Letter VI. To Mother de Chantal

On Holy Communion and abandonment to God.

ijth January 1612.

M. MICHEL is going to start a little sooner than usual, in order that you may take your tablet * at least an hour before dinner. But, my dear daughter, both these things which you will take are tablets of cordial virtue, particularly the first, composed of the most excellent powder that ever was in the world. Yes, my dear daughter; for Our Saviour has taken our true flesh, which is in substance powder, but in him is so excellent, so pure, so holy, that the heavens and the sun are but dust in comparison of this sacred powder. Now, the tablet of the Holy Communion is precisely that; and it has been made into a tablet that we may take it better, though in itself it is the most divine and very great table which the Cherubim and Seraphim adore, and at which they eat by real contemplation as we by real communion.

Oh! what happiness that our love, whilst waiting

• Referring, apparently, to some medicine which Mother de Chantal was taking. Afterwards the Saint speaks of the tablet of Holy Communion which she was to take next day, and plays on the words table, tablette (table, little table). [Tr,]

for that visible union which we shall have with Our Lord in heaven, is by this mystery so admirably united to him! My dearest daughter, keep your soul in peace, do not look where its little maladies come from, do not put yourself into any trouble about its cure, but divert your spirit, as far as possible, from return ing upon itself.

The great St. Anthony, whose intercession has an extraordinary influence to-day, will make you, by God's goodness, rise to-morrow quite strong. It is a great joy to the heart to picture to oneself this great Saint among his hermits, drawing from his mind deep and sacred sayings, and pronouncing them with extreme reverence, as oracles from heaven: but, amongst other things, it seems to me that he says to our soul what he said among his disciples, taken from the Gospel: Be not solicitous about your soul, or, for your soul.* No, my dear daughter, remain in peace; for God, to whom it belongs, will console it.

Meantime, my well-beloved daughter, I cease not, in the depths of my soul, to form holy hopes that after God has proved us by this occasional little abandonment, and has exercised us in interior mortification, he will revive us by his sacred consolations. He, this dear love of our heart, only abases us to lift us up: he holds back, and hides himself, and looks through the lattices to see how we are behaving. Ah! Lord and Saviour, I half see, meseems, the brightness of your gentle eye, which promises us the return of your rays, to make fair spring appear again on our earth. Ah! my daughter, we have got well through worse: why shall we not have the courage to surmount * Animce. Matt. vi. 25.

LET. VIIL] Earlier Letters to Visitation. 101 this difficulty also? Believe, my daughter, that I pray to Our Lord for you with all my heart, for my soul is knit to yours, and I cherish you as my soul, as is said of Jonathan and David.* May God be for ever gracious to this heart, all vowed, all dedicated, all consecrated to heavenly love!

Good-night, my most dearly sole daughter: keep Jesus crucified tightly within your arms, for the spouse held him there as a bundle of myrrh^ that is, of bitterness: only, my dear daughter, it is not he who is bitter to us, he merely permits us to be bitter to ourselves. For behold, says Ezechias, my most litter bitterness is in peace. | May the God of sweetness deign to make your heart sweet, or at least make your bitterness to be in peace.

This good sister wants to open her heart to you somewhat fully, but says she does not know how to do it; you must help her, then, and you may tell her that I said so. Blessed be God. Amen.