IV. Letters of Spiritual Direction

IT is manifestly impossible to sort into orderly heaps, each one of which shall deal with some special phase or need of the spiritual life, the bundle of letters which lies before me as I write. Often two or three subjects are dealt with in the same letter. Neither would it serve any purpose to quote them chronologically.

I can think of no better plan than the simple one of taking the letters as they come, and quoting from them without comment, and with little, if any, attempt at arrangement. For, indeed, they need neither arrangement nor ex planation.

In answer to a question about Heaven:

(i) " It seems to me we have to think of it all like this: Because we are finite we have to ex press to ourselves the Infinite in finite ways. These finite ways are not adequate to what they express; but so far as they go they are perfectly true. Things like human affection, therefore, are really only shadows of Divine Love; but they are true so far as they go, and have the nature of Eternity in them.

" Therefore it is perfectly true to say that they will last; but they also point to things so in finitely higher that we cannot imagine them.... Things will open and broaden to such an extent that it is useless to try to present them to the imagination. But we are perfectly safe in believing that not one single tender detail of earth will be lost in Heaven. It will all be there; it will be changed, too, as a seed changes into a flower. It seems to me that we shall just stare at one another and laugh in Heaven, for at least ' the space of half an hour.'... We must just leave bye-products alone. We haven't time to attend to them, nor the necessary knowledge: but God has.... Only we may be certain that no soul is lost except by its own deliberate fault. We are wholly alone with God."

The following letters, spread over a period of many years, deal with various aspects of exterior and interior suffering:

(ii) " Diagnosis: — a bad attack of ' This-Worldliness/ You have been, without the shadow of a doubt, indulging your imagination recklessly in plans for this world; dwelling on things that either are impossible or entirely unsuitable; and Almighty God, exactly as I should expect, has been leaving you to yourself in consequence to brood over what you very properly call ' cinders/ What these things are, you only know.... Whenever one does that, one suffers for it badly. One is only allowed to make one's ridiculous little plans in peace so long as one says every instant, ' Nevertheless not my will/...

" There is only one remedy... but it is an unfailing remedy if one will apply it courageously; and that is to wrench oneself free, continuously and brutally, from all the material points, whether persons, places, or things, round which one's imagination has been circling. One must do this both interiorly and exteriorly — always and every where. One must deliberately exercise one's imagination upon the absence of those things — e.g. if you like writing, you must go on accepting in imagination the fact of not writing, until the acceptance is real and sincere. You must also deliberately not write sometimes when you might. And when you are prevented, you must embrace that prevention willingly.

" Now, when this is done the heavenly magnetism begins to act again; and while one is left, still, it may be, lonely and ineffective, one does not really mind. The heart begins again actually to apprehend heavenly things, and to touch them.

8o SPIRITUAL LETTERS TO A CONVERT

" I conjecture also that you have enervated and weakened your spiritual and mental life by day-dreaming instead of strengthening it by meditation.... Somewhere or other in your imagination you have got an idol — perhaps it is the idol of a scheme-of-life.... And in your solitude you have been worshipping it with all your might. You must knock that idol down instantly, and never go near the pieces again.

"... Now, I am absolutely confident that this is true in outline. I'm not sure of the de tails, of course. But you know them. And I am absolutely sure that those remedies are un failing if you will apply them. Remember that without any outward act or word at all, complete deterioration may set in in the inner life, through an undisciplined or perverse imagination. You have therefore to reform the imagination, and tame it by starvation and hard work under the disciplinary lash of the will. Then the sun comes out again.

" God help you to do it."

(iii) " I do wonder whether, conceivably, you may not be meant to be at home for awhile. What do you think? Do you think there may not be a piece of work to be done there that cannot possibly be done by any one else? Have

LETTERS OF SPIRITUAL DIRECTION Si your people got any chance of coming across Catholics other than you?... May it not be just possible that you are intended to inform people who do not know in the least what the Church is?... Never... begin the subject — always... make the best of Protestants — never... be ruffled or... show impatience even in one's eyes — always... be absolutely fair and... insist on the good faith of others — and so on.

" As regards dying without a priest, being far from church, &c. — these things are not vital. But it is vital that you should do God's will."

(iv) " It appears to me that solitude is what you need: and I am quite sure that you are working out, unknown to yourself, all these problems and difficulties. I expect that the thing to do is to draw one more clean line across the page, and to say: ' That is past. I now have the whole of eternity before me — just as much as I had a year ago.'

" I know that you are remembering that our Lord has every single thread of your life in His Hands; and that He is going to weave something out of it that you do not know.

" Don't ' sit with the pain ' too much. It is doing its own work.... Do not forget the immense and eternal joy that God has given you in this... friendship at... You have that for ever. Do you not think, perhaps, He desires to refine it and spiritualise it beyond all belief by this separation? It would have been terrible if it had been spoiled.... Let me tell you too that pain of this kind gives one a tenderness that nothing else can possibly give.

" So do use all this — as I know you are doing: and let God have His Way!

" God bless you always, and comfort you."

(v) " Please do not think for a second, as some people do, that Love is primarily an affair of the emotions. It is not: it never ought to be. It is an affair of the will: it is an act of choice. You can love a person deeply and sincerely whom you do not like. You can like a person passionately whom you do not love.

" Therefore seek for the cure in this matter in the will — by choosing God; by deliberately, internally, removing the will from [this friend] until the emotions have slunk back to heel. Then you can choose — again, keeping the whip well raised over the emotions. Try to stop them even whimpering. You can."

(vi) " What you should put before you, I think, is that your work is to build up in the minds of and, confidence in the Catholic

Religion. These things are not done in a day, and of course, again and again they will say things that seem to show that they have none— and that even the foundation is not laid. But it is a work that can be done; and I am sure you must take it at present as being your business.

" Leave all things like Death to God. Nothing Eternal can possibly depend on an accident; and nothing except the Eternal matters.

" As regards all your physical discomfort and illness — well — humanly speaking, I am sorry as I can be: but from the other point of view the persistence of it all is so continuous and deliberate that there must be some particular object in view. What that is one cannot quite tell; but it is obvious that the way to meet it is to welcome it by sheer will: — and not even to ' day-dream ' of escaping it. Indeed, there is some reason that will be plain presently.

" When one once begins to meditate on the will, and to try it, like a key, on every locked mystery, more and more doors fly open, and one sees all kinds of things that were invisible before. Faith, Hope, Love, Sorrow, Sin, Worship — all are ultimately solved by the will. That is on one side; and on the other the will has to hold to

God's, and be identified with it. And the one completely perfect instance is the Incarnation up to the Passion."

(vii) " When things become, as you say, ' un bearable,' there is absolutely only one thing to do, and that is to grasp them, like spear-points, and guide them to one's heart. A cross that we cannot ' bear,' when it is laid upon us, is perfectly possible to ' take up ' — and that is precisely what our Lord asks of us.

"... Directly a thing seems intolerable, if one can but make a supreme effort of will, and grasp it, and hug it, and thank God for it — the pain becomes shot with joy. It is so, also, with the souls in purgatory.

" Now, cannot you do that, in this particular [Holy] week of our Lord's life? No man took His Life: He laid it down of Himself.... Re member that God is taking you seriously at your word. Is not that an honour? "

(viii) " I dare say you were quite right in leaving; plenty of things may have made it necessary. But it also seems to me possible, since I do not know the circumstances, that you would have done better to have stopped [where you were]. I don't think that unpleasantness, very hard work, and only occasional Mass are, apart from other things (such as grave risk to spiritual or bodily health), sufficient. But I dare say there was such a risk; and in that case, of course, you were perfectly right.

"... Try to see whether there is any cause for your other unhappinesses that is remediable in yourself. Look at yourself critically with regard to the other places which were not, by God's Providence, suitable for you, and see whether there is anything resembling such things as impatience, or self-centralisation, or despair. I don't for an instant say that there was. Plenty of holy people have had quite as many dis couragements without any fault of their own; and it may well be that God is trying you through external discouragement of this kind. But it may be that it is not so, and only you can supply the evidence. But it is no good my omitting to say this kind of thing out of tenderness for your feelings, if I am to be of the slightest use to your spiritual life."

(ix) " Here is another thing you won't like. Please detach yourself internally as well as externally from. I know it is fearfully hard:

it means steady, reiterated, ruthless acts of the will.... I am perfectly certain that it is your only chance of happiness to get your heart under the control of your will. At present it isn't. Now, isn't that true? Do it in the large, not in the small way — blaming nobody but yourself — not giving yourself the relief of resentment, nor framing internal sentences to act as safety-valves — you know!... If you can master that in the way I suggest you will be far stronger than you have ever been. You will be able to make friendships with much greater security. It will increase incalculably your hold on God.... This all means loneliness for a time: it is the ' for saking of wife and children and lands and houses ' for Christ's sake: and the ultimate reception of them, back again, in this world, a hundred fold."

(x) "I didn't and don't in the least mean that you did not have a hard time; but what I did and do mean is that I think you should enquire of yourself whether you were at all responsible for it.,.. It seems to me probable that any one who has a series of intolerable positions to put up with must have been responsible for them to some extent: — not that it was simply ' their fault ' — I don't mean that — but that they con tributed to it by un-patience, or intolerance, or brusqueness — or some provocation. It seems to me possible that the incident of [which you speak] may have been the moment when you showed one of these things.... I throw out this as a suggestion. But it is only you who can say whether it was so. Do look back on all your intolerable situations, not to discern the hardness of other people, but — if possible — any mistake or defect that perhaps you showed.... No doubt it did become necessary for you to leave each; but the question is: Did any action of yours lead up to that situation? Are you conscious of having been to blame in the earlier stages?

"... I congratulate you on the reception into the Dominicans. They are a glorious Order."

(xi) " You know, I think you are a little apt to go from one extreme to the other. With that old lady whose name I forget, and with, you seemed to me rather to oscillate between, saying: ' I have been brutally treated,' and ' I am no good for anything.' Now, both of those things are untrue, really. Nobody is perfectly tactful and considerate, always; yet they are not necessarily, for that reason, brutal; and neither you nor I are ever perfectly brave and resolute.... It seems to me that the mean is golden. On the one side, people never fit in perfectly with ourselves; and, on the other hand, we ourselves are practically always largely to blame when that is the case.

" These are simply general remarks, please observe.... But I think when one has suffered a series of reverses, one is not justified in treating each only on its own merits; one must take the series as a whole, and consider whether there is any constant defect in ourselves which partly accounts for them — and then, quite simply, as children of God, cure that defect."

(xii) " Don't be discouraged by what has hap pened. Take it as a humiliation that God has permitted to show you your weakness, and then begin all over again from the beginning.

" Now another point. Please don't allow your self to say, even to yourself, that you are un comfortable. To do that means to make an atmosphere round you which makes things inevitably go wrong. One's tendency is always to think that one's discomforts are exactly those which are peculiarly intolerable. Rouse your sense of humour and see that! Above all, please remember again and again that God wishes to draw you into a peculiar intimacy with Himself; and that He has therefore put you in a place where there are no positive distractions, only negative ones. You were worsted, you must remember, when He did allow positive distrac tions. Don't be worsted by negative ones, too! This is surely quite plain: one doesn't often see Providence so plainly! The fact that you don't feel drawn to is a good sign of this. So, too, with religious emotions. Oh! remember that they are not God!... I am really thankful that He has put you down in a flat country, with flat emotions and flat people and a flat heart. He is giving you your chance that way, as the other didn't succeed.

" Please don't answer this — and take that as another flatness, too. We are always thinking that God is only Up: remember that He is also Down. Don't aspire, if you can't; but go right down and find Him there. ' Lift the stone and thou shalt find Me: Cleave the wood and I am there/ "

(xiii) " I should entirely leave off arguing about trifles as well as about religion. It is no good. And do not let yourself be tempted to answer by the thought: ' Unless I speak they will continue to hold a misconception/ Re member that they will continue to do that any how. I know that kind of character perfectly. It is no good. They do not need information; but a much simpler thing — grace. One must just shrug one's shoulders and let them go on: and meanwhile keep the channel absolutely clear between one's own soul and God, and one's own soul and theirs. And for the rest, take every sneer and plant it carefully like a thorn in the middle of one's heart, saying: ' This is certainly deserved; if not for this particular thing, for something else/ But what one is always tempted to do is to say: ' My God, I can accept anything but this. I know I deserve hell, generally speaking; but not this sneer in particular.'

" And above all, do remember that sordid squalor was part of the Passion."

(xiv) " Then why not consider once more my suggestion that God made you for Himself exclusively?... I think what you are doing is to try to put people in His place.... Will you make meditations for a week on [a quoted] sentence in your letter? If you think you wrote that in haste, or with deliberate exaggeration — I dare say you did. But it shows, anyhow, doesn't it — to what logical end you are drifting? Now I am not writing as sympathetically as I feel, because I know what a deadly thing this kind of thing may become: and because vivid and sharp pain is the only cure. But pain is of no use unless- you inflict it on yourself. This is what I want you to do: deliberately to break down this golden image, and to stand waiting in the wilderness for God again.

"... You want the light from our Lord to shine on people you love, and make a heavenly atmosphere; but you don't want, at present, to look at the Source of the light, alone."

But spiritual direction — and correction — was only a part of the wise and patient guidance given, so generously and tenderly, for many years. Scarcely a letter without practical counsel and advice about temporal, every-day matters. These, of course, are obviously not matter for quotation here. I cannot, however, refrain from copying the following — relating to the treatment of a nervous hypochondriac.

(xv) " May I suggest that the one fatal thing — or rather the two or three — in dealing with people with nerves are: (i) Ever to ' answer back/ Simply say nothing at all. Refuse to argue or even speak while ' nerves ' are in the air. (2) Ever to show the slightest concern at such things as a refusal to eat. Be simply dispassionate and detached. People with nerves love to sway others. Don't be swayed. Shake yourself, men tally, as a man caught in an avalanche. You can only do this by having a very real religious life of your own. Continually shrug your mental shoulders, and go your own way.

" As for sharp things said, shame yourself into not minding. You wouldn't mind if they were said in delirium. Well, they are.

" I think this is all I can offer as a contribution. You must put it into the cauldron and let it mix up with the rest, and then see what kind of a calf comes out. Above all, for goodness' sake, be DELIBERATE, whatever you do."

But even the letters which, on first opening them, seem to be entirely filled with advice (greatly needed) on temporal matters, contain each at least one sentence — perhaps only a tiny phrase — which throws a supernatural light on the most matter-of-fact details; or a scrap of description, like the frontispiece to a book.

Speaking of the prayers which had been pro mised him by a Religious who had received for her convent a copy of the Book of the Love of Jesus, Father Benson writes:

(xvi) " Such prayers are like wings: please add some more feathers."

In other letters:

(xvii) " You know one's feelings really are un important. As soon as you see that you will be so happy. I believe it is the keystone to your arch, and that it isn't yet in its place."

(xviii) " I am sure you are putting yourself into the Hands of God; and that is the only thing that matters."

(xix) " [To be peaceful and quiet] is more worth while than anything else. We can neither know nor do the will of God if we are fretful and upset."

Speaking of a choice between several openings:

(xx) " God gives His people an embarras de richesses sometimes — that they may learn to refuse as well as to assent."

(xxi) " When Providence takes matters into His own Hands, and withdraws and refuses means to do what one wants, there is an end of it: and it is a great comfort."

Here is a delicate water-colour sketch of Cam bridgeshire, at the end of March:

(xxii) " This country has an extraordinary charm of its own, I think. I went to on a bicycle to-day... through miles of flat country, with an enormous vault of blue sky and white clouds overhead, and a racing wind, and things like almonds and japonica out here and there — a most exhilarating day."

Such a paper as this might be continued in definitely, so rich is the material from which one can draw. This is impossible; but the following letters, at least, cannot be omitted. Most of us, probably, know what it is to suffer from depression, nervous or spiritual — a depression which, if indulged, may develop into actual morbidity. For a certain type of subjective soul it is a very real danger both to mind and spirit.

(xxiii) " And now about... the fits of morbidity. Fr. was preaching here last Sunday, and something he said struck me immensely. (He has a wonderful power of making truisms fresh!) It was on the Lord's Prayer: and he showed that since it is the model of prayer we must follow it. Its system is that before we ask anything for ourselves we have to look up at God — in the first three petitions. Then he said: ' Nine times out of ten, by the time we have really prayed the first three petitions we either forget ourselves; or we are willing to bear the trouble; or it has been removed.' May I recommend that? In your prayers and meditations and communions dwell on God's Name, and Attributes and Kingdom, and Will; and leave yourself out. It is the brazen serpent once more. Just do the necessary work as regards your actual sins; and then leave them.... God means you to lose yourself and escape from yourself in

Himself and His children. All you say about an increased acuteness in hearing and seeing God in nature seems to me an additional indication of all this: and that the reason you are suffering is because you want to cure your soul in your own way instead. Do give yourself up to this! Make your meditations on God direct. Put yourself among the Seraphim and look at Him. Forget everything else for a while; and find Him in Nature and work, and let yourself vanish."

(xxiv) " I am really sorry for writing as I did about my life here. I hadn't at all realised what yours was like; and the dreariness of it, externally. I wish I could say something; but what can I say except what would be threadbare by now— if that were possible — of the marks of the Cross? And with nerves it must be nearly intolerable. Personally I believe that the cure for nerves is an attempt at contemplation. I hope this does not sound absurd. But it seems to me that the one thing that does cure that maddening soreness of spirit that we call nerves is to s^ still, in body, mind, and soul, and exclude every thought but that of God as He is in Himself. But it is foolish to say all this.... Perhaps too you have not much time to sit still bodily. I do think, however, that the remedy lies in that immense effort of cessation of effort. I wonder whether you ever take attributes of God, and set them before you, excluding everything else: saying the word — e.g. PEACE; over and over again — and then imaging it in a quiet sea, a space in air, a summer garden, and so on.... For people with strong imaginations I do believe it is often infinitely more useful than elaborate ' points,' and ' resolutions,' and ' bouquets/

" I cannot tell you how sorry I am you are having a depressed time. I am doing my very best for you, and said Mass for you this morning. But frankly, I should have been very much sur prised if, under the circumstances, you did not have a good deal of temptation that way. It is exactly like the convalescence of the body after an operation. You have had the fiercest of all operations in the cutting of so many ties; and your soul has to lie still in a strained position, until our Lord heals it. So I do not feel any dismay at it, although all the sympathy that my poor little soul is capable of."

The following letter, written at a difficult crisis, has always seemed to me as one of the most perfect messages of encouragement which a soul acutely conscious of continued failure could possibly receive:

(xxvi) " You have got on the wrong road, somehow. I think it is what I said to you a good while ago — that God means you to be lonely and you don't want to be.... Don't bother about the past. We all make mistakes.... Thank God that you have learnt [a real lesson] instead of lamenting over the fact that you had not learnt it previously.

" To sum up, then: Don't bother yourself. You have the whole of eternity, after all. This is only a rehearsal, with the Prompter continually saying, ', you didn't do that right!

Do it again, please.'

" Look forward rather to the night when no man can work; but when he can enjoy what he has learnt during the day. And may the ' Prompter ' bless you always."

TO ONE BEGINNING A LITERARY CAREER

PROBABLY more than one contemporary Catholic writer has been encouraged to perseverance and an ultimate measure of success by Monsignor Benson's generous help and advice, never withheld, at whatever cost to himself. Others, perhaps too unselfish to trouble him for counsel and criticism, may be interested to learn from these pages a few of his own methods of teaching a beginner. The first letter, written many years ago, refers to the first article I published; revised by him, as was indeed everything I wrote for several years, by his own wish.

(i) " Here is the paper. I thought it best to send it back to you as there were a few criticisms that certainly need your consent. But I have written to, warning him of its arrival.

" I think it excellent — skilful and moving. As I said I would do, I have only criticised it from your standpoint, so to speak. It is never the slightest use to attempt to make a paper which expresses the character of its writer, express the 98 character of another writer. Therefore, although there are phrases that I should not use, that would only be because they would not harmonise with my manner. These I have left untouched. " Won't you spell ' Saint/ St, not 5? "

The following, written about the same time, refers to a letter of my own:

(ii) " Your description is beautiful. I wonder why you don't write — really, as a kind of profession. I feel sure that you could. If you are at all drawn to it, I should be happy to give you the benefit of my very small experience: and the first thing I would say is, Prune your reading, and read what you do read with an eye on the style, and as to why certain things are effective — e.g. epithets, gaps, rhythm. I should read no magazines ever — no, none. And never leading articles. I should use Latin devotions in preference to English — for English Catholic devo tions are really lethal to style. I should also, quite deliberately, read a novel of Stevenson's, continually at odd times; any Ruskin you can find.... Well, so on. Then, slowly, I should keep an extremely careful diary, regarding it as the public would regard it...."

I make no apology for publishing what has always seemed to myself, and obviously to others,

LI, CHRIST! REGIS bIB, MAJ. 10KONTON ioo SPIRITUAL LETTERS TO A CONVERT

Father Benson's extraordinarily generous view of one's first feeble attempts at authorship. Many, who deserved it better than I, have doubtless received the same kindly encouragement. Supreme artist himself, he was great enough to see the merits of a painstaking piece of work, or of a few pages of mere description, before its obvious faults. And his artistic sympathies showed him that to praise the merits was the surest way to help a certain type of beginner, keenly conscious of shortcomings of all sorts, and intensely aware of his own mistakes.

At the same time, criticism was always forth coming when necessary; but it was criticism that stimulated and spurred, not depressed and annihilated.

(iii) " Now as to the article: (I shall neither flatter nor spare, but say the simple truth as I believe it).

" Without the slightest doubt you have got the ' seeing eye ' and the power of expression. These are the only two things that matter in the least. All the rest is simply technique and hard work. Without these (' eye and hand ') technique and work are useless.

" But you want lots of hard work. First, generally, you must read carefully and intelligently, and only the best authors. Don't corrupt your taste by anything else. Avoid third-rate novels like poison; read first-rate novels greedily. And above all, read Stevenson again and again;

and a certain amount of Ruskin, Walter Pater, and Newman. These are the people for style.

" Next, you must carve and re-carve for the present — being perfectly willing to go over a MS. again and again in all moods, especially in the moods when you feel alert and intuitive.

" Next, you must write a lot. I should strongly recommend a diary of description — putting down tiny phrases too at odd times; tiny similes; perfect epithets. (Consider this simile of Steven son's. A man hiding in fear of his life behind sandhills sees a windmill turning its sails beyond other sandhills ' like some foolish person holding up his hands.' Do you see the gorgeousness of that? Yet every word is absolutely common.)

" Now your paper in particular. You say many beautiful things beautifully. But here are some criticisms.

" (i) You use sometimes the conventional words instead of the exactly right words. You describe distant plains as green. They are never green, except once in a hundred years. If you mean green you must draw attention to that fact.

" (2) Your article is the wrong ' shape.' Tenny son once said that a poem was like an apple-rind, curving in a particular kind of way, ending in a final kind of way." [Here follows a little drawing