Letter XI. To Magdalena de Loyola

Rome, May 24:, 1541.

JHUS.

May the highest grace and love of Christ Our Lord ever favour us continually and help us.

Some days ago, on receiving a letter from you, and gathering from it your good desires and holy eagerness for the greater glory of God, I was filled with great joy in Our Lord. May it please Him, in His infinite and supreme goodness, ever to increase in you His love in all things, so that not in part only but entirely you may set all your affection and desires upon the same Lord, and upon all creatures for His sake, conversing with those who speak and act to the glory of His divine Majesty, frequently going to Confession, and receiving the most Holy Sacrament as often as you can; that so He may bring your soul to be united in everything with Him by the bond of true hope, and may increase in you that lively faith and most necessary charity without which we cannot be saved.

With this object in view, seeing that the soul which is anxious to serve its Creator and Lord in all things seeks all good means possible to that end, thinking that I might be of some help to you, and believing that what I offer will be received with the reverence and respect with which the things of Our Creator and Lord should be reverenced and respected, I send you twelve beads, with many blessings attached to them, three more with other blessings, and also another three which have all the blessings of the first two together, as you will see from a memorandum which goes with them by favour of the Licentiate Araoz, as well as the conditions necessary to gain these great graces. Should you receive some special favour I shall be very pleased in Our Lord if you will keep me informed of the spiritual advantage you may derive from the devotion, to the greater glory of His divine Majesty. Recall me to the memory of those who love you in Our Lord, and who will be pleased to know that I remember them, and ask them to commend me to His divine Majesty and to visit me in Him; and may He in His infinite and supreme goodness deign to grant us abundance of grace that we may feel His most holy will and accomplish it entirely.

From Rome, May 24, 1541.

Kept back until June 10.

Poor in goodness,

IGNIGO.

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