Letter XI. To Madame de Chantal

On the choice of a director. Remedies Jor temptations against faith. Rules of conduct for the use of a Christian widow. Liberty of spirit.

14th October, 1604.

Madame, — May God give me as much power as I have will to make myself clearly understood in this letter! I am sure that I should give you consolation about part of what you want to know from me, and particularly in the two doubts which the enemy suggests to you on the choice you have made of me as you spiritual father. I will do what I can to express in a few words what I think necessary for you on this subject. As to the first doubt, the choice you have made has all the marks of a good and legitimate election. The great movement of soul, which brought you to it almost by force, and with consolation; the consideration which I have given to it before consenting j the fact that neither of us trusted self, but used the judgment of your confessor, a good, wise and prudent man; that we gave time for the first agitations of your conscience to grow quiet, supposing they were ill-founded; that the prayers, not of one or two days, but of many months, went before; — these are, undoubtedly, infallible signs that it was the will of God.

The movements of the bad spirit or the human spirit are of a very different kind. They are terrible and vehement, but without constancy. The first word they say in the ear of the soul is to avoid counsel; or if it takes counsel it must be that of people of no weight, and without experience. They hurry, they want to make a bargain without stating terms, and content themselves with a short prayer, which only serves as a pretext to decide the most important questions.

There is nothing like this in our action. It is neither you nor I that formed the contract: but a third person, who in this can have regarded only God. The difficulty I made in the beginning, which proceeded only from the deliberation which I was bound to give to it, ought completely to reassure you. For be certain it was from no want of a very great inclination to your spiritual service; this I had beyond words; but because in a thing of such consequence I wanted to follow neither your desire nor my inclination but God and Providence. Stop there, I beseech, and dispute no more with the enemy on this subject; tell him boldly that it is God who wanted it and did it. It was God who placed you under that first direction, profitable to you at that time; it is God who has brought you to this, which, though the instrument of it is un worthy, he will make fruitful and useful to you.

As to the second doubt, my dearest sister, know that as I have just said, from the beginning of your conferring with me about your interior, God gave me a great love of your soul. When you opened yourself to me more particularly, it was an obligation on my soul to cherish yours more and more, which made me write to you that God had given me to you. I do not believe that anything could be added to the affection I felt in my soul, and above all when praying to God for you.

But now, my dear child, a certain new quality has developed which I seem unable to name. I can only, say its effect is a great interior sweetness which I feel in wishing you the perfection of the love of God, and other spiritual benedictions. No, I do not add a single line to the truth; I speak before the God of my heart and yours: every affection has its particular difference from others: that which I have for you has a certain specialty which immensely consoles me, and which, to say all, is extremely profitable to me. Hold that for the truest truth, and doubt it no more. I did not mean to say so much, but one word brings on another, and besides I think you will apply it properly.

It is remarkable, I think, my child, that the holy church of God, in imitation of her Spouse, does not teach us to pray for ourselves in particular, but always for ourselves and for our Christian brethren: Give us, she says: grant us, and such like terms, which include many. I had never happened to think, under this general form of speech, of any particular person: but since I left Dijon, under this form, us, several persons who have recommended themselves to me have come into my mind, — yourself almost always the first; and when not the first, which is rarely, then the last, to dwell more on it. Can I say more than that? But, do not communicate this to any one; for I say a little too much about it, though with all truth and purity.

This is quite enough now to answer henceforth all those suggestions, or at least to give you courage to laugh at their author, and to spit in his face. I will tell you the rest one day, either in this world or in the other.

In the third place you ask me for remedies in the trouble caused you by the wicked one's temptations against faith and the Church j for so I understand you. I will say what God gives me to say.

In this temptation you must behave as in temptations of the flesh, disputing neither little nor much. Do as did the Children of Israel with the bones of the Paschal Lamb, which they did not even try to break, but simply threw into the fire. You must not reply at all, nor appear to hear what the enemy says. Let him clamour as he likes at the door; you must not say as much as, Who goes there t

True, you will tell me, but he worries me, and his noise makes those within unable to hear one another speak. It is all the same; patience, — we must prostrate ourselves before God, and remain there at his feet: he will understand, by this humble behaviour, that you are his, and that you want his help, though you cannot even speak. But above all keep yourself well shut in, and open not the door at all, either to see who it is or to drive the nuisance away; at last he will get tired of crying out, aud will leave you in peace.

And never too soon, you will say. I pray you get a book called On Tribulation, composed by Father llibadaneira, in Spanish, and translated into French. The Father Rector will tell you where it is printed; read it carefully. Courage, then, it will come to an end at last; provided he enter not, it matters not. And meanwhile it is an excellent sign when the enemy beats and blusters at the door; for it is a sign that he has not got what he wants. If he had it, he would not cry out any more, he would enter and stay. Take note of this, so as not to fall into scruple.

After this remedy, I give you another. Temptations against faith go straight to the understanding, to make it parley, and think, and dream about them. Do you know what you must do while the enemy is occupied trying to escalade the intelligence? Sally out by the gate of the will, and make a good attack on him. That is, when a temptation against faith comes to engage you: — how can this be? but if this, but z/ that? — instead of disputing with the enemy by argument, let your affective part rush forth vehemently upon him, and even joining the exterior voice to the interior, cry: Ah! traitor, ah! wretch, thou hast left the church of the angels, and wishest me to leave the church of the saints! Disloyal, faithless, perfidious one, thou didst present to the first woman the apple of perdition, and thou wantest me to eat of it! Get thee behind me, Satan! It is written: thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God* No, I will not reason or dispute. Eve wishing to dispute with the devil was seduced and ruined. Vive Jesus, in whom I believe! Vive the Church, to which I cling! and similar words of fire.

You must also say words to Jesus Christ, and to the Holy Spirit (such as he will suggest to you), and even to the Church: O mother of the children of God, never will I separate myself from you, I will to live and die in your bosom.

I know not if I make myself understood. I mean to say that we must fight back with affections and not with reasons; with passions of the heart and not with considerations of the mind. It is true that in these times of temptations the poor will is quite dry; but so much the better: its acts will be so much the more terrible to the enemy, who, seeing that instead of retarding your progress he gives you an opportunity of exercising a thousand virtuous affections, and particularly the protestation of faith, will leave you at last.

In the third place, it will be sometimes good to * Matt. iv.

apply fifty or sixty strokes of the discipline, or thirty, as you may be disposed. It is remarkable how good this recipe was found in a soul whom I know. It is, doubtless, because the exterior pain diverts the interior mischief and affliction, and provokes the mercy of God. Add that the wicked one, seeing that his partisan and confederate the flesh is getting beaten, fears and flees. But this third remedy must be used with moderation, and according to the profit you find from it after the experience of some days.

In fine, these temptations are only afflictions, like others; and we must stay ourselves on the saying of Holy Scripture: Blessed is he that suffers temptation; for when he has been tried he shall receive the crown of glory * Know that I have seen few persons make progress without this trial, and we must have patience. Our God, after the storms will send the calm. But above all use the first and second remedy.

For the fourth point, I am not willing to change the offerings you made the first time you vowed yourself, nor the condition which was appointed you, nor any other thing.

As to your daily prayers, this is my* counsel. In the morning make the meditation with the preparation as I have marked it in the writing which I send for this purpose. Add the Paternoster, Ave Maria, Credo, Veni Creator, Ave Maris Stella, Angele Dei, and a short prayer to the two Saints John, and the two Saints Francis of Assisi and of Paula, which you will find in * James i. 12.

the Breviary, or perhaps you already have them in the little book you mean to send me. Salute all the Saints with this vocal prayer:

Holy Mary, and all Saints, deign to intercede for us with our Lord, that we may obtain to be helped and saved by him who liveth and reigneth, world without end. Amen*

Having saluted the Saints who are in heaven, say a Paternoster and Ave for the faithful departed, and another for the faithful living. Thus you will have visited all the church, one part of which is in heaven, another on earth, another under the earth, as St. Paul and St. John witness. This will take you a full hour.

Hear Mass every day, if possible, in the manner which I have described in writing on meditation.

And either at Mass or in the course of the day I wish the Rosary to be said with the greatest devotion possible.

Throughout the day, plenty of ejaculatory prayers, and specially those of the hours when they strike; this is a useful devotion.

In the evening before supper, I approve of a short recollection, with five Paternosters and Ave Marias, to the five wounds of our Lord. The recollection may be made by the entrance of the soul into one of the five wounds of our Lord for five days, into the thorns of the crown for the sixth, and into his pierced side for the seventh: for there we must begin the week, * Prayer at Prime.

and there end it; that is, on Sundays we must return to this heart.

In the evening, about an hour or an hour and a half before supper, retire, and say the Paternoster, the Ave, the Credo: this done, the Confiteor up to meet culpa; then the examination of conscience; after which finish the med culpa, and say the Litany of our Lady of Loretto, or, in order, the seven Litanies of our Lord, our Lady, the Angels, and the others as they are in a book made for this purpose. This book is not easy to find; and therefore, if you cannot get them, the Litany of our Lady will do. This will take you nearly half an hour.

Every day take a good half-hour's spiritual reading, this is quite enough for each day. On Feasts you can assist at Vespers, and say the office of our Lady. But if you have a great taste for the prayers you have been used to say, do not change, I beg. And if you happen to omit something that I order, do not make a scruple of it; for here is the general rule of our obedience written in great letters:

WE MUST DO ALL BY LOVE, AND NOTHING BY FORCE.

WE MUST LOVE OBEDIENCE RATHER THAN

FEAR DISOBEDIENCE.

I leave you the spirit of liberty; not that which excludes obedience, for this is the liberty of the flesh; but that which excludes constraint, and scruple, and worry (empressemenf).

If you very much love obedience and submission, I wish that if a just or charitable necessity require you to omit your exercises you should make this a species of obedience, and supply the defect by love.

I wish you to have a French translation of all the prayers you say. I do not want you to say them in French, but in Latin, for they will give you more devotion; but I want you to have the meaning at hand, even in the Litanies of Jesus, of our Lady, and the others. But do all this without anxiety, and in a spirit of sweetness and love.

Your meditations will be on the life and death of our Lord I approve your using the Exercises of Thauler, Meditations of St. Bonaventure, and those of Capiglia; for being on the Gospels they are on the life of our Lord. But you must reduce all to the method I send you in this paper. The meditations of the four ends of man will be useful to you, on condition that you always finish with an act of confidence in God, never representing to yourself death or hell on the one side without the cross on the other j so that, after exciting yourself to fear by the one you may return to the other by confidence. The hour of meditation must be only three-quarters at most.

I love spiritual canticles, sung with affection.

As to the ass (body) I approve the fast of Friday, and the frugal supper of the Saturday. I approve your keeping it down the whole of the week, not so much by abstinence from meats (sobriety being observed) as by abstinence from choice in them. I

M approve your flattering it sometimes, giving it some oats to eat, as St. Francis did, to make it go quicker. I mean the discipline; which has a wonderful force, by stinging the flesh to quicken the spirit; but only use it twice a week.

You must not lessen the frequency of your communions, unless your confessor orders it. I have this particular consolation, on Feast-days, namely, to know that we are going to communion together.

For the fifth point, it is the truth that I cherish, with a very special love, our Celse-Benigne, and all the rest of your children. Since God has given your heart this desire to give them entirely to the service of God, you must bring them up in this design, sweetly inspiring suitable thoughts. Have the Confessions of St. Augustine, and read them carefully from the end of the eighth book; you will there see St. Monica, a widow, with the care of her Augustine, and many things which will console you.

As to Celse-Benigne, you must suggest generous motives, and plant in his little soul the noblest and most gallant aspirations after the service of God, and impress on him a very low idea of mere worldly glory; but this little by little. In proportion as he grows up, we will think of the particular things required, God helping.

Meanwhile, take care, not only about him, but about his sisters, that they sleep alone as far as possible, or with persons in whom you have as full confidence as in yourself. I cannot tell you how important this advice is; experience recommends it to me every day.

If Frances wishes, of her own accord, to be a religious, it is well: otherwise I do not approve that her will should be anticipated by resolutions, but only, like the others, by sweet attractions (inspirations).

We must, as much as we can, act on souls as the angels do, by gracious and gentle movements. But I quite approve that you have her brought up in the order of Puy-d'Orbe, in which I hope devotion is soon going to begin to flourish again in good earnest. And I want you to co-operate in this intention. But from all the girls keep away vanity of soul: it is almost born with the sex.

I know you have the Epistles of St. Jerome in French: look at what he says of Pacatula and the others, about the education of girls: they will do you good. Still you must use moderation. I have said all when I have said " sweet attractions."

I see that you owe 2,000 crowns; hasten the payment all you can, and be sure to avoid retaining anything of any one's, as far as possible.

Give some little alms, but with great humility. I like the visitation of the sick, of the old, and women chiefly, and of the young when quite young. I like the visitation of the poor; particularly of women, with great humility and mildness.

For the sixth point, I approve your dividing your abode between your father and your father-in-law, and that you occupy yourself in procuring the good of their souls, after the fashion of the angels, as I have said. If the stay at Dijon is a little longer, no matter: it is also your primary duty. Try to make yourself every day more agreeable to both your fathers, and further their salvation in a spirit of sweetness. No doubt the winter will suit you better at Dijon.

I am writing to your father, and as he had commanded me to write him something for the good of his soul, I have done it with much simplicity, perhaps too much.

My advice lies in two points: one, that he should make a general review of all his life for a general confession; a thing without which no man of honour should die; the other that he should try little by little to despoil himself of worldly affections — and I tell him the way to do it.

I propose this to him, in my opinion clearly and gently enough; and with this conclusion, that we must not exactly break through the ties of alliance which we have with the affairs of the world, but unsew and undo them. He will shew you the letter, I doubt not. Help him to understand and practise it.

You owe him a great charity in leading him to a happy end, and no consideration should hinder you from employing yourself in this with a holy ardour; for he is the first neighbour whom God obliges you to love; and the first part you should love in him is his soul, and in his soul the conscience, and in his conscience, purity, and in purity the seizing hold of eternal life. I say the same to your father-in-law.

Perhaps your honoured father, not knowing me, will find my freedom improper; but make me known to him, and I am sure he will love me for this freedom more than for anything else.

I am writing to Monseigneur de Bourges a letter of five sheets, in which I point out to him the method of preaching, and with this I tell him my opinion about several points of the life of an archbishop. "Well, as for him, I have no doubt he will find it agreeable. In fine, what would you further? Father, brother, uncle, children, all are infinitely dear to me.

As for the seventh point, about the spirit of liberty, I will tell you what it is.

Every good man is free from acts of mortal sin, and does not keep any affection to it. This is a liberty necessary for salvation. I do not speak of this; the liberty of which I speak is the liberty of well-beloved children. And what is it? It is a detachment of the Christian heart from all things to follow the known will of God. You will easily understand what I mean to say, if God gives me the grace to propose to you the marks, signs, effects, occasions of this liberty.

We ask from God before all things, that his name may be hallowed, his kingdom come, his will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

All this is no other thing than the spirit of liberty; for provided that the name of God is sanctified, that his majesty reigns in you, that his will is done, the soul cares for nothing else. First mark: the soul which has this liberty is not attached to consolations, but receives afflictions with all the sweetness that the flesh can permit. I do not say that it does not love and desire consolations, hut I say that it does not attach its heart to them. Second mark: it does not at all attach its affection to spiritual exercises; so that, if by sickness or other accident kept from them, it feels no grief thereat. Here also I do not say it does not love them, but I say it is not attached to them.

Such a heart scarcely loses its joyfulness, because no privation makes him sad whose heart is quite unattached. I do not say he does not lose it, but that he scarcely loses it, that is, only for a short time.

The effects of this liberty are a great suavity of soul, a great gentleness and condescension in all that is not sin or danger of sin; a temper sweetly pliable to the acts of every virtue and charity.

For example: interrupt a soul which is attached to the exercise of meditation; you will see it leave with annoyance, worried and surprised. A soul which has true liberty will leave its exercise with an equal countenance, and a heart gracious towards the importunate person who has inconvenienced her. For it is all one to her whether she serve God by meditating, or serve him by bearing with her neighbour: both are the will of God, but the bearing with her neighbour is necessary at that time.

The occasions of this liberty are all the things which happen against our inclination; for whoever is not attached to his inclinations, is not impatient when they are contradicted.

This liberty has two opposite vices, instability and constraint, or dissolution and slavery. Instability, or dissolution of spirit, is a certain excess of liberty, by which we change our exercises, our state of life, without proof or knowledge that such change is God's will. On the smallest occasion practices, plan, rule are changed; for every little occurrence we leave our rule and laudable custom: and, thus the heart is dissipated and ruined, and is like an orchard open on all sides, whose fruits are not for its owners, but for all passers by.

Constraint or slavery is a certain want of liberty by which the soul is overwhelmed with either disgust or anger, when it cannot do what it has planned, though still able to do better.

For example: I design to make my meditation every day in the morning. If I have the spirit of instability, or dissolution, on the least occasion in the world 1 shall put it off till the evening — for a dog which kept me from sleeping, for a letter I have to write, of no urgency whatever. On the other hand, if I have the spirit of constraint or servitude, I shall not leave my meditation at that hour, even if a sick person have great need of my help at the time, even if I have a despatch which is of great importance, and which cannot well be put off, and so on.

It remains for me to give you one or two examples of this liberty which will better make you understand what I cannot properly describe. But first I must tell you that you are to observe two rules, to avoid stumbling in this point.

A person shonld never omit his exercises and the common rules of virtues unless he sees the will of God on the other side. Now, the will of God shows itself in two ways, by necessity and charity. I want to preach this Lent in a little place of my diocese; if, however, I get ill, or break my leg, I must not be grieved or disquieted because I cannot preach; for it is certainly the will of God that I should serve him by suffering and not by preaching. Or if I am not ill, but an occasion presents itself of going to some other place, where, if I go not, the people will become Huguenots, — there is the will of God sufficiently declared to turn me gently from my design.

The second rule is that when we are to use liberty for the sake of charity, it mast be without scandal and without injustice. For example: I may know that I should be more useful somewhere very far from my diocese. I cannot use liberty in this; for I should scandalize and commit injustice, because I am obliged to be here. Hence, this liberty never interferes with vccations; on the contrary, it makes each one satisfied with his own, since each should know that he is placed in it by the will of God.

Now, I want you to look at Cardinal Borromeo, who is going to be canonized in a few days. His was a spirit the most exact, rigid, and austere that it is possible to imagine: he drank nothing but water, and eat nothing but bread; he was so austere that, after he was archbishop, he only entered twice during twenty-four years into the house of his brothers, when ill, and twice into his garden. Yet, this rigorous soul, when eating with the Swiss, his neighbours, as he often did to keep a good influence over them, made no difficulty in drinking bumpers and healths with them, besides what he drank for his thirst. There is a trait of holy liberty in the most austere man of this age. A dissolute spirit would have done too much; a constrained spirit would have considered it a mortal sin; a spirit of liberty would have done it for charity.

Spiridion, an ancient bishop, having received a pilgrim almost dead with hunger, during Lent, and in a place in which there was nothing but salt-meat, had some of this cooked, and offered it to the pilgrim. The pilgrim was unwilling to take it, in spite of his necessity. Spiridion had no need of it, but ate some first for charity, in order to remove, by his example, the scruple of the pilgrim. Here was a charitable liberty in this holy man.

Father Ignatius of Loyola, who is going to be canonized, ate meat on Wednesay in Holy Week on the simple order of the doctor, who judged it expedient for a little sickness he had. A spirit of constraint would have had to be besought three days.

But I want now to show you a shining sun of detachment, a spirit truly free, and unbound by any engagement, and holding only to the will of God. I have often thought what was the greatest mortification of all the Saints I know; and after many consideratious I have found this: St. John Baptist went into the desert at the age of five years, and knew that our and his Saviour was born quite near him, that is, one day's journey, or two or three, or so. God knows whether St. John's heart, touched with the love of his Saviour from the womb of his mother, desired to enjoy his holy presence. Yet he stays twenty-five years there in the desert, -without going even once to see our Saviour. Then he stays everywhere to catechize, without going to our Lord, and waits for him to go to him: afterwards, having baptized our Lord, he does not follow him, but stays to do his own work. O God! what a mortification of spirit! To be so near his Saviour, and not to see him! to have him so near and not to enjoy him! And what is this but to have the heart free from all, even from God himself, to do the will of God and to serve him? To leave God for God, and not to love God, in order so much better and more purely to love him! This example overwhelms my soul with its grandeur.

I forgot to say that the will of God is known not only by necessity and charity, but by obedience; so that he who receives a command must believe that it is the will of God. Am I not writing too much? but my spirits runs quicker than I wish, carried on by the ardent desire of serving you.

For the eighth point, remember the day of the blessed King St. Louis, the day on which you took again the crown of your kingdom from your own soul to lay it at the feet of the King Jesus: the day on which you renewed your youth, like the eagle, plunging it in the sea of penance; a day, the harbinger of the eternal day of your soul. Remember that after the grand resolutions you expressed of being all God's, body, heart, and soul, I said Amen, on behalf of the whole Church our Mother: and at the same time, the Holy Virgin, with all the Saints and blessed made their great Amen and Alleluia resound in heaven. Remember to hold that all the past is nothing, and that every day you must say with David: now I have begun * to love my God properly. Do much for God, and do nothing without love. Apply all to this love; eat and drink for it.

Be devout to St. Louis, and admire in him his great constancy. He was king at twelve, had nine children, made war continually, against either rebels or the enemies of the faith; was king more than forty years; and at the end of all, his confessor, a holy man, swore that having confessed him all his life, he had never found that he had fallen into mortal sin. He made two voyages beyond the sea: in both he lost his army, and in the latter he died of pestilence, after having for a long time visited, helped, served, dressed and cured the plague-stricken of his army — and dies joyous, constant, with a verse of David in his mouth. f I give you this saint as your special patron for all the year; you will have him before your eyes, with the others named above. In the coming year, if it please

• Ps. lxxvi. 11. kf I will enter into your house, 0 Lord, &c. — Ps. v. 8.

God, I will give you another, after you have profited well in the school of this one.

For the ninth point, believe two things about me: — the one that God wants you to make use of me, so do not hesitate; the other, that in what is for your salvation, God will help me with light necessary to serve you; as to the will, he has already given it me so strong, that it cannot be stronger. I have received the note of your vows, which I guard and regard (garde et regarde) carefully, as a fit instrument of our alliance, entirely founded on God, and which will last for eternity, by the mercy of him who is the author of it.

Monseigneur, the Bishop of Saluzzo, one of my most intimate friends, and one of the greatest servants of God and the Church, died a little while ago, to the incredible sorrow of his people, who had only enjoyed his labours one year and a half; for we were made bishops together and on the very same day. I ask you for three chaplets for his repose, certain that if he had outlived me he would have procured me a like charity from all those with whom he had credit.

You seem, from one passage of your letter, to consider it settled that we shall see one another again some day. May God will it, my dearest sister! but for my part, I see nothing before my eyes which can make me hope to have the liberty to go thither! I told you the reason in confidence, at Saint-Claude.

I am tied here, hand and foot, and as for you, my good sister, does not the inconvenience of the past ourney frighten you? But we will see, between this and Easter, what God wishes from us: his holy will be ever ours.

I pray you to bless God with me for the effects of the voyage of Saint-Claude: I cannot tell them you, but they are great; and at your first leisure write me the history of your gate of Saint-Claude,* and believe that it is not from curiosity that I ask it.

My mother is as entirely yours as she can be. I have been consoled to see that you willingly call Madame du Puy-d'Orbe sister; she is a great soul if wrell assisted, and God will make use of her to the glory of his name; help her and visit her by letter. God will be pleased with you for it.

If I decide for myself, I shall never finish this letter, which is written without other design than to answer yours. Still I must finish it, begging the great assistance of your prayers, and declaring my great need of them. I never pray without making you part of the subject of my prayers. I never salute the angels without saluting yours; do the same for me, and get Celse-Benigne to do it. I always pray for him and for all your household! Be sure I never forget them, nor their deceased father, in Holy Mass. God be in your heart, your mind, your soul, my dearest sister; and I am in his merciful love, your very

• Referring to a certain vision of Madame de Chantal's.

devoted servant, with liberty because it is par homme* Pray sometimes for the return of my unfortunate Geneva.

• I think this means that his sort of feudal service to Madame de Chantal is not direct, but by deputy, as kings acknowledged their vassalship.