Letter 73. To a Cavalier his friend

THankes be given to Christ our lord for having made you a partaker of pain and trouble for it is the most certain title to heaven which can be had upon earth: since it doth enable us to be like our lord who descended from heaven to give us light that we might love him, and strength by his example, and grace by his merits. Let not the dispensation of the works of God seem cruelty in your sight: for as the reward which he gives is not light so neither must the means be light whereby it is to be obtained. Nor is there any thing further of from being a matter of toys or jest then that which our lord hath prepared for such as love him Now to the end that this may be known and rightly understood it is fit that they who are to enjoy it may be so treated as he was that so the world may be unbeguiled if it still conceive that by living in jest they are to enjoy that great reward in earnest.

Our lord gives advice to his servants, and he threatens such as will needs be strangers to him. For to the former sort of men he saith that they must think highly of his reward: since he will not give it but upon high terms. And as for these other he asks them how they think to escape the rigour of his hands, they who are his enemies: since even his children be strictly treated who are yet elected for so great a good. If we cast our eyes towards this beam of rigour and justice which are the afflictions whereof we now speak, we shall find that they contain great occasions both of hope and fear. And on the one side the mercy of God is much glorified thereby and his justice on the other. Let trouble expect to find repose and let him fear affliction hereafter who doth not feel it now. For since in any man how just soever he be there are many things which may deserve punishment though not in hell: (and this punishment is to be personally endured if it be not purged with so great an excess of love as that the contrition may stand for the punishment as it did in S. Mary Magdalen and some others) it is plain that either here or in purgatory they must pass through fire And though they who find not in themselves so great love of God as to cause this grief which may stand for a satisfaction, may think perhaps that they receive hard measure in being saved by fire whilst others shall be saved without it yet indeed they are much deceived in their account.

For the great love of God even here on earth when men see that God is offended doth cause greater grief then that to which you are subject. And that truth is seen by this then when one love's God greatly he would be glad of the pain you suffer so that he might be free from that which he feels for the offences which are committed against God. And at this we must not wonder since there are persons who even to free you from the pain wherein you are would endure themselves. And this also may serve for a proof that the love which one bears to another puts him to more trouble than the pain itself would do which the other feels: that if yourself love another very much, you would not be rid of your own pain if it were upon condition that the other must endure it for you; which proves as I was saying that it would trouble you more in the person of that other then in your own.

Now if the love of a creature can reach so fare, how much more will the love of the creator be able to do, it being infused by the most holy spirit of our lord which fare exceeds all other force. And thus it grows to be a most certain truth that either in this fashion or in that there is no means to escape from suffering before we arrive to enjoying. And tell him who would complain of this law ather complain that he is a man, & that he was not made an angel; and let him complain against justice and reason which do absolutely require that virtue must be obtained with labour and the reward must correspond with the virtue.

But who o lord who shall ever presume to complain of thee as if thou didst treat them with rigours since instantly thou stoppest their mouths with showing that thou so loved the world as to give thy only begotten son, to the end that in the strength of these afflictions and sorrows and death which they charged upon him, the world might escape the torments of hell and might triumph in heaven. Who I say o lord will presume to complain when he shall see thy best beloved friends to be so severely handled, and observe that in thy court it is hard to say which of these two have the pre-eminence either afflictions or favours; and that it was said by thy commandment to one of thy favourites. Because thou wert accepted by God it was necessary that temptation should try thee.

Do not permit your heart to sink under your crosses but remember that heretofore you have desired to do and suffer somewhat for the love of God God is not deaf to the desires of our hearts. He hath given that which he knew to be best for you; and if you think it heavy confide that he who sends it, will give you shoulders wherewith to bear it. That which afflicts will have an end, and that which gives repose will succeed; but the latter will not be like the former, but incomparably greater. And if you tell me that you will renounce this later upon condition that you may not endure the former, it is not well said nor doth it become a noble mind which desires, more to see itself in difficulty & trouble for the obtaining of virtue then to be idle and without exercise. Nor is it fit that you who have carried so much courage in your hart through these wars of the Emperor should have it faintly affected in the war of God. We demand not of you here that you should conduct a whole army like some Captain general but only that you trail your pike well & give a good account of your personne, & of the place where you are put. Be not a coward in the less occasion who are so valiant in the greater.

Put yourself wholly into the passion of our lord and learn thereby how much he endured and how great love he bore to you; since being able to redeem you by other means yet he would not do it but upon the price of his excessive pains and sorrows. And so it comes to pass that as he in one hour did more love his father then all mankind put together in all their lives, so in one hour did he pass through more bitter sorrows than all mankind; and there was not in the whole lives of them all to be found either any love or any grief like his.

Strain yourself to a desire of enduring somewhat for him. Be not a slave since he love's you and treats you as a son For the father corrects the son and you may hold yourself for his son since he corrects you. Love's your father departed from yourself and give yourself too God. Say to him I will follow thee though it be by the way of sorrow I will present thee with this suffering. I will not give thee any thing of little value; but that which may cost me my blood, that so thou mayest to me as thou didst to Abraham, Quia fecisti hanc rem & non pepercisti unigenito tuo propter me etc. Now if God take it so well that a man give his son for the love of God how much reason is it that man should be very grateful to god for the giving of his son for man. And he only is indeed thankful for the benefit who in recompense thereof gives his own son to god; namely that thing which his hart would most be troubled to leave and this because God will have it so.

Consider the true Original of love which God did bear you, but let it be with fetching this resolution from thence that as they drew blood from him & gave sorrows to him he may give them to you; and as they gave him pain so he may give pain to you. For infallibly if so you shall answer to the sorrows of God with your sorrows he will answer to those sorrows of yours with such a reward as shall make you esteem yourself happy for having endured them. And though our flesh believe not this yet faith must supply that defect & you must sing. Laetati sumus pro diebus quibus nos humiliasti annis quibus vidimus mala. So God grant it may be. Amen.