Of the Causes of Distraction at Prayer, and Remedies for It

THIS is a very common complaint, and so the saints commonly treat of it, Cassian in particular. They say that distraction in prayer may come of three causes or roots. The first is our own carelessness and negligence in pouring ourselves out during the day with little guard of our heart and little custody of our senses. He who lives in this way has no need to inquire whence it comes that he is distracted in prayer and can make no way in it, since it is clear that the images, shapes, and representations of things that have been allowed to enter therein must needs afterwards molest and disturb one in prayer. Abbot Moses in the Collations of Cassian says very well that, though it is not in the power of man not to be assailed with importunate thoughts, still it is in his power to refuse them admittance and cast them out when they come. He goes on to say that it is largely in a man’s power to correct and amend the quality of these thoughts and make them good and holy, and consign to oblivion those others that are vain and irrelevant. If a man gives himself to spiritual exercises of reading, meditation, and prayer, and occupies himself in good and holy works, he will have good and holy thoughts; but if he deals with nothing of the sort during the day, but lets his senses browse on idle and irrelevant objects, such also will be his thoughts. And Cassian makes a comparison, which is also that of St. Anselm and St. Bernard. They say that the heart of a man is like a millstone which is always grinding; but it is in the power of the miller to make it grind wheat, or barley, or rye; what you put under it, that it will grind. So the heart of man cannot go without thinking of something; it must always grind, but by your industry and care you may make it grind wheat, or barley, or rye, or earth; what you put into it, that it will grind.

According, then, to this, if you wish to be recollected at prayer, you must take care during the day to keep your heart recollected and guard the gates of your senses; the Lord loves to converse with souls that are as enclosed gardens. This was a maxim of the ancient Fathers, and Cassian quotes it. You must take the current of your thoughts higher upstream, and keep yourself during the day in such condition as you would wish to find yourself in prayer; since from the state and temper of the mind out of prayer is formed and determined what it is to be in prayer. St. Bonaventure says: “As is the liquid that you pour into a vessel, such will be the odor; and as are the herbs which you plant in the garden of your heart, such will be the fruit and seed that they will produce.”

And since it is quite a common and natural thing to think often of what one loves, if you wish to keep your heart steady and firm at prayer, and that thoughts of vain and irrevelant things may be forgotten and put an end to, you must mortify your affection for them, despise all the things of earth and fix your heart on those of heaven. And the more you advance and grow in this, the more also you will advance and grow in firmness, steadiness, and attention at prayer.

Secondly, these distractions are wont to arise from the temptation of our enemy, the devil. St. Basil says that, as the devil sees that prayer is the means whereby all good comes to us, he endeavors by all ways and means he possibly can to hinder it and put a thousand obstacles in our way, that, finding us bereft of this help, he may gain readier entrance into our soul for his deceits and temptations. He acts with us as the general, Holofernes, did with the city of Bethulia, which was standing a siege against him. He cut the aqueducts whereby water came into the city (Judith vii. 6); in like manner the devil does all in his power to break and dismantle in us this aqueduct of prayer, whereby the water of grace and of all spiritual blessings finds its way into our soul. St. John Climacus says that, as at the sound of the bell the faithful and religious visibly assemble to pray and praise God, so our enemies, the devils, unite at that time invisibly to tempt us and hinder us from prayer. In the “Spiritual Meadow” it is told of one of the Fathers of the Desert, the Abbot Marcellus, that, rising one night to pray and sing psalms according to his custom, he heard the sound of a trumpet, sounding what seemed like a battle-charge. The old man was much puzzled to imagine where such a sound could come from in such a lonely place, where there were no soldiers nor any war. Then the devil appeared to him and told him that, though he thought there was no battle going on, there was a battle, and that trumpet roused the devils to attack the servants of God; and that, if he wanted to escape the combat, he had better go back to bed and sleep, otherwise he would see it. But he, trusting in the Lord, started his prayer and went on with it.

One of the things that go far to let us see the great importance of prayer is the great spite that the devil has against it and the continual war that he makes upon it, as the holy Abbot Nilus well observes. Other good works the devil suffers and can get on with, as fasting, discipline, and haircloth; but an allotted time of prayer he cannot endure and tries by all ways in his power to hinder and put obstacles to it. Hence it is that, when we are at prayer, we are apt occasionally to feel more temptations than at other times. Then there seems to come upon us the whole troop of thoughts, thoughts at times so evil and foul that it looks as though we had come here for no other purpose than to be tempted and molested with all manner of temptations. Things that never have occurred to us, never entered our mind in the whole course of our life, then present themselves at meditation; everything seems to have been kept for then. That is because the devil knows that prayer and meditation is the remedy for all our ills, the source and origin of all spiritual blessings; therefore he takes great pains and calls out all his powers to hinder it. That is why the saints call prayer the torment and scourge of the Evil One. The same should be to us a reason and motive for esteeming it all the more and giving ourselves all the more to it, the more we see the devil for envy trying to stop us. St. Thomas, Abulensis, and other grave authors say that this is the reason why holy Mother Church, guided by the Holy Ghost and understanding well the wont of the devil to tempt and make all the war he can upon people at their prayers, has ordained that at the beginning of every canonical hour there should be repeated the verse: Incline unto my aid, O God: O Lord, make haste to help me; whereby we implore the Lord’s gracious aid to pray as we ought, and His assistance against the snares and temptations of our enemies.

Thirdly, these thoughts and distractions sometimes come, without any fault of ours, from our own infirmity and weakness; for we are so weak and miserable, and our nature is so maimed and depraved by sin, our imagination especially, that we cannot say an Our Father without sundry incongruous thoughts’ coming into our mind, as St. Bernard _complained. For this it will be a good remedy to take for matter of our meditation the very distress that we suffer, humbling ourselves, considering and recognizing how great our weakness is, for this humility and self-knowledge will be a good meditation. Besides this, we will mention other remedies that the saints and masters of the spiritual life give us,