Letter Xxxiii

TO A NOVICE OF THE VISITATION. Congratulations upon her profession.

AND so, my very dear daughter, you are now at last on the sacred altar in spirit, to be sacrificed and immo lated, yea consumed as a holocaust, before the face of

LET. xxxm.] Later Letters to Visitation. 229 the living God. Oh may this day be counted amongst " the days that the Lord hath made! " May this hour be an hour amongst the hours which God has blessed from all eternity, and which he has appointed for honour from all eternity! May this hour be founded in the holy humility of his cross, and end in the most sacred immortality of glory! How many desires will my soul make on this dear day for the soul of my dear daughter! How many holy exclamations of joy and happy omens upon that beloved heart! How many in vocations to the most holy Virgin Mother, to the Saints and Angels, that they would honour with their special favour and presence this consecration of the spirit of my dear daughter, whose vocation they have obtained and whose obedience to vocation they have inspired!

I do not disjoin from your spirit, my dear daughter, that of dear Sister N., my well-beloved daughter. I unite it with yours in the same action: for as yqu know she found herself united with you in affection and love on the day of your Visitation, and it would seem that she then already immolated in re solution her heart with yours. How glad I am when I picture to myself that according to my hope they will announce to you in all truth that word of life-giving death: Ye, are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God: * for, my dear daughter, 011 the truth of this word depends the truth of the event which afterwards they declare: But when Christ shall appear, who is your life, and the rest.t

I salute your dear soul and that of Sister N., and am ever in union of spirit according to God most singularly all yours.

• Col. iii. t Words used in the ceremony of Profession. [Tr.]