Of Some Differences and Advantages Which This Particular Exercise of Walking Always in the Presence of God Has over Others

O evidence the perfection and profit of this particular exercise and further to declare the same, we will mention some points in which it differs, and differs for the better, from other methods. In the first place, in other methods which some are wont to bring forward of walking in the presence of God, all seems to be an act of the understanding and all seems to end in imagining God present; but in our method the act of understanding and of faith in God’s presence is presupposed, and the soul passes on to make acts of the love of God, wherein our exercise principally consists; and it is clear that this is better and more profitable than the former. As in prayer we have said that we should not dwell on the act of the understanding, that is, the meditation and consideration of things, but on the act of the will, which consists in affections and desires of virtue and of the imitation of Christ, and this should be the fruit of the prayer; so here the principal thing in this exercise, and the best and the most profitable, lies in the acts of the will, and that is the thing we ought to lay stress on. The second conclusion that follows is that this act is easier and pleasanter than the others because in the others there is need of discussion and labor of the understanding and imagination to set things forth and represent them— a thing that is apt to weary people and break their heads, and so cannot be kept up so long; but in this exercise there is no need of such discussion, but solely of affections and acts of the will, which are made without fatigue. For, though it is true that there is here also some act of the understanding, yet that is presupposed by faith without our fatiguing ourselves over it; as, when we adore the Blessed Sacrament, we presuppose by faith that Christ our Savior is there, yet all our attention and occupation is in adoring, reverencing, loving, and asking favors of the Lord Whom we know to be there. So it is in this exercise. And by reason of its being easier one can hold on and persevere in it a longer time. So even with sick people who cannot otherwise make their prayer, we are wont to counsel them to raise their heart to God repeatedly with some acts and affections of the will, because that they can do with ease. Thus, though there were no other advantage in this exercise but this of our being able to hold on and persevere in it longer than in others, we shouid value it much; how much more, seeing that there are in it so many other advantages.

The third and principal thing, and a thing much to be taken notice of, is that the presence of God is not merely for us to dwell upon, but a means for us to do our ordinary actions well. If we were to content ourselves with merely paying attention to God as present, and thereby grow negligent in our duties and commit faults in them, that would be no good devotion, but an illusion. We must always make up our minds that, though with one eye we deal with His Divine Majesty, we are to fix the other on doing our works well for Him. The reflection that we are in the presence of God should be to us a motive for doing well and with greater perfection all that we do; and this is done much better by this exercise than by others. In other exercises the understanding is much occupied with those corporeal figures which we endeavor to set before us and by the thoughts that we seek to draw from what is before us. Now to draw out a good thought, a man often does not look well at what he is doing and so does it badly; but this exercise, involving no occupation of the understanding, nowise hinders the doing of our duties, but rather is a great aid to our doing them well, because we are doing them for the love of God and before God, Who is looking at us. So we endeavor to do them in such manner and so well that they may be fit to appear before the eyes of His Divine Majesty and have nothing in them unworthy of His presence.

SH SE VRNTH TREATYIS Bitoni