for want of Fidelity and overmuch sparing themselves by too tender a love of their Body Goods Friends and Relations giving an ear more to Humane reason than the voice of Grace Sometimes we perswade our selves that Devotion is a Life full of Peace without Crosses but we deceive our selves nor ought we to enter into the Service of God without a disposition of Indifferency to all states to be mortified there not as we would have it but after what manner best pleases God Crosses from the immediate hand of God do much conduce to Sanctifie us but what arise from our vanity or too much love of the World are for the most part unprofitable and rather a hindrance to the Soul in her way to Perfection Suffer we must more or less and what pleases God we must accept of with contentation O how rare is it to find Souls truly amorous of Crosses I am of Opinion that the little love we have for Sufferings is the only cause we so little advance in the ways of Grace and if we well examine our selves we shall acknowledge it The love of Sufferings is quite repugnant to our Natural Inclinations but God can make that easie by Grace which is impossible to Nature and if we ask this great Grace as we ought we shall receive it as God has promised Neither does the Love of the Cross so much consist in great Corporal Austerities as embracing with an amorous generosity all those little Contradictions Mortifications and Humiliations we dayly meet withall either from others or our selves or by the secret orders of Divine Providence and to make good use of them for our Spiritual advantage is not the work of Nature but of Grace The more perfect our Virtue is the more we have a love for the Cross that we may be more conformable to our Blessed Saviour Know we not that they who will live Piously in Christ Jesus must suffer Persecution They shall suffer indeed on all sides from the Flesh from the Spirit from the World and God himself will try them with Afflictions This on earth is the high way to Heaven wherein Love must walk to come to Perfection which can never be gain'd without a labourious and couragious resolution CHAP. III. That we must have a great Love for Crosses WE must have a great Intellectual thirst to suffer all sorts of Crosses This is the Character of true Christians this is the Mark to know that Jesus Crucified is establish'd in us And this thirst ought to continue in us whatever our condition be because it much augments our Enjoyments and Consolations The more the Soul enjoyes the more she becomes thirsty not only of a more Savorous Union but also of a more heavy Cross Jesus Christ did thirst after his Passion for us and Dying on the Cross his thirst Increased being not quenched with all his Sufferings We say we ought to have the Image of Jesus Christ Crucified imprinted on our Souls and what is this but to have a thirst for Sufferings as he had O how the cup of affliction is pleasant to a Soul athirst for Sufferings When some great Cross happens to such a Soul she finds comfort and satisfaction therein as one enflamed with heat is refresh'd with Drinking God has a strange thirst for our Sufferings he is a thirst in us by the Fire of his Divine Love wherewith he loves himself and his Divine Perfections why do we not refresh him with our Sufferings But alas this Divine thirst is little known to men O how is it hidden from sensual eyes O Jesus how little are you known How little are you loved These Proceeding of Jesus are not understood by those who only follow the Light of Sense and Reason Emitte lucem tuam Whence once the Spiritual man discovers this nothing is more desirable to him then Suffering The great desire of the
Blessed in Heaven is Enjoyment but we Travellers on earth ought to desire nothing more then to suffer for Jesus This Suffering does mortifie Old Adam in us by Holy Violence makes us die to the World and separates from us whatever is Impure and Earthy as Gold is purified in a burning Furnace Our Corruption cannot be ruin'd but either by Fire or the Sword of Afflictions which should induce us to embrace them with Contentment seeing the more we Suffer the more we are Purified Let us have an Honourable esteem for the greatest Crosses because they work in us the profoundest Purity and the purest Love of God which is the Life of our Soul and the end of our Creation I am much pleas'd with my present state of affliction seeing it is the readiest way to form Jesus Christ in me and make me a Perfect Christian which is the work of works the highest Honour the richest Treasure and the Soveraign Happiness of this Life While we are Pilgrims on Earth we are exiles from Gods presence Which must needs be a Cross to Souls that sigh after the Beatifical vision I know not how it is but methinks I see more Purity of Love of resignation of Perfection in my present Suffering condition then what I have found in the joyes of union which puts my heart in repose and quiet It seems to me that I can say more truely than at other times O my God what do I desire in Heaven or on Earth but you who are my Portion and my Heritage for ever My Life is Crucified with Jesus Christ and altogether hid with him in the good Pleasure of God To send us Crosses and make us content with a Suffering condition is one of the choicest effects of the Providence of God Seeing he has an Infinite Love for himself his will is that all Creatures capable of his Love should love him also To dispose them thereto the better he sends them Crosses which purifie our corrupted Nature and produce in us dispositions fit for Divine Impressions O Infinite Goodness O merciful Justice I return you Thanks with all my Heart that you have afflicted me to make me love you Losses Contempts Poverty Sufferings come you are welcome my heart is open to give you entertainment Behold I receive you with open arms because you bring with you Divine Love CHAP. IV. God is pleas'd to send us Crosses in the place of Persecutions that our Life may be a continual Martyrdom I Am much taken with this Saying of St. Clement of Alexandria That seeing our Love and Fidelity to God does not at present appear by shedding our Blood for our Faith the Persecutions of Tyrants being ceas'd we must now manifest them by making our Faith visible in all our Actions To do the will of God is a great testimony of our Love to him but 't is a far greater to suffer for him Souls loving God and beloved of him are careful to correspond to Divine Graces whether by acting or Suffering and are so couragious in their Resolutions that no humane fears though of loss of Life it self is able to stop the torrent of their Affections Witness that good Religious man who askt his Spiritual Guide whether it was not better to die than complain of the Infirmarian who provided Diet not proper for him We now suffer more notably in some things than the Martyrs of Old by Bloody Persecutors For our Crosses Interiour or Exteriour being impressions of the Divine Holiness though they separate not the Soul from the Body yet they separate the Soul from the Love of all Creatures to unite us to God alone This Holiness of God having an Infinite abhorrence of whatsoever is not Pure and Holy Delights to purifie the Elect by Tribulations as Gold in the Fire When therefore the Soul feels her self as it were nail'd to the Cross by Derelictions Aridities and Interiour Sufferings let her not strive to free her self but continue in this Suffering contentedly as long as pleases God because hereby she Glorifies him and Purifies her self Seeing 't is certain that the Cross is the Source of Graces and Purity we are inconsiderate to complain and shun Afflictions for we flee from our advancement in Spirituality and the Purity of Love neither will we permit God to accomplish in us his good pleasure To die naked on the Cross is the ultimate disposition of pure Love 'T is in vain to pretend to the Perfection of Divine Love unless with St. Teresa We desire either to die or suffer The Holy Martyrs could not attain it but by dying for God nor we except by Suffering for him When I am in Prayer in the Presence of God I am much ashamed of my self to suffer so little and with so much Imperfection in a manner so different from the Saints I am in such confusion hereat that I dare hardly stay in Gods Presence were it not that to repair my Miseries and make him satisfaction I offer up to him Jesus suffering poor and abject for us sinners And thereupon I make resolutions to endure whatsoever Crosses happen to me with all the Fidelity that Grace requires It seems to me that a Soul can hardly be content without some Suffering or other I have had experience hereof in some little tempest that now is over And which is more I cannot believe so much content may be taken in limiting our sufferings as desiring greater if God thinks good because the Peace and Content of the Soul consists in Loving and Love is best satisfied with what most pleases God and therefore in suffering for him From these words of our Blessed Saviour If any one will come after me he must deny himself and take up his Cross and follow me I learn that the state of this present corrupt Life requires that we must live in a continual dying to the World seeing the enjoyment of Creatures does too much work upon our weakness to bring us off from God Our Corruption and the long habit of taking Pleasure in the things of this World makes it very difficult for us to live this dying Life which is a great Cross and a long Martyrdom It cannot be denyed but we must suffer much to arrive to the possession of God in a Super-natural Life however to taste the sweetness of God for one moment does Infinitely transcend the pains of gaining him And when he hides himself and tryes us with Derelictions what a Cross is it 'T is a state of great Perfection indeed to be content without Comforts both Divine and Humane Many Martyrs have suffered less in dying for God then the Soul does sometimes in this condition Patience a little and God e'er long will sufficiently recompense us with abundance of his Graces and Consolations Sometimes God seems to abandon his most Faithful Servants as he dealt with Holy Job permitting Satan to assault them with several Temptations sometimes against Charity sometimes against Chastity and sometimes against Faith 'T is
in Corporal Infirmities I have a mind to call my Hermitage the Hospital of the Incurable and only to lodge with me such poor Spiritual Christians who have a good will to heal their Imperfections but yet still fall into relapses At Paris there 's an Hospital for those who are Incurable in Body But mine shall be for such in Soul The end of the Sixth BOOK BOOK VII Of Ordinary Prayer and Contemplation CHAP. I. What Esteem we ought to have for Prayer WE must have a great care not to place Perfection where it is not for this will much retard us in the path of Virtue We must not therefore have too great an esteem for the Unitive Mystick way not but that it is good and very good for a Soul that God conducts to Perfection by such extraordinary Elevations But we may safely believe the Unitive Practical way to be as excellent and more necessary seeing 't is nothing else but the practice of a Christian Life and the other consists in Elevations and Unions of Spirit with God by Contemplation 'T is observable that our Blessed Saviour says Whosoever will come after me must take up his Cross and follow me He says not he must be Elevated in Prayer but he must take up his Cross that is he must practice the Maxims of the Gospel Happy then are those who suffer although they be not elevated in Spirit And those who are elevated in Spirit are not happy but inasmuch as they are conform to Jesus Christ Crucified and by such Unions are more disposed to the Cross and Sufferings The Crucified Life is in a manner the end of the Mystick Life whose Gusts and Lights conduce to fortifie the Soul to carry her Cross the better St. Teresa says That 't is a good sign after a Soul has been in an extasie if she find in her self extraordinary desires to suffer in that she cannot return from those Holy Communications with God but well instructed For the Perfection of Love here consists in Suffering for the Love of Jesus and not enjoying him Let us not complain then if we be not elevated by Mystick Unions but rather rejoyce too see our poor Soul in Prayer among the Thorns of dryness and aridities than the Roses of a sweet and gustful Devotion Interiour as well as Exteriour Sufferings must be pleasing to us seeing a true Christian ought to Glory in nothing but the Cross of Christ But that did extend it self as well to his Soul as Body for his Divine Soul was deprived of sensible succours in this Dereliction on the Cross and we must Love to be conform to him and rest content Happy are those Souls that love Sufferings rather than Enjoyments and complain of nothing sooner than not to suffer A Soul which receives no great Light from God in Prayer but is left in darkness and Interiour Sufferings carries in reality a heavy Cross But a Soul illuminated in Prayer by illustrations from Heaven endures another Cross more intime and burdensom For this Light discovering to her the great merit of pure Suffering 't is a pain to her not to suffer and so she remains without all sort of consolation seeing the state of Light and Sweetness appear to her not preferrable to that of obscurity And so tasting of those Sweets they are not now so pleasant having discover'd that the bitterness of Aridities is more acceptable to a Soul that desires nothing but the pure Love of Jesus Christ Crucified and that thereby may be more firmly united to her Saviour When I am in Darkness and Aridities I stand in need of an indifferency in every state that I may bear with Patience my Abjection and Poverty I have more need of Indifferency when my Soul is enlightned which irradiations God vouchsafes us to strengthen our weakness and not as I have thought heretofore to advance us in the practice of Divine Love which is more eminent in the contrary condition I have stood in need of comfort in my Sufferings and I have stood more in need of it in a state of Joy and Sweetness I said heretofore when I abounded with Consolations that I should never suffer again At present I think I shall suffer as long as I live seeing I find Crosses in every state and I frame my self to an Indifferency to Gods will and Pleasure in his dealings with me Heretofore inebriated with Consolations I said Fulcite me floribus stipate me malis quia amore langueo Surround me with Flowers and Aples to augment my Comforts and increase my Love But now I say surround me with Crosses Contempts and Sufferings for languishing with Love I desire to Love Jesus better than ever 'T is a wonderful thing that I should be more poor now then when I was deprived of all Consolation I will not then too greedily seek after Light and Sweetness seeing methinks they make me poorer I stand amaz'd to see a Soul to find her self desolate by Consolation In Desolations the Inferiour part of the Soul suffers but in Consolations the Superiour part and more elevated but little known I perceive that the Supreme part of the Soul cannot be content and comforted but by the Death of the sensual part and a seperation from all inordinate Affections to the Creature I should therefore rather desire a state of Desolation and Fidelity therein than all the Delicious gusts of Prayer though so elevated as to bring the Soul to ravishing extasies CHAP. II. Of the different sorts of Mental Prayer I Find a comparison which explicates very well the difference of ordinary Prayer and Prayer Passive A man may see well enough the Furniture of a chamber and the riches of a Cabinet by striking Fire and lighting a Candle to view the particulars Or by the lighting of the Sun when we have nothing to do but to open our eyes to behold those Objects Meditation much resembles the first way of seeing with a Candle Perfect Contemplation the second way of seeing by the Sun because 't is done not only without labour but all at once and with delight When the Light of the Sun fails us we must supply it with a Lamp or Candle When God does not Communicate himself by Contemplation we must seek after him by Meditation and be content with Gods Gifts whatever they be with Peace and Humility When God withdraws his Passive Light 't is in vain to strive to retain it We must acquiess in his Pleasure 'till it return again as he thinks good If God please to leave us in darkness without Sun or Candle 't is an opportunity to practice Humility and Patience for we must desire nothing but God alone and in what manner he thinks best Let a Soul be never so perfect she is never continually elevated to a high degree of Contemplation but more or less as it pleases God she must descend to the practice of Virtue and exercises of Charity or to discursive Meditation by Applications to God in the
obscurity of Faith She must therefore keep her self in an Indifferency rising and falling according to the conduct of Gods Holy Spirit Always esteeming her self unworthy of the least Grace and never pretend by forcing her Spirits to the extraordinary favours of high Contemplation But when she has a call to such elevations in Prayer the way to arrive thither is by a perfect death to all things and a Faithful imitation of Jesus Christ in his Crucified states of Abjection and Poverty with a Love of Solitude as much as our condition will permit There 's a great deal of difference between that Light and Fervour which is imparted to a Soul in the elevations of passive Prayer and that Light which is procured by the ordinary Grace of Meditation That is more in time and piercing and full of Heavenly Benedictions This however suffices to acquire Virtues and serve God in the state of our Vocation 'T is our duty to attend to our present condition with Peace and Humility and submission to the Divine Will and let God alone to order as he pleases the time of his Visits and our manner of Prayer Sometimes this will be by simple Thoughts sometimes by Discourse sometimes by Faith alone and sometimes by passive Illuminations But whatever is given us we must receive from the hand of the Divine Goodness with great respect and Thankfulness acknowledging our selves unworthy of the least good Thought That which a Soul ought to do both in and out of Prayer is to be very attentive to Gods Holy Inspirations and follow them with Courage and Fidelity If she find that God elevates her to extraordinary Contemplation let her yield to those Divine impressions If she be kept in an ordinary way let her there abide If she be left in Aridities let her also sit down without complaining The great secret of a Spiritual Life is for a Soul to purifie her self so as to comply with the motions of God who is our Alpha and Omega our Origen and final end There are things sufficiently declared as the Commandments of God and the Church the Duties we owe to Obedience Charity or Necessity There 's no need to expect immediate Light from God for the performance of these things But only in such which are neither commanded nor forbidden And in these great Purity of Soul is necessary to discern the motions of Grace for fear we be deceiv'd by our own imaginations Those Saints who by the Impulses of Gods Holy Spirit have writ Spiritual Treatises to direct Interiour Christians in the wayes of God oftentimes affect us with their Thoughts and Sentiments because they Pray in Heaven for this Blessing on their labours on Earth and therefore t is Beneficial to read their Books to advance our Devotion But do what we can we shall never know what that Prayer is by what those Books write of it unless by the practice and Light of the same Prayer We know well enough in general that Prayer is the source of all Virtue in the Soul who leaves that off falls into Luke-warmness and Imperfections Prayer is a Holy Fire that warms the Heart and Affections which without it must of necessity grow cold in Devotion In Health or Sickness Joy or Sorrow we must always Pray except we have a mind to fall from Grace to our utter ruin CHAP. III. That we ought to be indifferent to what manner of Prayer God is pleased to give us WE ought to shun two Extreams equally vitious The one is to covet more Grace and Perfection than God intends us so as to be troubled and disgusted to see others more elevated in Gifts of Prayer than our selves The other is not to co-operate faithfully with the Grace vouchsaf'd us either for want of Courage in the Difficulties that occur in the practice of Virtue or of Attention to observe the Motions of Grace or being observed by too easily diverting our selves to other matters and so neglecting the Mercies of God When a Soul is well purified and hath experience of the Impulses of Grace in her and can distinguish them from the motions of Nature she must give free ingress to the rayes of this Light from Heaven that she may be throughly illuminated and warm'd in her Devotions For to do otherwise under a pretence of Humility and fear of deception is not to yield to the Conduct of God's Spirit who inspires when and whom he pleases 'T is then our Duty to be entirely passive that God may fully work his Will in us When these Divine Illuminations are withdrawn from a Soul for the Glory of God and her good and so left in darkness or when her own Imperfections have made her not so capable of supernatural Lights she must rest contented with these privations till it pleases the Sun of Righteousness to shine upon her A purified Soul is satisfied and resign'd on such occasions because God only is her joy and not his gifts which he by his infinite Goodness communicates to her when he pleases And this is the reason that she loves not her inward peace and joy when she is deprived of heavenly Irradiations and Gifts in Prayer He who gives himself up to his Prince for his sole interest and satisfaction without seeking his own peculiar concerns and contentment does not much matter what Service he renders and what Rewards he receives provided his Prince be well pleased and satisfied If he keep him near his person to caress him he is content not that he is caressed but because it is his Princes pleasure If he imploy him afar off in troublesome Affairs he is content not to be so far from his Person and in a hazardous Employment but because this is the Pleasure of his Prince whose Content he only had an eye to in giving himself up unto his Service This is the true case of a Soul that desires to serve God purely for the Love of God If God caress her in Prayer with Visits full of Sweetness she is content because this is his Pleasure if he affords not his Presence but leaves her in Darkness she is content because 't is the good pleasure of God If God call her to the exercises of Charity in a life more active and laborious than the contemplative she is content because this is the good pleasure of God which is the only thing she seeks and desires in his Service This indifferency disposes a Soul to receive great Graces for by this means she sometimes arrives to a total oblivion of her self and all creatures without any reflection on her own Interests Temporal or Eternal haveing nothing in her eye but the good pleasure of God and desiring him alone insomuch that if any thing of self creep in at any time as soon as she discovers it 't is distasteful to her This is a state of great Nakedness and entire Mortification and a perfect disposition to most sublime Prayer whether God elevates a Soul whom he sees ready to submit
little or no Service but I rest contented herein seeing God hereby does magnify his Goodness and Mercy to me I doubt not but there are many Souls in Heaven who have in the eyes of the World done little Service for God as Solitares in the Deserts and many Persons without Talents and yet have high Places in the Mansions of Eternity They spent all their Time to purify their Interiour by being faithful to the Graces they have received from the infinite Bounty of God and the Service they rendred him to the Glory of his Name is only written in his Omniscience but will be laid open to the World at the great Day of Manifestation CHAP. V. Of the Impediments of Prayer I Clearly see and know by Experience that the temporal Affairs of our Oeconomy does not a little take us off from God We do ill in it yea it being our Obligation 't is pleasing to God to manage our Temporals with a good Intention though it would be better if we can to lay aside these Worldly Distractions to spend our time only in God's Service And those who have a Call from God to attend on him alone in a state of Prayer and Contemplation cannot without being unfaithful to his Grace continue in the solicitous Distractions of worldly Affairs I must needs say that Worldly Business darkens and hinders my Soul in her Spiritual Exercises and I would never spend time therein upon Humane Considerations but purely because God has so order'd it However it must be our care not to spend more time therein than necessity requires Too delicate Dyet though it may strengthen Nature yet it weakens Grace When the Body is brought down by Abstinence the Soul is more vigorous in her Elevations to God I find this true in me by Experience A Soul must be very well grounded in Grace that among temporal Imployments and worldly Cares can keep her self up in Fervour and Purity She meets with a thousand Occasions to move her to Anger Impatience Sadness and vain Joy and though she do not give way to them yet she is sensible of them and this must needs more or less disturb her Interiour Peace whereby she is united to God her Happiness A little thing will hinder a Soul from raising her self to Contemplation and a less matter will somewhat darken her when elevated because the least emotion of Spirit will indispose her to receive Divine Impressions Therefore a man of Prayer must be a man dead and mortified for that is not pure Prayer which does not work in us a victory over our Passions and Vicious Inclinations and bring us to the practice of all Christian Virtues I see now more clearly than ever that the Spirit of Prayer does not persevere and gather strength but in those who are dead to Sensuality austere to themselves Penitent and disengaged from whatsoever is not God 'T is true as for Corporal Austerities a tender Complexion must follow the Councel of a Director But commonly we are too indulgent to our selves and far from the practice of great Penitents who were very severe to themselves and also great Contemplatives We deceive our selves if we think to enter into a state of Prayer and take delight in Worldly things Though in rigour this may in some sort be permitted to Candidates of Devotion yet not to Proficients in whom the Spirit of Prayer and Conformity to Jesus Christ Crucified ought to be wholly predominant For 't is our Duty to live Conformably to that state where God has put us Gerson says very well If we refuse Exteriour Consolations we shall receive Interiour The reason hereof seems to me to be this because Interiour Consolations participate of the Purity of their source which is the union of God with the Soul and will not permit any mixture with Impurity and Imperfection For sensual Joyes and Consolations are Earthly Impure and Imperfect and consequently are contrary to the Spirit of Grace which makes the Soul pure and Penitent and Mortified to the things of this Life Moreover Interiour Consolations are slender participations of those Infinite Delights which God has in himself of himself and he is jealous of such favours not communicating them but to a Soul entirely beloved that takes no delight but in him alone But when earthly consolations enter into a Soul they draw her partly from God and so God withdraws his favours from her For this reason the Saints who would be wholly for God mortified themselves without reserve as much as humane weakness would permit that no sensual or Worldly Pleasures might have any part in their Affections but God alone Take courage O my Soul let us embrace the Cross and follow Jesus Christ who will conduct us through the garden of his Delights Let us not trouble our selves with Worldly Affairs unless we know 't is the Will of God for otherwise we shall find affliction of Spirit and decay in Spirituality Thrice happy is he who shuns multiplicity for this will dispose him to pure Love Many things seem to us necessary which serve but to entertain the corruption of Nature still working in us If God should severely examine all our Actions perhaps he would hardly find one in all respects well pleasing to him We too much follow Nature and our Humane Inclinations if Grace sets us a working we hardly go through with it but Nature creeps in some way or other to sully our Actions What is purely Natural cannot be Meritorious all merit proceeding from a Principle of Grace and therefore no Actions but what have an influence from Grace can dispose us to a union with God O how rare a thing is pure Virtue That which seems best is not for the most part without some blemish Those who have Illustrations from Heaven discover these Impurities others in the dark see nothing but grosser Faults and Imperfections From all this we may conclude that there are principally four great Obstacles which hinder for the most part the exercise of Prayer 1. To engage our selves in Worldly Affairs more than the order of God requires 2. To be too delicate and use very little Corporal Austerity 3. To practice little either Interiour or Exteriour Retreats and to have no Love for Recollection and for Solitude 4. Want of zeal and Courage in the ways of God and so living a Life meerly Humane by following our Naetural Inclinations But he shall never be a Man of Prayer who does not live a Super-natural Life and practice all Christian Virtues with a Faithful and Generou Resolution And Blessed is he who by his constancy in Spiritual Exercises has brought his Soul to such a temper that 't is in a manner as easie for him to Pray as breath Hic accipiet Benedictionem à Domino Misericordiam à Deo Salutari suo quia haec est generatio quaerentium Dominum He that thus seeks God while he may be found shall enjoy him there where he can never be lost CHAP.
by Jesus Christ there being no other Means to attain Salvation 6. That the Sacred Trinity which consists in the perfect Knowledge and pure Love of the Divine Persons is the true Model of Perfect Prayer These deeply consider'd are very instrumental to elevate a Contemplative Soul to so high a pitch that sometimos she in a wonderful manner participates of that Life Eternal which is in God himself I have made a Resolution to desire of God that my Prayer may be altogether Intellectual to the end I may not feel such sensible Gusts of Heavenly Consolations which prejudice Nature These are but sweet Baiâ—s for self-Love which sullies the Purity of Prayer and diminishes the Contemplative Attention which continues more strong and vigorous when kept on the point of the Spirit whereby the Fire of Divine Love burns brighter and with more constant Flames This is that continual Union which is the Object of Perfection and whatever hinders this ought to be suspected as are sensible Gusts of Devotion in Inferiour Nature O my Soul let us therefore entirely give up our selves to God in Prayer to receive from him such impressions as he thinks best let our chief care be fully to submit our selves to him and to be disingag'd from all worldly things and accept with Thankfulness whatever he gives us If he gives us nothing let nothing content us and peaceably acquiesce in Union with his Divine Will A Soul faithful in the state of Privations will sooner or later as God sees best be raised to pure Union and Enjoyments on the lofty Wings of Contemplation CHAP. IX Of the Prayer of Faith THis Prayer is a bare reflection or simple remembrance of God who is believed by naked Faith as he is seen and known by the Light of Glory 'T is the same Object here and there but known by the Soul in a different manner The way of knowing God here is but learned Ignorance Earth is the Land of Believing Heaven of Seeing To see God as we are seen of Him and understand all Divine Mysteries is reserv'd for the Light of Glory here we must walk by the obscurities of Faith This Faith must be naked without Images or Representations simple and without Discourse universal without a distinct consideration of particulars The operation of the Will is conform to that of the Understanding Naked Simple Universal Spiritual Independant on the Senses We must expect great Combats in this way from our Spirit which will still be working and rely on Creatures But though it be much distasted by the understanding part of the Soul yet she must strive to die to her own operations and willingly entertain what helps her in this Combat as Aridities Privations Desolations which at last leave the Soul in exercise of pure Faith whereby God is known in a higher manner than those Lights which serve as a Medium between God and the Soul for this Union of our Spirit with God by pure Faith is immediate and so more elevated The Will also must die to what ever is not God To live only in Him and to him by pure Love For the Life of the Will is this Death and this Death is not ordinarily wrought but by Privations This kind of Prayer is uniform and not much lyable to alterations nor brings any damage to the Body For Nature has nothing to do in it being not procurable by greatest endeavours of Humane Industry but depending purely on the Will of God who alone gives it when and to whom he pleases 'T is true this pure and naked Contemplation of God by Faith is given but rarely and to those who have past through many Purgatories and states of Penance to fit them for it In the beginning it darts into the Soul but Transient Irradiations like flashes of Lightning if at any time they continue about half an hour 't is very much However they work in the Soul very great Effects One of the principal is that this Light of Faith discovers to us the verity of Divine Mysteries Imperfections and the Perfections we want and practical Virtues And all this at once not successively one after another by discourse which could never arrive to produce a knowledge so clear and universal But indeed the understanding has much ado to die to its own operations and not act by Humane Lights by being wholly given up to the obscurity of Faith However this must be done to be rightly disposed for Divine Operations There are divers degrees of Contemplations but what God is pleas'd to give us must be received with submissive Thankfulness While we live in Mortal Bodies we shall have always something to purifie and therefore always something to suffer Three parts of our Life pass away in a Suffering condition In a state of obscurity the Soul is intimately united to God although she be not sensible thereof I am much taken with the way of pure Faith in Prayer whereby the Soul knows God as much as she can do in this Life and though it be obscure it matters not being sure and certain For my part take as much as you will of my Light of Reason if the Light of Faith increase thereby O how Beautiful is pure and naked Faith It much conduces to Spiritualize a Soul to live continually by Faith to esteem and love nothing but what we ought to esteem and love Man rarely will relinquish his Reason and nevertheless he must raise himself above it or drag on the Earth with Imperfections Faith is a participation of the Eternal Wisdom she only conducts us with true assurance for her Lights though dark are certain and their obscurity does incomparably transcend the clearest evidence of Natural Reason Moreover to make Prayer more Intellectual and that Nature may have no hand in it we must leave off some things which usually did raise our hearts to God with a sensible Devotion As Musick Rich Ornaments Devout Pictures in Churches and the like This is good and profitable in the beginning of a Spiritual Life and some time after but when a Soul has attained purity of Prayer there 's no need to take her nourishment that is her Knowledge and Love but from pure Faith and Supernatural Lights infused into her When we take not good heed we keep not our selves sufficiently passive to the Operations of God but we go a beging for the Life of the Soul to sensible Objects when God himself would nourish her with more purified Knowledge and Diviner Love Why should we hanker after sensible Gusts of Devotion seeing Nature is commonly too much taken with them to the damage of naked Faith and the hindrance of our pure Union with God which requires a total denudation of all Creatures Notwithstanding when God tryes us with Derelictions and gives us not admittance into his presence but by things sensible and Discoursive Prayer we must humbly comply with this state and not pretend to higher elevations in our Addresses to him Yet if a Soul in
he pleases without her knowledge or discovery Before the Soul can fix in this state she must suffer much from her imagination which will be still proposing her Representations Lights and Sentiments according to her usual practice but the Soul must quit all these to yield her self passive to the operations of God Yea even Spiritual Lecture at this time proves hurtful because it keeps up the ordinary way of working in the Soul Neither is this to tempt God seeing he will have the Soul to treat with him in this manner and her present disposition thus requiring she ought to be Faithful in complying with it There be many degrees of this denudation whereof I speak The first takes from the Soul what Lights and Affections she got discursive Meditations to give her in lieu thereof a more noble knowledge and love of God The second evacuates this knowledge by infusing particular and distinct notions of God The third after our way of conception is a pure and general knowledge of God by Faith The Soul must pass through these several dispositions as it pleases God to conduct her therein and remain in a perfect denudation adhering only to God and his good Pleasure We must not be discourag'd at the difficulties we shall meet with in this sublime exercise but prepare our selves to bear the Cross they must endure who are call'd to this state and contentedly loose our selves to be found in God Doubts frequently arise for although the Soul in this Prayer hath often assurances of her well doing yet this sometimes does not appear and the humane Spirit which is wholly blind herein is much terrified But when the Soul thus dies to her self and the World not by her own but the operations of God in her she is not idle as she may fear but disposes her self to receive the Divine enactions altogether extraordinary and Super-natural which are hindred in her by her own operations For the Humane Spirit must die before a new Super-natural Life can arise in her The Soul begins this passive Prayer by having an eye to God in himself confus'd and general After which she receives Divine Infusions as God sees good or remains suffering in a total denudation desiring nothing else but to suffer seeing she finds at present that this is the will of God The Soul cannot well give an account of what passes in her in this state of Passivity God working in her and by her what she knows not Only she sees obscurely that all goes well with her in her Interiour and that God is hers and that suffices And indeed she need not fear seeing a Soul thus passive and given up totally into the hands of God is more under the Sacred wings of his Protection than ever and belonging in a singular manner to his Providence Nor is it expedient the Soul should always know this work of God in her who would but hinder it by her reflections and complacences and therefore God keeps often from her knowledge for her good This passive Contemplation cannot be understood but by experience For God takes posseossin of the Soul in a much other manner than in active Prayer 'T is God that works his wonders as he pleases and the Soul receives the Divine operations co-operating therewith in a sort very sublime and Spiritual For the Soul is not idle but acts with a real activity elevated above her ordinary manner of working This is possible for the Blessed in Heaven are perfectly passive and yet very active their Powers working in a most sublime manner By how much the more our Prayer is pure it appears more passive in respect of us who apprehend not things Spiritual but by the service of our Senses The Soul in this state has daily experience of Divine impressions not only in Prayer but in many other matters according to that of St. Paul Spiritualis homo judicat omnia The Spiritual man discerns all things And this is wrought in a different manner for sometimes God immediately infuses his Light and Love into the Soul without any previous disposition sometimes by the looking on an Image sometimes by bringing to mind some passage in Scripture we have read before sometimes by a Sermon sometimes by Conference c. But 't is God always who works powerfully in the Soul these Exteriour things being only subservient to his Grace The Soul then makes no Acts but is wholly taken up with God and his Perfections or with Jesus and his states or the subject given her in Prayer I understood not this before this Light was Infus'd into me and now my former Exercises in Prayer seem nothing in comparison What is it that the Soul pretends to by her Meditations and Affections but to unite her self to God But when she does already possess him she needs not but to repose her self in him and live in him and of him as she desires And all the Sacraments especially the Holy Eucharist serve only to establish and plunge her more deeply in God Oh how rarely does a Soul free her self from all her own operations And yet that hinders her perfect union with God She leaves him to come to him again when she had nothing to do but to keep close to him I observe that upon my waking my Soul has an eye to Jesus Christ and reposes her self as in his bosom by whom she finds her self attracted to the Contemplation of the Divinity by the Light of Faith This Divine Idaea of Jesus Christ eclipsed all the Images of Creatures and at last my Soul was insensibly lost in a general and amorous knowledge of God and afterwards she perceived no more of what God wrought in her being then environed with Darkness which clouded the Light of her understanding I also laid aside all Exteriour occupations except such as I saw clearly God required of me Spiritual Entertainments Actions of Charity Visiting the Poor c. To intermedle much with such like things does take up the time for Prayer and Contemplation which is my chief and principal affair And as I ought to serve God in a denudation of all Creatures so I ought to be dis-engaged from too many Exteteriour occupations to treasure up time enough with Mary Magdalen for the one thing necessary And because Solitude and Retirement from Worldly Conversation do much cherish this manner of Life I must embrace it as much as possible But however with a high esteem of the Exercises of the Active Life which are excellent in the order of Divine Providence Sometimes the string is to be slakned a little to divert my Thoughts by Recreation or Exteriour Actions I have known Solitaries that have done so for the preservation of their Health and advancement of their Spiritual Exercises I know very well that my Life has been too much taken up with amusements and therefore now I ought to be more Solitary and retir'd otherwise I shall not be Faithful to the Grace of my Vocation nor conform my self to
the Will of God If I have not a great care the Devil will deceive me and make me delay to my own ruine CHAP. XX. Of the different Caresses God vouchsafes a Soul in Prayer THose who practise Prayer know by Experience that God unites Himself to the Soul in different manners all most intimate most pure and full of Sweetness Oftentimes by the pleasing Attractions of his Goodness and Mercy so delightful to the Soul that for the time she in a manner enjoys a Heaven upon Earth Sometimes God unites Himself to the Soul by the Rigours of his Justice trying her with interiour and exteriour Sufferings so that only the supreme part of the Soul remains united to God the inferiour part being in a Suffering condition Sometimes God unites himself to the Soul by his Sanctity his Bounty Power and other Perfections and to the end all these Unions may be pure it suffices that the Soul render her self passive to the Operations of God in her whether sweet or bitter comforting or afflicting with Respect and Affection 'T is observable that to live this Divine Life it is not necessary to find no Repugnance from sensual Nature it suffices if we continue firm in this state by the Superiour part whether Grace could only advance us and where we cannot subsist but by being dead to all Creatures He that will live this life must resolve to suffer All the Interiour Commerce between God and the Soul passes principally in the Will the Understanding is not so capable thereof but the Will receives the more intimate more pure and more perfect Communications being more proper for it The Understanding herein is more lyable to Illusions the Will is more assured in her way and the Devil cannot counterfeit what passes in her in the feelings of pure Love For the Soul that has experience of the effects of pure Love cannot easily be deceived From hence it comes that the Purity of the Will is the principal Disposition for the Prayer of Vnion be it ordinary or more sublime by the powerful influences of preventing Grace This Purity is altogether necessary God being not pleased to work these Wonders but in a purified Soul And this Purity consists in willing nothing but Gods good pleasure being dead to all other things contenting her self with the orders of Providence God finding the Soul thus purified especially in her Will takes up his mansion in her Interiour where he exercises his Divine Operations putting her into divers states acording to the different Designs he has upon her Sometimes he is pleased to inflame her Affections with Divine Love and to kindle this holy fire in her Breast manifests to her his Divine Perfections Other times he puts her upon the Cross and exercises his Justice for her greater good Sometimes he hides himself the more to purify her and make her dye to whatever is not God Otherwhile he gives her Councels to advance her in Perfection and then if she has not been faithful to his motions he gives her interiour Checks of Conscience Sometimes he enlightens her Understanding to enflame her Will and the Soul being retired within her self finds her Divine Bridegroom working something in her to which she is to be purely passive and adhere in all simplicity of heart to his gracious Operations Being thus retired into the Cabinet of her Heart she is elevated above her self and all Creatures and being united to God though he send her Sufferings she is not taken up with them but Divine Love she feels his Caresses is inricht with his Gifts and imploys all her Intellectual Powers to Love and Glorify her Well-beloved Here is her ordinary abode from whence she descends not to her inferiour part but for necessity and enjoying the Embraces of her Divine Bridegroom she adheres to him by pure Faith and Love without being diverted by her Imagination in intellectual Contemplation I cannot but think that a Mistress of a House that had a King and Queen in her Closet willing to converse with her would have a care not to divert her self by other matters and quit them to wash dishes in the Kitchen What strange Incivility would this be yea what Infidelity would it be in a Soul that is honoured with the Presence of God in the Cabinet of her Heart to have her near himself to converse with her and to ravish her with these Spiritual Delights which are ineffable Souls that are thus favour'd of God if they quit him for exteriour Imployments and temporal affairs neglecting the Presence of the King of Glory for some inconsiderable Business by this strange Neglect or Contempt of his special Favours must needs be guilty of deep Ingratitude O my Soul be thou faithful to the Divine Calls thou art too much favour'd of God considering thy too frequent not complying with his Graces He calls thee to himself his Attracts are powerful and sweet let us quit Temporal things and leave them to who will take them fear not we shall want nothing having God in possession If Divine Providence dispense to us with so liberal a hand the great Favours of God's Spiritual Graces let us not think he will deny us his lesser blessings which concern the Body and are as nothing in comparison Let us betake our selves to Prayer and never leave it for that is our great and sole Affair The End of the Seventh Book BOOK VIII Some Maxims of great Importance to conduct us in a Spiritual Life CHAP. I. To have above all things an extreme Horrour of Sin THere is nothing of greater Concern to us in this World than to manage well our Love and Hatred to which Passions our Will principally owes her Motions Our Love ought wholly to be fixt on God who is an infinite Good and our final Happiness Our hatred ought to have no other Object but Sin which is an infinite evil and utter ruine of our Souls Love makes all things easie and what is done with great Love is of great value in the sight of God Who knows to love cordially knows how to do whatever God requires of him seeing Love includes in it all Perfection Hatred also makes all things easy for from a torrent of Hatred commonly flows an inundation of evils He who really and from his heart hates an infinite Evil that is Sin will be reveng'd on himself by severe Penance and fly from it with such a Horrour and Detestation that he would sooner cast himself alive into Hell than commit a Sin that breaks Friendship with God A Soul that sees clearly the enormous Malignity of Sin and how it fights against the great God of Heaven and Earth to annihilate Him if it was possible will easily conceive an implacable Hatred against Sin and abhorr it to the utmost with an irreconcileable Enmity knowing well that Sin can only separate her from God her final Happiness This hatred ought to possess the Soul with permanency and such extensions as not only to preserve her from
the good pleasure of God does not at all hinder her Co-operation whether it be to act with God in Prayer or exteriour Imployments God by this means works in the Soul a disposition to enjoy or suffer of Action or Contemplation of Darkness or Light as he pleases For then she desires to do nothing of her self but to follow entirely the Attracts and Motions of God's Holy Spirit A Soul that sets her self a work without an eye to God and her Interiour is imprudent for what she so undertakes is of no value in that she does not the will of God but withdrawing her self from her necessary Dependance endeavours as it were to conduct God when she ought only to be conducted by him If we were sensible of our misery herein we would be afraid of our selves Self-confidence is a thing so formidable and we should discover a continual disorder in all proceedings except in those wherein we have an eye to God and are industrious to conform our selves to his Divine Pleasure When a Soul has fully given up her self to God she receives Interiour Irradiations from Heaven by which she discovers what she ought to do and what God requires of her and so is not disquieted with solicitous Thoughts but walks on securely in the ways of Perfection For this Abandonment preserves this Interiour Light which daily directs her in the Knowledge of God's Will to do her Actions with Interiour Purity As the Light of the Sun guides us in our wayes without which we should take one thing for another so the rayes of Grace discover to us what God would have us do and if the Soul should not be thus enlightned she would wander in the dark and our poor Life go on without the Conduct of God in Mysts of Misery and Infidelity The common Life of Christians is more guided by the Light of Reason than the Light of Grace but those that live by Faith are Interiour Christians CHAP. IV. We ought to make it our Business to be content to Suffer IF we will follow the ways of Virtue in this earthly Pilgrimage we must be content to suffer continual Mortifications lead what Life we will be it Active or Contemplative In the Active Life spending our selves for the good of others if we be not in a Disposition to sacrifice our own Wills with a Spirit of Resignation while we would profit others we shall endammage our selves for we must expect to meet with Crosses and Occasions of Patience for which if we be not prepared we shall without doubt fall into many Imperfections Yea in the Sweets of Contemplation we shall find some Thorns as well as Roses to put us in mind of our Suffering Condition In a word the Union with Jesus Christ crucisyed is the perfectest Union we can attain in this Life When Jesus Christ conducts his Saints to Mount Tabor they in a manner are out of themselves being ravished with the Glimmerings of Glory but upon Mount Calvary they receive the best Impressions of Perfection 'T is requisite a Soul should have a view of the Beauties of Jesus before she see and feel the Horrours of the Cross lest she should be scandalized at this last state and her Palate should not relish the bitterness thereof Spiritual Infants stand in as much need of Milk as Corporal Our heavenly Father does not take his Children from the Breast 'till he sees them strong enough and capable of more solid Food He lays the first Dispositions of a Spiritual Life in the Sweetness of Enjoyments but he compleats it in the Bitterness of Sufferings That which makes us profest Christians is Faith and Baptism but the Cross and Sufferings make us practical Christians and the greater they are being born with the Christian Patience and Resignation they advance us higher in Perfection We ought not then to fear Crosses and Sufferings but rather embrace them with Peace and Affection And we must hold this for a Maxim that we advance in the way to Perfection according to the Degree of Mortification and Self-denyal which we cannot attain but by a Suffering Life Let us therefore above all things abandon our selves to the Divine Providence desiring nothing but by the pure will of God without troubling our selves at what happens to us 'T is no just matter of Astonishment to see in this world the wayes of the Just beset with Thorns and Bryars of Affliction and the wicked to abound with worldly Comforts in Beds of Roses Those who will have no portion in the Joys of Heaven have refreshments in this world and find here their Paradice to recompense that little good they have done among those many evils they have committed But such who are preserved from Eternal Pains have their Souls purifyed in this Life in the Furnace of Affliction from those stains they have contracted which else would somewhat darken the Beauty of their virtuous Actions Thrice happy are they who by the Sufferings of this Momentany Life have just Cause to hope they shall never suffer everlasting Burnings CHAP. V. To renounce our selves wholly and strive against our proper Inclinations WHosoever designs to be wholly for God must likewise endeavour to curb the Motions of his Interiour and Exteriour Senses which have not their Rise from Grace but Nature yea all such like Thoughts and Desires and the Objects of our own Will which we in Prayer mingle with those Communications God is pleased to work in us by heavenly Visits But above all we must have a care to desire nothing without an entire Resignation and Submission to the Will of God which ought to be the sole Rule of all our Actions and Intentions Hence it proceeds that we have no Will to serve God but as he pleases according to the manner and designs of his Providence and when God will vouchsafe us nothing extraordinary in a Spiritual Life we sit down content with Peace and Humility For we are dead to our Selves to be living only to God's good Pleasure which is the Soul of our Souls our Riches our Grandeur our Perfection and Blessedness To renounce our own Will and all means which our own Industry presents as most excellent and give our selves up purely to the Divine Guidance conduces very much to Perfection To renounce our Judgement and follow the sentiment of others as better in works of Piety so as voluntarily to act but with Dependance is a means to mortify by degrees our own Will and Affections If we be content that our Defects should be made known we shall glorifie God with the Love of Abjection We get no good but rather hurt by our Defects concealed but we may draw much good by their Manifestation if so be they work our greater Humiliation We ought to remain in a Disposition of Self-denyal and Humility in the Presence of God and desire nothing but the pure Ordination of his Will who can make us poor or rich in Grace as he pleases A Soul that receives excellent
Graces and Gifts from God ought not to rejoyce in the abundance of such Favours but her whole content ought to be in the pleasure that God takes to be so bountiful to his Creatures so unworthy of his Blessings Wretched is that man who has less care of his Soul than his Body loving more to follow the Inclinations of Sensuality than the Inspirations of Grace Wretched is he who is all for the good things of this Life a good House good Apparel good Provision c. and is content to have a bad Soul Wretched is he who by his vitious Course of Life makes himself the most contemptible thing of his whole Family For he who forsakes God to follow his Sensuality is in worse state than the meanest Creature O sad condition Believe 't is far more easy to command our Passions than obey them to conquer our natural Inclinations than to satisfy them and therefore more pleasant to walk in the wayes of Salvation than Perdition 'T is a wonderful Punishment to suffer the continual Lashes of a guilty Conscience an unspeakable Torment to have our Hearts always terrified with the Judgement of God hanging over our Heads with the fears of Death which is uncertain and the horrours of Hell which cannot be avoided by such who neglect the Service of God and die in their sins To become slaves to the World and our passions and vicious Inclinations most cruel and ungrateful Tyrants and to have no repose nor contentment not one only moment of true solid joy is to suffer a Hell in time before that of Eternity We shall find nothing to be compared to the way of Heaven the yoak of our Blessed Saviour is Easie his Burden Light his Will is Lovely his Helps are Powerful and the Consolations wherewith he refreshes the Souls of his Servants so abundant that they are far more Happy with their Crosses than Carnal Men with all their Worldly Delights and Pleasures CHAP. VI. How to Comport our selves well in Superiority JEsus be your Light and your guide and your support in Superiority To be in this condition seems to some troublesome and insupportable because things do not succeed as they desire but believe themselves to be a hindrance to the increase of Grace in the Souls of their Subjects who might have been better govern'd by a Person more capable and advanc'd in Perfection 'T is indeed well said and the pretence is specious and yet notwithstanding all this may proceed from Self-love and desire of our own excellence Prostrate thy self at the feet of Jesus Christ and if he dart into thy Soul Divine Irradiations thou wilt discover the Truth of what I have said herein That little resignation we have to the Ordinations of God create these troubles in us God only expects from us such a certain measure of Glory and we are for rendring more than he requires of us 'T is our Happiness not to conform our wills to Gods good Pleasure touching the manner of Glorifying himself what pleases him does not content us He will have us glorifie Him by Suffering and we are for Action We are for giving Alms and He for receiving in a word we do not entirely conform our selves to the pure will of God We ought not to perplex and disquiet our selves with the Defects and Imperfections of those with whom we live and are under our charge They are Mortal and infirm Creatures and not Angels and to expect they should be faultless is to look for Impossibilities and flatter our Impatience which would have no occasion of displeasure This is but to afflict our selves for the loss of our own esteem which appears by our ill conduct in such small matters And yet we pretend only to seek Gods Honour and the good of Souls Those who truly seek the Glory of God sometimes are troubled but 't is a displeasure joyn'd with Peace and Tranquility yea abounding with influences of Heaven and Divine Love A displeasure that rather increases than takes away the Peace of the Soul and disposes her to a perfecter union with God and to the practice of all Christian Virtues I know no better means to be humbled in our own eyes and in the sight of others than the miscarriages that arrive by our manifold Imperfections If I do a good Action for which others think the worse of me I shall not seem so to my self But if I shall fall into a gross Imperfection which neither I nor others discover how shall I be ashamed and learn thereby a lesson of Mortification When Nature is surpriz'd and as it were amaz'd to see her own Frailties what prop can she find to uphold her Ambition She must needs be humbled by this means and so draws much good from evil Who are we that we should presume to think that out pains and industry can add any thing to augment God's Glory Know we not that he is Self-sufficient by reason of his Infinite Perfections and therefore so replenish'd with his own Glory that all the Glory Creatures can render to him is nothing in comparison Alas the greatest Saints in this respect can truly say they are unprofitable Servants All Creatures are oblig'd to serve their Creator 't is their Duty and not to do it makes them guilty but this brings no profit to God who is no less nor more Happy in Himself thereby but only from hence it proceeds that he bestows on his Servants great and glorious rewards For my part I would never afflict my self nor be discourag'd for not doing all the good I desire and ought to do in the charge incumbent on me but instead of being troubled with my own Insufficiency I would rejoyce in the All-sufficiency of God O my God what complacency do I take to see you so Rich and so All-sufficient I am well content with my weaknesses seeing they make it more evident that you stand not in need of your Creatures O beautiful Sun enrich'd with an Infinite Light live Happy in your self absorp'd in your own Beams nothing can alter your Felicity For all the Sins of Men or Devils though they offend you yet do not hurt you no more than dirt cast against the Sun would darken his Splendors in his High-noon Glory When I consider the defects in my self and the faults I have not hindred in others either for want of zeal or capacity I will exercise my mind in such Thoughts as these O my God your Beauty is not Sullied hereby nor your Glory darken'd nor your Mercies diminished I know 't is my Duty to be sorry for what Sins offend your Majesty But likewise I ought to rejoyce that you are immutable in your self and your Blessedness cannot be disturb'd by our Iniquities CHAP. VII That we ought to have our Intentions Purified from all Self-Interest THe Soul that seeks purely to please God ought to be content with all designs of Providence whatsoever whether of Mercy or Justice giving her self up wholly into the hands of
God to deal with her as seems best pleasing to him For ought she knows 't is best for her to be afflicted and therefore she willingly submits to Gods chastisements rejoycing thereat and Blessing him for them Yea if she may but bring Glory to God thereby she is content to be cast into Hell In this state her Love is wholly centred in God and she gives her self up to the rigours of Justice that she may be entirly Sacrific'd to Gods Glory which is an Intention pure from all Self-interest An indifferency to any state does possess that Soul which has a well purified Intention with a perfect resignation to the good pleasure of God to remain content with her present condition being satisfied with whatsoever portion of Grace she has received with profound Humility and Mortification Being thus disposed she has no mind to any thing but what pleases God and does that Faithfully and by this means obtains wonderful Peace of Conscience and joy in the Holy Ghost To Will nothing but what God Wills requires a great degree of Mortification and being dead to all Greatures for this is the highway to the Purity of Divine Love What did the Ancient Hermits search for in the Deserts but by a perfect denudation of all Creatures to arrive to the Perfection of Divine Love Let us fear and sigh to see our selves so engaged and beset with several Temptations in the World 'T is a hard matter but some or other may cease upon us and rob us of that perfect poverty of Spirit which puts us in full possession of God alone 'T is a special favour of God to have a vocation to the Poor and Abject states of Jesus Christ And 't is no small Grace when God conducts us to them by a Happy necessity with little noise or stir to call the eyes of others upon us 'T is well enough if the Soul consent purely to the Ordinations and events of Divine Providence CHAP. VIII A Conference clearing many difficulties touching Prayer Qu IN what consists precisely good mental Prayer I find many sorts thereof in Books The Saints have practic'd it with much difference and yet all so good that I am taken with them To which of them shall I betake my self Ans The ways of Souls in Mental Prayer are so wonderful various that 't is best for every one to hold to that which they find most proper for them Or else they will loose their time in a wilderness of Thoughts without Spiritual profit Hence it is that in Mystical Authors we seldom meet with what is proper for every Soul And though we find very sublime and solid Verities concerning Prayer in the Writings of St. Teresa Blessed John de la Croix and others yet they have but described their own experiences and not how the case stands with other Souls unless a light discovery in some things agreeable to their illuminations Such Instructions are good to read but not exactly to be followed so as to conform our selves entirely to their manner of Prayer We shall find in such Books matter very profitable and 't is time well spent in Spiritual Lectures and not without delight to Virtuous Souls Qu. From whence proceeds these different manners of Prayer seeing there 's but one Soveraign and single Verity in God to be known one Soveraign good to be Loved and Charity being of the self-same Nature in all Souls one would think there ought to be a great conformity among all those who know and love God Ans That which makes so many different manners of Prayer arises from the different manner of knowing God Some conversing with him by Meditation and humane Ratiocination Others receive from God Heavenly irradiations above the Powers of Reason by which he manifests himself immediately to the Soul as the Sun by his Beams Others contemplate God by the obscure Light of Faith in an ineffable manner which is a kind of feeing him without seeing him These different manners of treating with God make not only different manners of Prayer but cause also much diversity in every manner For example in the Prayer of Faith which seems more simple than the other there are many degrees which represent to the Soul different views of God and Divine matters When Faith is seated in an understanding well purified from Images and alien Representations she then discovers God more sublimely as he is in himself though but in a manner negative general and confus'd yet efficacious to work in the heart a great esteem of God and ardent Charity All Books and Sermons and Conferences will not satisfy a Soul advanced to this kind of knowing God For those manners of speaking and conceiving God seem to her too full of Imperfection Faith wholly purified contents her self with having an eye to the Light of Glory which discovers God in his Infinity although but obscurely and according to the measure that Faith is more or less pure and simple these discoveries are more or less perfect Qu. Are all sort of People capable of these sublime manners of Prayer and if any one desire to attain them by what means must he go about it Ans The gift of Prayer is not proper for all People yea some great Saints have never had it as some good Servants of God who have become Holy in the Exercises of an Active Life which would not afford them much time for Contemplation and accustom'd themselves to the ordinary method of Meditation which is good and advantagious for such Souls whom God calls not to a more sublime way Those whom God favours with the extraordinary gift of Prayer do possess an inestimable Treasure and with this only Grace which is the source of many more they are rich enough though never so poor in things of this Life But seeing 't is the meer gift of God I account it Folly and Rashness to think we can bring our selves to the sublime state of Contemplation unless God elevate us by his immediate work and special favour All that we can do therein is to dispose our selves by corresponding Faithfully to the motions of Grace by dying daily to our Natural Inclinations in the practice of Mortification and leave God to do the rest Except God build the House they labour in vain who think to raise the Edifice by their own Abilities Qu. A Soul establish'd in a sublime manner of Prayer and that hath a long time practic'd it can she easily fall from this state Ans If such a Soul gives her self over to her Sensual Inclinations and commit gross Imperfections becoming Faithless to Gods Holy Inspirations she may fall from it But 't is very credible she will return to it For she cannot long endure the loss of so great a Happiness without forcing her self by her Humiliations and Penitences to recover her former state And as much as she dies to all Creatures so much she advances to God But she can never attain it without Practice a Fidelity and therefore it highly concerns her to free her self from too many Worldly Affairs and love Retirement Notwithstanding those which God requires of us as belonging to our Duty will not hinder us from arising to such a degree of Prayer as God hath prepared for us from all Eternity Qu. The most elevated and perfect Prayer is not without Darkness and Privations and sometimes perplex'd with Interiour Crosses and Desolations But is there not a state of Light and enjoyment to be attained here wherein the Soul may possess God clearly and peaceably without any disturbance Ans No the permanent state of Enjoyment is reserv'd for Heaven In this Life indeed we are visited without Divine Irradiations and Glimmerings of Glory but they are only now and then and transient The term of this Life is working Time and not of Rest for acquisition not possession where the Soul may daily purchase new Graces and advance her self in Prayer according to her progress in Virtue and Purity by being Faithful to the Calls of God on all occasions Gods usual way is to make Souls pass through Darkness Temptations Derelictions Desolations Exteriour and Interiour Sufferings to come to a good Stock of Virtue and a higher degree of Purity which raises them to a more sublime state of Prayer And being exercised some way or other to raise them nearer to Heaven by Spiritual Ascensions they at length leave Time to meet with Eternity Neither must we wonder to see the wayes of the Just thus beset with Thorns and Bryars for this is expedient to advance them in Perfection and Divine Love Qu. How much time must we imploy daily in Prayer if we mean to Profit thereby so as to attain Perfection Ans We cannot much advance in Prayer without a long and constant usuage of this Divine Exercise 't is not enough to do good Works but we must spend some Hours in our daily Devotions 'T is by Prayer we advance in the ways of God and not otherwise We must be careful to imploy much time in the Exercise thereof if God calls us to it and not apply our selves to the Active way Let us not be too Sollicitous to discharge our other Obligations for a Soul in the state of continual Prayer performs readily what she ought on all occasions When the time comes for Confession she is presently all dolorous Love Contrition When she Communicates she is all Humility all Desire and flaming Affection When she is to correct she is all Sweetness and Charity When she is to help her Neighbour she is all Zeal and Love When she must act for God she has an intention purified from all Self-Interest And all this she performs in Virtue of Prayer as it were without distinct Acts but habitually and in an excellent sublime manner by the special operation of Gods Holy Spirit and not by Meditations or Considerations which are means only to find God A Soul that thus once hath laid hold on God does take her repose and rest in him making it her only business to Love and Worship him in Spirit and Truth FINIS
of Joy and Peace and It then seems to her that heretofore she was wandring in darkness In effect it seems to her that she now lives in another World with other Lights and other Principles and other Proceeding and another tast of Spiritual things She now seeks occasions to mortifie her Senses obedience dependance contempts losses do relish with her and she 's pleas'd only to live a Life of Faith making no matter of the mockeries of Worldly men who judge not but by Sense or at best but according Humane Reason Second Day Jesus an Infant BEginning my Morning Prayer these words of the Prophet were presented to my Thoughts Consideravi opera tua expavi I have considered your Works O my Saviour and stand amazed with admiration And how could I be otherwise affected to see the Eternal God an Infant To see that Immensity which the Heavens cannot contain lie Swadled in a Manger Eternity but one day old Omnipotency become weakness The joy of Angels in a suffering condition O God of Love who can but fall into an Extasie to see these wonders this excess of Goodness above the comprehension of Men and Angels But Blessed Saviour 't is your Glory to have nothing and do nothing but what is altogether incomprehensible I observ'd a great silence in Heaven and Earth where the whole Creation seem'd to be struck dumb with admiration of the great Mysteries then brought to pass I beheld how the Virgin Mary and good Joseph fixing their Eyes on the Infant God-man lying in a Manger spake not one Word being transported with Love and Admiration and wholly astonish'd at an Humiliation so Prodigious and I wonder'd all Creatures did not stand immoveable for a whole Age at the sight of so incomprehensible a Mystery All Expressions are below this excess of Love and Condescention Let us O my Soul be silent with a respectful attention loveing adoring admiring these great things God has done for us Methinks I have a desire to stand always in silence at the feet of Infant Jesus I apply'd my self in my second Prayer to consider the universal denudation of all things that seem'd most necessary at his coming into the World To be born as an Exile out of his Mothers House to have no lodging usual for men but a Stable which is prepar'd for Beasts to be his Bed-chamber and a Manger for his Cradle to suffer the rigours of Winter for want of Fire what poor miserable Creature could be reduced to a greater denudation Notwithstanding this is that which ravish'd both Heaven and Earth and the Glorious Angels found nothing in Heaven of equal admiration and therefore hither they came to contemplate these wonders and to bring the glad tidings thereof to men making the Air to eccho with their joyful Melody and without any mention of the Divinity declare only to them that they shall find an Infant wrapt in swadling Cloaths lying in a Manger And hither the Shepherds ran transported with Joy and the World has followed them When the Wise men demanded of Herod Where he was born who was King of the Jews This Idaea of Royalty did much afright him and in rage he design'd a Cruelty more Barbarous than what as yet the Sun did ever behold 'T is a great Truth that Grandeur and an elevated condition though in the Person of God himself made man is attended with many evils and commotions but abjection and Humiliations in the Infant Jesus has force enough to win our hearts And yet we will not understand this In my third Prayer I discover'd that since the Mystery of the Incarnation which is the wonderful union of the Creator with the Creature then Sons of men are called to a higher degree of Prayer and Converse with God then formerly The gift of sublime Prayer is one effect of this Divine Mystery and we ought to value and preserve it as a Treasure The heart of Jesus is the center of men and when a poor Soul is distracted she must gently lead her self to the heart of Jesus to offer to the Eternal Father the holy dispositions of that adorable heart to unite that little we do with that Infinite service Jesus renders to his Eternal Father Thus our little will be made great by Jesus Christ O my Soul let this Divine heart of Jesus for the future be thy Oratory 'T is in him and by him thou must offer all thy Prayers to God to make them acceptable to the Divine Majesty Make this thy School to learn there the supereminent knowledge of the Love of God which is quite contrary to that of the World Thou wilt find there Principles sublime and pure a Treasure which will enrich thee with Purity Love and Fidelity and what is very plentiful in this Treasury Humiliations Poverty and Sufferings The love and esteem of these things is a precious Jewel which principally and originally is found in the heart of Jesus Other hearts how noble soever have more or less of it according to the measure they receive from this exhaustible Treasury In my fourth Prayer I had a strong Idaea of the dispositions which the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph had towards the Infant Jesus 'T was revealed to a Holy Soul that the Blessed Virgin passed all the time in Prayer while her Sacred Womb was the Tabernacle of the Son of God and never ceas'd to adore the Word made Flesh That St. Joseph entring with the Holy Virgin into the Stable at Bethlehem was elevated in high contemplation upon the Mysteries there to be Accomplish'd and in this Prayer was so replenished with the Holy Spirit that his desires for the coming of the Messias were more pure and more ardent then of all the Holy Patriarchs before And that next to the Holy Virgin he was enlightned with the wonders of the Mystery of the Incarnation At the moment of the wonderful Nativity of the Infant Jesus such Rayes of Glory and admirable Splendors were darted from his Soul as pierced the Spirit of the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph and discover'd to them the Infinite Grandeurs of that Babe through all the weaknesses their eyes were witness of And in deep silence and contemplation they offer'd to him a pure and amorous offering of their whole Being as to their God O who can comprehend the wonderful effects that his presence caus'd in their Hearts These considerations did sweetly possess my Soul during my Prayer and I found my self in a disposition of great Love for Internal Prayer in Silence and Solitude with Infant-Jesus Third Day Jesus Poor and Abject IN my Morning Prayer I found in my self a great esteem and love for Poverty seeing Jesus had so esteem'd and lov'd it and we have an obligation to be conform to him And I said within my self O Poverty of Spirit what riches dost thou bring to a Soul Thou givest her possession of a Kingdom of Peace Thou dost purifie her to unite her to Jesus in his Humiliations which