Letter XXXIV. To a Lady

On the death of her son.

Annecy, 2nd December, 16 19. The father confessor of Sainte-Claire de Grenoble has just told me that you have been extremely ill, my dear daughter, after having seen the dear N. pass away, and that you have been healed of a great infirmity. I see amidst all this your well-beloved heart, which, with a great submission to the Divine Providence, says that all is good, since the fatherly hand of this supreme goodness has given all these blows.

O how happy is this child, to have flown to heaven like a little angel, after having but just touched the earth! What a pledge have you there above, my dearest daughter! But, I am sure, you will have treated heart to heart with our Saviour about this affair; and he will already have holily soothed the natural tenderness of your maternity, and you will already often have said with all your heart the filial words taught us by our Lord: Yes, eternal Father, for thus it has pleased thee to do, and it is good to he so*

O my daughter, if you have done like this, you are happily dead in this Divine Saviour with this child, and your life is hidden with Christ in God; and when the Saviour shall appear who is your life, then shall you also appear with him in glory* This is the T\ay the Holy Spirit speaks in the Scriptures.

We share in the sufferings and death of those we love by this affection which holds us to them, and when they suffer and die in our Lord, and we acquiesce with patience in their sufferings for the sake of him who has willed to suffer and die for love of us, we suffer and die with them; all this well heaped up, my dearest child, is spiritual riches incomparable; and we shall know it one day, when, for these light labours, we shall see eternal rewards.

Yet, my dearest daughter, as you have willingly been ill, so long as God has wished it, be cured now in good earnest, as he wishes you to be. And I beg him ever, my dearest daughter, that we may be his^ without reserve or exception, in health and in sickness, tribulation and prosperity, life and death, time and eternity. I salute your filial heart, and am your, &c.