Letters 100–114

Letter 100

God only gives His Spirit to those who ask it in meekness and lowliness. Humble yourself, soften your heart. Be as a good little child who lets himself be carried about, and does not even ask where he is being taken. As to myself, I cannot have ihe honour of seeing you any more; but you have no need of me if you can but have the courage not to choose for yourself, but give yourself up to those who bear rule over you. There was once a hermit who laid aside his one book, the Gospels, and said, " I have detached myself from everything, even the book which taught me detachment." What is the use of the renunciation you have so long cherished? Is it not a delusion if you do not practise it when occasions offer for its exercise.'' I am not to be compared with the Holy Gospels, which contain the words of eternal life; but were I an angel from Heaven instead of a poor unworthy priest, you should think of me only by remembering anything good I may have said.

I have always taught you unreserved selfrenunciation and childlike docility, detachment from myself as from all else, with unhesitating yielding to the guidance of your superiors. When the time comcG that God takes away certain helps from US, you may be sure that they are no longer helps; they only become snares. So far from being links which bind us to God, they become an earthly medium between God and one's self, which hinders one, and prevents closer union with Him.

Letter 101

I AM really glad to know that you can open your heart so freely to me; I will always speak to you with like frankness. But you must not cling to a secret resting in me. God is jealous of all we lean upon; most of all to any indirect seeking after that which we are afraid to seek openly. One should trust to nothing, not even to one's own detachment, which may insensibly become a snare. Forget yourself, and all your troubles will disperse. People fancy that the love of God is a martyrdom, but on the contrary all our troubles spring only from self-love. It is self-love which doubts, hesitates, resists, suffers, reckons up its sufferings, is uncertain, and hinders the real peace which they enjoy who are set free from self. Enough: I am sure you wish me to speak as I feel, without any reserve.

Letter 102

I AM very sorry for all the disappointment you have met with. One must accustom one's self to look for little from men; it is the only way to avoid disappointment. One muct take that which they

ON PATIENCE 203 are able to give, as we take from a tree the fruit it bears, though indeed some trees bear nothing but leaves and caterpillars. God bears with and waits patiently for imperfect men, and is not even repulsed by their resistance; we ought to imitate this loving patience, this merciful forbearance. It is only imperfection which is intolerant of what is imperfect; the more any one has advanced towards perfection, the more patiently and quietly he will bear with, though not foster, the imperfection of others. Let those alone who make a tribunal out of their own prejudices; if anything can cure them, it is to let them go their own way, while we go ours with childlike simplicity and lowliness.

Do not hurry N. . . We must only ask for that which God gives. When he is reserved, wait patiently; when he expands, one word will do more than thirty unseasonably spoken. There is no good in sowing or tilling when the ground is hard with frost. If you urge N. . . , you will discourage him. He will shrink from seeing you, and imagine that you are prompted by your desire to rule him. When it pleases God to give a better opening, be ever on the watch to follow the slightest sign, but never forestall it. That is the work of faith, the patience of saints. It is a work carried on within the workman at the same time as without upon his neighbours; for he who labours is continually dying to self while he labours to carry out God's Will in others. cm.

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I AM not surprised at your coldness. One is not always fervent. God does not permit our fervour to be continual; for it is well that we should be made to feel, by its ebbs and flows, that fervour is a gift of God, which He gives and takes away as He pleases. If we were always fervent, we should not feel either our cross or our weakness, and temptation would cease to be really such. We need to be tried by the inward rebellion of our corrupt nature, and to have our love purified by weariness. We never hold so fast to God as when sensible satisfaction has no share in the grasp, but our faith hangs simply on the cross. External trials would be nothing if we were free from interior trials. Bear, then, patiently with your weariness, and it will be more to your soul's profit than a lively devotion combined with self-confidence. Weariness in devotion, endured with a stedfast will, is an excellent penance. It humbles one, makes one mistrust self, realise one's own frailty, and have more frequent recourse to God. Surely these are great gain. Such an involuntary coldness, and tendency to seek whatever gratifies.self-love, ought not to hinder you from communicating.

You want to hunt after a sensible satisfaction in God which is neither love nor prayer. Accept such satisfaction when God gives it you; and when He denies it, love Him, and try to pray as though it were not lacking. Those who wait for God do

ON MEDITATION 205 really possess Him while so doing. You are quite right not to ask more satisfaction and comfort than He sees fit to give you. If He purposes to sanctify you through privation of sensible satisfaction, your part is to conform to His merciful plans, and endure dryness; it will help to make you humble and selfdenying, and that is God's work.

Your troubles are all your own making; you rouse them by giving heed to self. Instead of bearing your cross patiently, and fulfilling your duty by helping to bear that of your neighbour, and of those God has intrusted to you, you shrink within yourself, and dwell solely on your own discouragement. Hope in God; He will sustain you, and make you to be useful to your neighbour, provided you do not doubt that He will help you, or spare yourself.

. Beware of interrupting your prayer; you would greatly damage yourself. The silence of which you speak is excellent when you are drawn to it Quit it for more active truths when you find so doing easy and attractive; but do not fear such silence when it results in a more faithful waiting upon God through the day. Be as free in your action with God as possible, so long as your will is united to Him, and so long as you strive to do His Will in all things at the cost of your own.

Letter 104

I THINK you may rest satisfied as to your meditation. It seems to me all right, and that you only

Co need to go on with it, trusting in Him Who prompts it, and in Whose Presence you are. As to what you call instinct, it is a hidden germ of that Presence, and of love which must be carefully fostered, inasmuch as it feeds everything else within you. The way to cultivate this instinct is most simple, consisting of: ist, Avoiding all such distractions as may weaken it; 2nd, returning at once to silence and recollection whenever you perceive that you have been distracted; ^rd, yielding to this instinct, and making all such sacrifices as it may require of you in a true spirit of self-renunciation.

You must not suppose that God's Presence is an unreality unless it kindles great light, and excites us to great words. That Presence is never more real or more merciful than when it teaches us to be silent, to humble ourselves, not to give heed to self-conceit, but to abide stedfastly in our own obscurity and insignificance. Such self-renunciation is far more profitable than the most dazzling visions or exciting imaginations.

As to having a less conscious sense of God's Presence than formerly, this does not depend upon you. God gives and takes it away as He pleases; enough that you do not yield to any voluntary distraction. There are amusements involving passion and vanity, which dissipate the soul, and raise a barrier between God and our souls; and there are others, only entered upon with simplicity and according to the order of God's Providence, for recreation and refreshment, while the heart remains stedfast to its secret moorings. Such diversions as

ON MEDITATION 207 these may well be used at suitable seasons, and may become a kind of semi-meditation, almost as profitable sometimes as a formal meditation.

Letter 105

Do not be troubled because you have so much repose in meditation. When it is sent, accept it without scruple; it would be resisting God to reject such a leading of grace under the pretext of humility, and a desire to dwell upon your own weakness. The impression of that is sure to come back ere long; but when you feel an inclination and power to dwell peacefully in God's Presence, nothing can be so desirable as so to abide. You confess that save for this repose you do not know what meditation means. Beware, then, of voluntarily forsaking an attitude without which you say that your prayer becomes idle.

On the other hand, do not fancy that all is lost when you are without a certain amount of sweetness in prayer. God deprives you of it so as to wean you like a child, and use you to dry bread instead of milk. The child has to be weaned, and it cries; but it is kinder to let it cry and wean it, so that it may be duly nourished and strengthened. The loss of such sensible sweetness does not invalidate prayer; on the contrary, it purifies it. It is to have God without God, as you said yesterday; that is to say, God only without His Gifts, which make His Presence so sweet and comforting. It is to have a

2oS hidden God, yet nevertheless it is Himself indeed; Cod testing our love, not indulging our likings and weakness. One needs to bear the alternations of these two conditions, so as neither to cleave to the one nor be disheartened by the other, to sit loosely to one and to be stedfast under the other, to be indifferent to both, and not one's self to change as they change. We have to remember that we cannot get the consolations for ourselves; God only gives them when and as He sees fit. We must let them %Of and offer up God's Own Gifts when He withdraws them, as a loving wife might readily forego her jewels, and even her husband's caresses, out of conformity to his wishes. It is a higher thing to cleave to God when He tries, despoils, abases us, than to do so when He lavishes sweetness and indulgence on us. Never mind your faults; it will suffice if you feel them when God's light points them out, and if you do not spare yourself in correcting them. Your temptations will turn to your gain. True union with God lessens our imperfections. Abide with Him, and bear calmly whatever trial He sends you.

Letter 106

. . . Your health is very precious to me, and your faithfulness to God is dearer still. It is not a question of the pleasure or the reward to be found in serving Him. Such conscious satisfaction does not even always depend upon the excellence of our

LtVINC TO CHRIST service; and while we must never bring privi upon ourselves bj" any voluntary carelessnes distraction, we must be ready to forego all comfortable sense of well-doing, and abide patii in darkness and disappointment when God rounds us with them. Sometimes, even, it is | gain to a stedfast soul to realise all its poverty helplessness. It matters much more that we our own weakness, and fly to God, than Iha enjoy a satisfaction which may tempt us to confidence.

O my dear child, the whole Christian life cor in dying to self and living to God! For thi need to die continually to all the secret, subtle of self-conceit; we need to watch jealously ag self-love as opposed to the love of God, perpet to force natural tendencies out of their groove, reduce them to His Will. This is the real ant to self-deception in the spiritual life. Peopk led astray under specious pretexts of perfd chiefly by seeking to please themselves rather to satisfy God, and by attempting to adapt rel to theit fancies rather than to subject every li and taste to the Cross of Jesus Christ. That false and saddened life which resists God; bi who dies to self will enjoy a true and happy Such a blessed death it is to lead a "life hid Christ in God," while all worldly happine: merely deceitful, and leads to real death. O child, may we so die to all, that Christ alone

You have to carry many a cross, but you need theiti, since God lays them on you. He knows how to select them; it is the fact of their being His selection which disturbs and roots out self-will. Crosses which you picked out and thought well to bear, so far from being crosses and means of death untO self, would be all that was wanted to sustain and strengthen self-will. You complain of your interior darkness and poverty: ** Blessed are the poor in spirit." " Blessed are they who, not having seen, yet have believed." Is it not far enough for us to see if we can perceive our own frailty, and not attempt to palliate it? If we see our own darkness, it will do! There is then no light whereby to indulge a curious disposition, but as much as is needed for mistrusting self, setting self aside, and yielding to others. What would that goodness be worth of which a man was always inwardly conscious, and with which he was satisfied — a mere visible light? I thank our Lord that He deprives you of so dangerous a stay. Go, like Abraham, ** not knowing whither; " follow the leadings of lowliness, simplicity, and self-denial, and you will acquire peace, recollection, gentleness, detachment, forbearance towards others, and contentment under all your troubles.

LAYING ASIDE WORLDLY THINGS 211

Letter 108

. . . How dear you both will become to me if what we talked of should really come to pass! . . . Yes, dear fellow, no more ambition, or worldly curiosity, or mere earthly policy! The exterior life as simple, lowly, and straightforward as the interior. ** If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit/' '

Be wise, but with the wisdom of God, not of the world. It is a poor security which springs from mere worldly prudence! Let go all impetuosity, all activity, all dissipation; you greatly need it. Even if not practising systematic recollection, try in simple faith to drop whatever disturbs and distracts you, all that excites your imagination, kindles your natural desires, and upsets interior peace and stillness. People talk grandly about mental passivity while they are in a state of perpetual activity; they want assurance, extraordinary lights, even forecasts of the future, in order to rest quietly in the shadows of simple faith. It is like wanting sunshine at midnight!

Be very humble, very simple; let there be neither Cephas nor Apollos, but only the Child Jesus binding us all together in the bonds of His holy childhood. Advent is coming; let us be born, anew with Him.

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Bear your inward cross patiently. utward crosses would be none without this, but rather lead to a continual triumphal sense of our own invincibility. Such crosses damage the soul, and foster selfconceit. Suffering, to be profitable, must be borne in conscious weakness and helplessness, hanging on the Cross with Jesus Christ, and saying with Him, "My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" Such crushing of self-will is very precious in His Sight Who is working in us. Dwell upon those most instructive words of S. Augustine, " Nihil in me relinqualur mihi, nee quo respiciam ad me ipsum." Do not heed your imagination, or the cogitations of worldly wisdom; let all go, and abide in the Hands of our Dear Lord. His Will and Glory are enough for us.

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. . . Be as simple and lowly amid the most censorious world as in your own study. Do not act from worldly wisdom or natural inclination, but merely as yielding to the spirit of life and death — death to self, life to God. No enthusiasm, no seeking conscious assurance, no trusting to the future, as though the present, however hard, were not enough for those who have no treasure save God's Will, or

HOiy TO RECEIVE ADMONITIOy 213 as though you sought to compensate self for present sadness by dwelling on a possibly prosperous future. They deserve disappointment who seek such hollow consolation. Accept all in humility; lay aside all self-interested aims, however disguised. Leave all to God, and think of nothing but how to die to self in the present moment, as though it were your whole eternity. Do not plan or manoeuvre.

Letter 111

l^otD to receftie Hnmonitioii.

I GREATLY wish that you could receive what is said with a view to your inward correction in a frank, hearty spirit. . . . You need a check to the continual sallies of your too lively imagination. Everything diverts and distracts you, and fosters your natural levity.

You follow your own fancy too much. You have too much to say about useless matters, and even about the unimportant details of necessary ones. You are too much concerned to win consideration, confidence, distinction; you think too much of your rank, and of persons who do you honour. You give too much time to whatever pleases and flatters you. You can only get free from all this by stopping short.

You ought to know the men with whom you want to live familiarly very well, and be clear as to their views and opinions. ... Be careful not only to receive admonitions or contradictions without pride or self-conceit, but beware of neglecting them through Carelessness or distraction. A good counsel is wasted if it is speedily forgotten. To be well used, time should be given for such counsel to sink into the inner mind, and you should endeavour quietly to apply it to every detail which it affects. . . .

CXI I.

Real Ee0t.

N. . . will never know any real rest until she leaves off trying to secure it. This life's peace is only to be found in uncertainty. Pure love only finds scope in the absence of all assurance. Every anxious glance is a drawing back, and a failure in true self-abandonment. Let us leave God to do what He will with us, and when that is done, be content to lean on nothing earthly.

Your sister must give herself up into God's Hands. "Whether we live, we live unto Him, or whether we die, we die unto Him," says S. Paul. Giving up self is only real when there is something to give up. God is the Same for the next life as for this, equally worthy to be served for His Glory and His Good Pleasure. In either case He requires our all, and His Jealousy hedges in the souls who seek Him on all sides. Paradise, hell, and purgatory have a kind of beginning even in this life.

I pray for the peace of pure faith and selfabnegation for your dear sister. Such peace is not easily lost or invaded, because it is not built upon any private possession or support. I would fain see her heart full of peace and simplicity. I say this,

REAL REST 21$ because simplicity is the true source of peace. Those who are not simple are not true children of peace, and do not taste its fruits. People often deserve the anxiety they feel by their useless selfcontemplation in spite of knowing it to be harmful. The spirit of peace only rests upon those who do not disturb it by giving ear to self rather than to God. Rest, which is a foretaste of the Eternal Sabbath, is very sweet, but the road which leads to it is a thorny path. It is time (this is meant for your sister) to let God complete His work of years. He requires more of her than of a beginner.

I pray with all my heart for your invalid; her cross is precious in God's Sight The more she suffers, the more I reverence her in Him Who crucifies her that she may be made worthy of Him. Great suffering sets forth at once the depth of the wound we have to heal, and the greatness of the gifts prepared for us by God.

For yourself, sir, shun dissipation; beware of your own impetuosity. That natural energy which you foster instead of repressing gradually withers up the grace of an interior life. A man only holds fast to rules and visible motives, while the " life which is hid with Christ in God'' is affected, becomes polluted, and dies out for lack of needful sustenance, namely, silence in the soul's depths. I was sorry that you were not in active service; but I see that it is the intention of God's Mercy to detach you from the world, and draw you to the life of pure faith, which is unceasing death. So give to the world only such time as necessity and social biensdances require. Do not let yourself be absorbed by trifles; only talk

2l when it is needful. Always control your imagination; let go everything. It is not through eager anxiety that you will cease to be impetuous. I do not ask for a laborious, toilsome recollection, but one which merely consists in dropping whatever stirs and excites you.

I am rejoiced to hear that you find so much that is good in. . . I hope you will make her still better by teaching her, through your simple, stedfast example, how attractive and unlike what the world esteems it true religion is. But her husband must not spoil her by a blind passion. While spoiling her he would spoil himself too; and such excess might end in a dangerous coolness, possibly in estrangement Let the stream flow by somewhat, but watch for providential opportunities to point him to moderation, recollection, and the preference of grace to nature. Watch for God's moments, and do not let them slip.

God would have us unite two very great acts of self-mortification in doing His work, />. to labour as though everything depended on the assiduity of our toil, and when the work is accomplished, to count it as nothing. Sometimes when we have worked hard, God sees fit to sweep away the fruits of our work as the broom sweeps away a cobweb, and then He Himself effects, we know not how, the work on which we bestowed what seems such a useless toil. Do you weave your cobwebs, God will sweep them away; and when you are dumbfoundered, He will work things out in His Own wjiy.

COMFORT UNDER TRIAL 21 7

Letter 113

Comfort unoet tSrial.

I AM truly concerned for the suflferings of your dear invalid, and the trial of those whom God brings into such close contact with her cross. Bid her never mistrust God, and He will proportion her sufferings to the patience He will give her. He only, Who has made all hearts, and renewed them by His Grace, knows what that due proportion is. The man on whom He is exercising it does not perceive it, and knowing neither the extent of his future trial, nor that of God's upholding Grace, he is tempted to depression and despair. He is like one who has never seen the sea, and who, when caught on the rocks by a rising tide, would imagine that the advancing waves would soon swallow him up. He would not know that the tide must turn at the precise spot which God's Finger has fixed, and he would be more frightened than hurt.

God lets a good man's trial be somewhat like the ocean: it swells, and rises, and threatens, but He holds its limits in.His Hand. " God is faithful, Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able." He vouchsafes to call Rimsoii/aith/uL How blessed is that faithfulness! Remind your invalid of this, and bid her not look beyond to-day, but leave all to God. Oftentimes that which seemed most terrible and unbearable beforehand is lightened when it comes. All that is excessive comes, not of God, Who never lays too much on us, but from our own imagination, which seeks to penetrate the future,

2l and our self-love, which exaggerates all we suffer. This will help. . . , who sometimes is distressed, lest she should give way to distress at some future time. All our moments are alike in God's Hand, the hour of death as that of life. With a word He cpjrtrols wind and storm, and they obey Him. "Why are you afraid, O man of little faith.** Is not God yet more powerful than you are powerless?

Letter 114

I DO not wonder that God spares you; you are too weak not to be spared. I told you that He would not honour you by treating you as hardly as you feared. It is no great matter if you do use a few old-fashioned expressions, or if two or three people remark that your language is not a perfect model of purity. Whatever tends to indiscretion, breach of confidence, charity, or edification, should never be tolerated. I need hardly say the same about common sense. If you should find yourself really in danger on such points, you had better tell me; but with regard to what merely concerns ordinary politeness, or les biensdanceSy I think you must try to cultivate a spirit of simplicity and humiliation. There is nothing you need so greatly as to mortify your thoughts, your tastes, your useless fastidiousness in all these trifles. The more you shrink from sacrifice therein, the more necessary it is proved to be. Such sensitiveness is a sign of a very lively self-will, which must be rooted out. But do not

SENSITIVENESS OF SELF-CONCEIT 2\f)

tamper with God. You see that He does but ask that which you yourself know He must take to destroy your pride. Do not dwell upon the future; one does but lose one^s self by so doing. Do not try to guess how far God will carry you if you always yield unresistingly to Him. He never deals with us in the ways we foresee; such foresight would break the blow. He rather touches us in ways we should never have expected, and of which we should have thought nothing. Very often, too, the phantoms we have raised melt away, and so all our forebodings only tend to disturb us. Obey from day to day; such obedience is our true daily bread. We, like Jesus Christ, are fed by His Father's Will, which Providence conveys to us in each present moment. This heavenly bread is like manna, it cannot be stored up; the anxious, mistrustful man who stored up for the morrow beheld it grow corrupt. Yield to all that is required of you. Be pliable and lowly, not arguing, not heeding self, ready for everything, and cleaving to nothing; |5eady to be high or low, praised or blamed, useful or useless, trusted, or suspected, and envied by those with whom you live. So long as you are free from pride, self-conceit, and self-will in all things, all will be well. ' This is a great deal to ask, but it is not too much. Keep silence as much as you are able; nourish your heart, and let your intellect fast. No one could be more concerned than I am for your real interests, or wish more heartily to see you detached from all that is not God. May you be filled with peace, stillness, simplicity, rejoicing in God, not in the creature, and lie passive in His Hand.

... IS really a good man, though he has his faults. Who has not? Yet, overladen as we are with our own, which we leave uncorrected, we are so sensitive and impatient towards those of our neighbour! Nothing, seemingly, can make us indulgent, since our own incorrigible frailty does not abate the severity of our criticism upon others. We can often do more for other men by correcting our own faults than by trying to correct theirs. Be at rest, sir; let all these things flow by, like the river beneath a bridge. Do you abide in the Presence of God, Which will never flow away.