Letter VI. To a Lady

In these letters and the following, the Saint exhorts this lady, who was aged and infirm, and whom he calls his mother, to lift up her desires towards heaven, to love crosses, to have patience and gentleness with the persons who waited on her.

My dearest Mother, — What shall I say to you? Only a word, for want of time.

Continually practise your heart in interior and exterior sweetness, and keep it in quiet, amid the multiplicity of your affairs.

Keep yourself very earnestly from eager anxiety (empressement), the pest of true devotion, and continue to keep your soul above, only regarding this world to despise it, and time to aspire to eternity.

Often submit your will to the will of God, ready to adore it as much when it sends you tribulations as in the time of consolations.

God be ever in the midst of our hearts, my dearest mother! I am in him, without reserve, and with an affection quite filial, your, &c.