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Chapter III

Of the genuine peace, oneness with Christ, and love for God which spring from the prayer of union, called by the Bride " the kiss " from the divine " mouth."

1. Fervour produced by the " kiss." 2. Signs that a soul has received it. 3. Comparison of the slave's ransom. 4. St. Paulinus of Nola. 5. Difjidence and contrition. 6. Holy confidence. 7. Friar Juan of Cordobilla. 8. Graces left by the " kiss." 9. The flesh wars against the spirit. 10. This appears in the Passion. 11. Strength won by determination. 12. Our blindness to divine love. 13. A prayer for peace.

" LET HIM KISS ME WITH THE KISS OF HIS MOUTH."

I. O HOLY Bride! Let us now ponder over the kiss you

for which reason the latter's half-brother, PhiKp II., obtained his canonisation in 1558. His feast is kept on November 13. 10 ask for, which is that sacred peace that encourages the soul to wage war with the world, while yet preserving perfect confidence and calm within itself. What a happy lot for us to win this grace! It consists in so close a union with God's will that He and the soul are no longer divided, but their will is one1 — not in words and wishes only, but in deeds as well. When the Bride sees that she can serve the Bridegroom better in any way, so ardent are her love and desires that she discusses no difficulties raised by her mind nor hstens to the fears which it suggests, but allows faith to act, seeking no profit or comfort of her own, having learnt at last that her welfare consists entirely in this.

  1. This may not seem right to you, daughters, for prudence is always commendable, but the point to consider is whether, as far as you can tell, God has granted your petition and kissed you with " the kiss of His mouth." If the effects prove that He has done so, you should no longer curb your zeal in any way, but forget self altogether in order to please so gentle a Bridegroom. His Majesty reveals Himself by many signs to the sovl which enjoys this favour. You must examine this point for yourselves — at least as far as the thing is possible — by noticing the effects produced in the soul. Evidently we cannot know for certain, for it concerns a state superior

to the state of grace and resulting from a very special

aid from God. I say that we can, to a certain

degree, ascertain by the effects whether His Majesty

has bestowed this favour on us, because God grants so

high a blessing to the soul in proportion to the strength

of its virtue. Such a soul, while recognising by its

interior light that the Lord has given it the peace craved

for by the Bride, cannot but doubt the fact at times on

realising its own miseries. When you are aware, sisters,

that you have received such a grace, let nothing daunt

you, but forget self entirely in order to please so tender

a Spouse. Perhaps you will ask me to explain myself

more fully, and to tell you which virtues I allude to;

and you will be right, for there are divers kinds of

virtue. I will mention some. One is a contempt for

all earthly things, which the mind rates at their true

price, no longer caring for worldly possessions as it

realises their futility. Such a person takes no pleasure

in the society of those who do not love God, and is weary

of life, holding riches at the esteem they deserve, and

showing other sentiments of the same kind, taught by God

to those whom He has led so far. Once raised to this

state the soul has nothing to fear, except that it may

fail to deserve that God should make use of it by sending

it crosses and occasions of serving Him at however dear

a cost to itself. Here, I repeat, love and faith take control, and the soul does not choose to take counsel from reason. For the union between the Bridegroom and His Bride has taught her things to which the mind cannot attain, so to say, so that she holds it subject beneath her feet.

  1. Let me explain this by a comparison. The Moors hold captive in their land a man whose only hope of rescue lies in being redeemed by his father or an intimate friend ^ who is so poor that all his belongings would not suffice to emancipate the slave, so that this could only be done by the ransomer exchanging places with the prisoner. The strong affection of the former prompts him to prefer his friend's freedom to his own. Then discretion steps in with its many pleas, declaring: " You are bound to care for your own interests first; perhaps you are weaker than he and you might deny your faith; it is wrong to run into danger," with many other objections of the kind. Oh, powerful love of God! nothing seems impossible to one who loves! Happy the soul that has

3 This comparison must have had a much greater force in the days of St. Teresa than it can have at present. Father Gratian, who first pubhshed the Conceptions, fell himself into slavery among the Moors, and the picture he draws in his Peregrinaciones de Anastasio makes one realise the horror of the situation, the barbarous treatment of the captives, the dangers to life, limb and faith, the difficulties of ransom. The church of San Juan de los Reyes at Toledo contains an object lesson: its walls are hung with thousands of heavy chains offered up in thanksgiving by ransomed captives. won this peace from its God! It holds sway over all the trials and dangers of the world, and fears nothing when there is a question of rendering any service to its faithful Spouse and Lord. Well may it be thus confident, for even the father or friend of whom I spoke felt such love!

  1. You have read, daughters, of a certain Saint2 who, not for the sake of a son or a friend, but because he must have won the happiness of having received this divine grace, desired to please His Majesty and to imitate, in some degree, the many sufferings He bore for us. This holy man went into the country of the Moors, and exchanged places with the son of a poor widow who had come to him in great distress about her child. You know of the success and the reward with which he met.3 Doubtless his mind presented to him many more objections than those I enumerated, for he was a bishop and had to leave his flock; indeed he was probably beset by great misgivings.

  2. I must mention something which applies to those who are naturally timid and wanting in courage, as are most women constitutionally, so that, though their souls have genuinely been raised to this state, nature takes alarm. We must be on our guard, lest through our inborn frailty we lose a priceless crown. When these fears assault you, have recourse to faith and humility, and proceed to act with the confidence that God can do all things now, as when, in the past. He enabled many noble maidens to suffer the grievous torments they had resolved to undergo for His sake. What He wishes for is the resolution which makes Him Master of your free will, for He needs no strength of ours. Indeed, His Majesty prefers to manifest His power in feeble souls, where it has more scope for work, and where He can better bestow the graces He longs to give. Profit, then, by the virtues He has implanted in you, to act with determination and to despise the obstacles raised by your reason and by your natural weakness, which will increase if you stop to wonder " whether you had better venture upon this course or no, for perhaps you are too sinful to deserve the same aid from God that He gives to others "!

  3. This is not the time to think about your sins; such humility is out of time and place. When some great honour is offered you or the devil tempts you to a self-indulgent life, or other things of the same sort, then fear that your misdeeds would prevent your doing so with rectitude. But when it is a question of suffering, either for your God or your neighbour, feel no misgivings because of your sins. Perhaps you may perform this action with such charity that God will forgive you all your bad deeds, and this is what Satan fears, and therefore reminds you of all your former wrongdoings. You may be sure that God will never desert those who love Him, when they incur danger solely for His sake. But let them examine whether they are influenced by selñsh motives: I speak only of those who seek to please God more perfectly.

  4. I knew a man in our own times, Fray Juan of Cordobilla,4 whom you saw when he came to visit me, who was inspired by our Lord with such charity that he was bitterly grieved at not being allowed to go and exchange places with some captive. Juan was a laybrother of the Barefooted Franciscans reformed by St. Peter de Alcantara, and told me himself all about it.

After a great many appeals, he obtained leave from his General, but at about fifteen miles from Algiers, while on his way to accomplish his good purpose, God took him to Himself. Doubtless Fray Juan was generously rewarded. How many prudent people must have told him that he was very foolish, and we who do not share his love for our Lord agree with them, yet what could be more unwise than to end our life's dream with such prudence? God grant that we may deserve even to enter heaven, not to speak of ranking with souls so far advanced in their love for God!

  1. I realise the need of strong help from Him that we may perform such deeds, therefore I advise you, my daughters, to persevere in begging from Him this delightful peace, which dominates the silly fears of the world, peacefully and quietly making war on it. Is it not evident that God has endowed with great graces the soul which He has favoured so highly as to unite it to Himself in this close friendship? For, most certainly, this is not our own doing: we can only pray and long for this mercy, and we need His help even for that. As for the rest, what power has a worm whose sins make it so cowardly and mean that we fancy all the virtues must be measured by the baseness of our human nature? What can be done, daughters? Pray with the Bride: " Let Him kiss me with the kiss of His mouth."

9» If a poor little peasant wench were to marry the king, would not her children be of royal blood? Then, if our Lord favours a soul by uniting it thus absolutely with Himself, what desires, what deeds, what heroic virtues will be the children born of the union, unless the soul put obstacles in the way? ' Therefore I repeat it:• if God shows you the grace of giving you an occasion of performing such actions for Him, do not recall to mind your past sins. Here faith must overcome our misery. Do not be alarmed if you are nervous and timid when first you determine to undertake such deeds, or even if these feelings should last, take no notice of them except to be on your guard more watchfully — let the flesh have its say. Remember the prayer of the good Jesus in the garden: " The flesh is weak,"5 and think of His wonderful and grievous sweat. If, as His Majesty said, His divine and sinless flesh was weak, how can our flesh be so strong, while we live in this world, as not to dread the persecutions and trials that menace it? When they come, the flesh will become subject to the spirit; for after our will has become united to the will of God, it will lament no more.

  1. It has just occurred to me that although our good Jesus showed human weakness before His sufferings, yet He was intrepid when plunged into the midst of them,

' The passage beginning " Therefore I repeat," to the end of paragraph 11, is only in the manuscripts of Las Nieves and Consuegra. for not only did He utter no complaint, but He showed no weakness in the way He bore them. On entering the garden He said: "My soul is sorrowful even unto death," ' yet while dying on the cross He never murmured. He went to wake His Apostles during the prayer in the garden, but He had better cause to speak of His pain to His Mother while she watched at the foot of the cross, for she did not sleep — her soul suffered and died a bitter death. Yet the greatest consolation is to be found in seeking sympathy from those we know share our sorrows and love us most deeply.

II. Let us not trouble about our fears nor lose heart at the sight of our frailty, but strive to fortify our humility and be clearly convinced of how little we can do for ourselves, for without the grace of God we are nothing. Let us confide in His mercy and distrust our own strength in every way, because reliance on this is the root of all our weakness. It was not without strong reason that our Lord showed weakness, for it is plain that He Who is power itself could never feel fear. He acted thus to comfort us, to show that good desires must be carried out in deeds, and to make us recognise that when the soul first begins mortifying itself, it finds everything painful. It is a pain to give up pleasures; a torment to forgo honour; an intolerable trial to bear a hard word; — in short, nothing but mortal sufterings. But * St. Matt, xxvi. 38: Tristis est anima mea usq'ue ad mortem. when once determined to die to this world, it is freed from all these ills, and no trials can make it complain. Now it has found the peace for which the Bride petitions.

  1. The " kiss of His mouth." Undoubtedly we should be enriched if we approached the most Holy Sacrament but once with great faith and love; how much more as we receive it so often? Apparently we frequent it only out of custom, and therefore gain but little light. O wretched world, who dost obstruct from thy dwellers the sight of the treasures by which they might purchase eternal wealth! Ah, Lord of heaven and earth, is it then possible, during this mortal life, to enjoy such close friendship with Thee? Clearly as the Holy Spirit states it in these words, we do not even wish to understand the meaning in the Canticle of Canticles of the caresses, the wooing, and the dehghts Thou dost bestow upon the soul.

  2. One speech of this sort should suffice to make us all Thine own. Blessed be Thou, O Lord, for nothing is wanting on Thy part! In how many ways, by how many means and manners dost Thou show Thy love! By Thy labours, by Thy bitter death, by the tortures and insults Thou didst bear, by the pardon Thou dost grant us, — and not by these alone, but by the words Thou dost utter and teach us to utter in these Canticles, which so pierce the soul that loves Thee, that I know not how it could endure them unless Thou didst afford it succour, not according to its merits, but as its weakness needs. I ask, then, O Lord, no more of Thee in this life except that Thou " kiss me with the kiss of Thy mouth," in such a way that, even if I wished, I could not separate myself from union and friendship with Thee. Grant that my will may be subject to and may never swerve from Thine, leaving nothing to prevent my saying with truth, O my God and my Glory, that " Thy breasts are better" and more delicious " than wine."

Footnotes

  1. Life, ch. xviii. 4 sqq. Castle, M. v. ch. ii. 4-6; ch. Hi. 6 sqq. * The following passage, till " I will mention some " — is only in the manuscripts of Las Nieves and Consuegra. ↩

  2. St. Gregory the Great narrates that St. Paulinus of Nola, having spent all the money he could raise in ransoming other captives, sold himself to the Vandals to redeem the son of a poor widow, and that he laboured as a slave, working in a garden until his master, discovering his merits and the spirit of prophecy with which he was endowed, set him at liberty {Dialogues, bk. iii. ch. i.). ↩

  3. The passage beginning " Doubtless his mind," to the end of paragraph 6, is only in the manuscripts of Las Nieves and Consuegra. ↩

  4. The chronicle of the Friars of St. Peter de Alcantara says that Juan de Cordobilla (near Mérida), who after the death of his wife had become a lay-brother, asked for leave to offer himself as a ransom for some Christian captive among the Moors. The superiors at first demurred, thinking him mad, but finally consented. His ship, having come within sight of the African coast, was driven back by a gale, and Juan, who was seized with fever, was landed at Gibraltar, where he died, October 28, 1566. As some of the nuns at Segovia had come from Avila, St. Teresa could well say: " You saw him when he came to visit me." ↩

  5. St INIatt. xxvi. 41; Caro autem infirma. ↩

Chapter 4 of 8