Letter XVI. To a Lady

We must always keep our soul in repose before God.

My dearest Mother, — As you have told me that my letters always consoled you much, I wish to lose no occasion of letting you have them to testify in some way the desire I have to be useful to your soul, — to your soul, I say, which I cherish extremely.

Keep it always seated and at rest before God during exterior works, and standing up and moving about during interior; as the bees, who do not fly about in their hives or while doing their house-work, but only when they go out. While we are at our affairs, we must aim at quiet of heart, and at keeping our soul tranquil for prayer; if it wants to fly, let it fly; if to bestir itself, let it do so, though then also tranquillity and simple repose of the soul in seeing God, in willing God, and in relishing God, is very excellent.

When I begin to write to you I do not think what I shall write, but having begun I write what comes to me, provided that it be something of God; for I know that all is agreeable to you; having much strengthened during the last journey the entire confidence which my heart had in yours. I saw clearly, methinks, that you had complete trust in me.

I am writing to that good D. N., who writes to ask me to advise her about her future life; which I find hard, having scarcely seen her spirit, and mine being too common and trivial to consider a singular life like hers: all the same I tell her simply what I think. May God keep you in his holy protection, a3id load you with his graces.