Letter III. To a Married Lady

TJie Vintage. — Sweet, peaceful, and tranquil love.

Madam, — I am told that you are well into your vintage. God be praised. My heart must tell you a word which I said the other day to a lady who is also making her vintage, and who indeed is one of your dearest cousins.

In the Canticle of Canticles the Beloved, speaking to her Divine Spouse, says that his breasts are better than wine, fragrant with precious ointments.* But what breasts are these of the Spouse? They are his grace and his promise; for he has his bosom, amorous of our salvation, full of graces, which he lets flow from hour to hour, yea from moment to moment, into our spirits, and if we will reflect upon it we shall find that so it is. On the other side, he has the promise of eternal life, with which, as with a holy and pleasant milk, he feeds our hope, as with his grace he feeds our love.

This precious liquor is far more delicious than wine. Now, as we make wine by pressing the grapes, so we spiritually make wine by pressing the grace of God and his promises; and to press the grace of God, we must multiply prayer by quick, but energetic movements of our hearts; and to press his promise we must multiply the works of charity; for it is these to * Cant. i. 1, 2.

which God will give the effect of his promises; / was sick, and you did visit me* will he say. All things have their season; we must press the wine in both these vintages j but we must press without impatience {presser sans s'empresser), take pains without disquietude. Considering,, again, my dear daughter, that the breasts of the Spouse are his side pierced on the cross — O God, how twisted a branch is this cross, but how well loaded! There is only one bunch, but worth a thousand. How many grapes have holy souls found therein by the consideration of the many graces and virtues which this Saviour of the world has produced there!

Make a good and abundant vintage, my dear daughter, and may the one serve you as ladder and passage to the other. St. Francis loved lambs and sheep because they represented to him his dear Saviour j and I wish that we should love this temporal vintage, not only because it is an answer to the prayer we make every day for our daily bread, but also, and much more, because it raises us up to the spiritual vintage.

Keep your heart full of love, but of a love sweet, peaceful, and sedate. Regard your own faults, like those of others, with compassion rather than with indignation, with more humility than severity. Adieu, Madam, live joyously, since you have wholly dedicated yourself to immortal joy, which is God himself, who wants to live and reign for ever in the * Mat. xxv. 36.

midst of our hearts. I am, in him, and by him, your, &c.