Abandonment;
OR,
Absolute Surrender to Divine Providence.
Posthumous Work
OF
REV. J. P. DE CAUSSADE, S.J.
REVISED AND CORRECTED BY
Rev. H. RAMIÈRE, S.J.
_Translated from the Eighth French Edition_
BY
Miss ELLA McMAHON.
NEW YORK, CINCINNATI, AND ST. LOUIS:
BENZIGER BROTHERS,
_Printers to the Holy Apostolic See_.
R. WASHBOURNE, M. H. GILL & SON,
_18 Paternoster Row, London_. _50 Upper O’Connell St., Dublin_.
1887.
[Illustration: Coat of Arms of Archbishop of New York]
Imprimatur,
☩ MICHAEL AUGUSTINE,
ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK.
NEW YORK, Feb. 15, 1887.
Copyright, 1887, by BENZIGER BROTHERS.
A PREFACE
ON THE
_FOUNDATION AND TRUE NATURE OF THE VIRTUE OF ABANDONMENT_,
TO EXPLAIN AND DEFEND
FATHER CAUSSADE’S DOCTRINE.
There is no truth however clear which does not become error the moment
it is lessened or exaggerated; and there is no food however salutary
for the soul which may not, when ill-applied, become a fatal poison.
The virtue of abandonment does not escape this danger; the more holy
and profitable it is in itself the more serious are the dangers we risk
by misunderstanding its just limits.
These dangers, unfortunately, are not mere possibilities. The
seventeenth century witnessed the birth of a heresy,--that of the
Quietists,--which, while claiming to teach its followers perfect
abandonment to God, led them into the most terrible disorders. For a
time this sect wrought its ravages in the very capital of Catholicism,
and put forth such specious sophistries that the pious Fénelon himself,
while abhorring the practical consequences drawn from this teaching,
was for a time misled by its false appearance of perfection.
To preserve Father Caussade’s readers from these dangers, we think it
well to add to these writings a succinct exposition of the rules which
should guide us in a matter so delicate. By the light of the principles
jointly furnished us by reason and faith, we shall have no difficulty
in determining the just limits which should mark our abandonment to
divine Providence; and it will be easy for us afterwards to elucidate
the points in our author’s doctrine which might be wrongly interpreted.
I.
Father Caussade explains very clearly in his “Letters” the two
principles which form the unalterable basis of the virtue of
abandonment.
First principle: Nothing is done, nothing happens, either in the
material or in the moral world, which God has not foreseen from all
eternity, and which He has not willed, or at least permitted.
Second principle: God can will nothing, He can permit nothing, but in
view of the end He proposed to Himself in creating the world; _i.e._,
in view of His glory and the glory of the Man-God, Jesus Christ, His
only Son.
To these two principles laid down by our author we shall add a third,
which will complete the elucidation of this whole subject: As long as
man lives upon earth, God desires to be glorified through the happiness
of this privileged creature; and consequently in God’s designs the
interest of man’s sanctification and happiness is inseparable from the
interest of the divine glory.
If we do not lose sight of these principles, which no Christian can
question, we shall understand that our confidence in the Providence of
our Father in heaven cannot be too great, too absolute, too childlike.
If nothing but what He permits happens, and if He can permit nothing
but what is for our happiness, then we have nothing to fear, except
not being sufficiently submissive to God. As long as we keep ourselves
united with Him and we walk after His designs, were all creatures to
turn against us they could not harm us. He who relies upon God becomes
by this very reliance as powerful and as invincible as God, and created
powers can no more prevail against him than against God Himself.
This confidence in the fatherly providence of God cannot, evidently,
dispense us from doing all that is in our power to accomplish His
designs; but after having done all that depends upon our efforts we
will abandon ourselves completely to God for the rest.
This abandonment should extend, in fact, to everything--to the past, to
the present, to the future; to the body and all its conditions; to the
soul and all its miseries, as well as all its qualities; to blessings;
to afflictions; to the good will of men, and to their malice; to the
vicissitudes of the material, and the revolutions of the moral, world;
to life and to death; to time and to eternity.
However, as these different orders of things do not enter in the
same manner in the designs of divine Providence, neither should our
abandonment in regard to these be practised in the same manner; and
the rules which we should follow in the practice of this virtue should
be founded on the nature itself of the objects which call it forth. We
shall indicate the principal ones.
I. Among all the dispositions to which our abandonment can be applied,
there are first, those which depend solely upon God, where human
liberty has no part either in producing or averting them. Such are, for
example, certain scourges, and vicissitudes of the atmosphere; certain
accidents impossible to foresee, certain natural defects of body or
soul.
In regard to facts of this order, whether of the past, present, or
future, it is evident that our abandonment cannot be too absolute.
There is nothing to do here but to passively and lovingly endure all
that God sends us; to blindly accept in advance all that it may please
Him to send us in the future. Resistance would be useless, and only
serve to make us unhappy; a loving and frequently renewed acceptance,
on the contrary, would make these inevitable sufferings very
meritorious. And oh, the marvels of God’s goodness! Our abandonment
will not only sanctify and fructify real trials; it will enable us to
derive great merit from trials to which we shall never be subjected.
For, if we lovingly accept these trials when they present themselves to
our minds as probable, or simply possible, this willing acquiescence,
this _fiat_ uttered in the depths of the heart, cannot fail to please
God, and be very useful to our souls. Therefore, in regard to this
first order of events, the practice of abandonment cannot but be very
sanctifying, as it changes into means of sanctification not only real
but even purely imaginary trials.
* * * * *
II. There are other sufferings which come to us through the malice of
creatures: persecutions, calumnies, ill-treatment, neglect, injustice,
and offences of every kind. What are we to do when we find ourselves
exposed to vexatious things of this sort?
1st. We evidently cannot like the offence against God with which they
are accompanied; we should, on the contrary, deplore and detest it, not
because it wounds our self-love, but because it is an offence against
the divine rights, and compromises the salvation of the offending souls.
2d. As for that which concerns us, on the contrary, we should regard
as a blessing that which is in itself an evil; and to do this we need
only recall the principles previously laid down: not to look only at
the creature who is the immediate cause of our sufferings, but to raise
our eyes higher and behold God, who has foreseen and permitted them
from all eternity, and who in permitting them had only our happiness in
view. This thought will be sufficient to dissipate the bitterness and
trouble which would take possession of our hearts were we to look only
at the injustice of which we are the victims.
3d. In regard to the effects of this injustice already consummated
and irreparable, we have only to resign ourselves as lovingly as
possible, and carefully gather their precious fruits. It is frequently
not difficult to divine the spiritual fruits God destined for us
in exposing us to temporal evils: to detach us from creatures; to
deliver us from inordinate affections, from our pride, from our
tepidity,--veritable maladies of the soul, frequently all the more
dangerous that they are less perceptible, and of which the heavenly
Physician wishes to cure us, using the malice of our neighbor as a
sharp instrument. We do not hesitate to endure much greater sufferings
to be delivered from corporal infirmities; then let us gratefully
accept the spiritual health, infinitely more precious, which God offers
us, however disagreeable the instrument through which He gives it to us.
4th. If it is in our power to avert the consequences of malice and
injustice, and if in our true interest, and in the interest of the
divine glory, we deem it necessary to take any measures to this end,
let us do so without departing from the practice of the holy virtue of
abandonment. Let us commit the success of our efforts to God, and be
ready to accept failure if God judges it more suitable to His designs
and more profitable to our souls. We are so blind that we always have
reason to fear being deceived; but God cannot be deceived, and we may
be certain, in advance, that what He determines will be best. Therefore
we cannot do better than abandon with fullest confidence the result of
our efforts to Him.
* * * * *
III. But should this abandonment extend equally to our acts of
imprudence, to our faults, and all the annoyances of every kind in
which they may result?
It is important to distinguish here two things which self-love tends to
confound. In the fault itself we must distinguish what is culpable and
what is humiliating. Likewise in its consequences we must distinguish
what is detrimental to the divine glory and the confusion inflicted on
our self-love. Evidently we cannot hate too much the fault, properly so
called, nor regret too keenly the injury done to the divine glory. But
as for our humiliation, and the confusion inflicted on our self-love,
we should rejoice, and acquiesce in it with complete abandonment.
This kind of sacrifice is undoubtedly the best fitted to destroy in
us the most secret fibres of self-love, and to cause us to make rapid
progress in virtue. To souls who have attained a certain degree of
regularity and detachment, exterior humiliations are very little. When
we have learned the vanity of human glory, we easily endure the sting
of contempt; but we may still unite with this exterior detachment great
attachment to our own esteem and approbation, and a wholly egotistical
desire of perfection. In this case, self-love, by changing its object,
would only become more subtle and more dangerous. To destroy it, there
is no remedy more efficacious than the humiliation resulting from our
faults; and we cannot, consequently, strive too earnestly to apply the
practice of abandonment to this humiliation, endeavoring at the same
time to correct the faults themselves.
And what we say of faults of the past applies equally to faults of the
future. The practice of abandonment well understood should deliver us
from that impatience which makes us wish to at once attain the summit
of perfection, and which only serves to keep us from it by turning us
from the only path which leads to perfection. This path is humility,
and the impatience which we are censuring is only another form of
pride. Let us make every effort to correct our faults; but let us be
resigned to not seeing them all disappear in a day. Let us earnestly,
and with the most filial confidence, ask God to grant us that decisive
grace which will completely wrest us from ourselves, to make us
live only in Him; but let us leave to Him, with an equally filial
abandonment, the care of determining the day and hour in which this
grace shall be given us.
With still greater reason should we abandon to God the determining
of the degree of sanctity which we shall attain upon earth, the
extraordinary graces which will accompany this sanctity here below,
and the glory with which it will be crowned in heaven. In as far as
it depends upon us, we should leave nothing undone to increase this
sanctity and this glory, in order not to fall short of the degree
God has marked for us; but if we must earnestly devote ourselves to
realizing His designs, we must not desire to have them other than they
are. If our love for God is what it should be, we will thank Him for
having granted other souls favors that He has refused us, and we will
praise Him no less for our poverty than for our riches.
* * * * *
IV. Should our abandonment go still farther? Should we, in view of
the hypothesis--perfectly possible, alas!--of our damnation, resign
ourselves thereto, and thus make to God the complete and absolute
sacrifice of all our own interests?
To this point would Fénelon have carried the purity of love and the
perfection of abandonment; and he did not lack plausible motives with
which to support this doctrine. He drew from the example and the
writings of the Saints arguments still more specious to prove that God
frequently requires this complete sacrifice of elect souls; and that to
obtain it He impresses them with an irresistible conviction of their
eternal loss. According to this great prelate, divine love is only
perfect in souls who have gone through this trial without faltering,
and who by a sacrifice have renounced, at least hypothetically, all
their own interest, even that of their eternal salvation.
But the Church has condemned this doctrine which, in proposing to man a
perfection contrary to his nature, reverses the order of God’s designs.
How, in fact, can perfection consist in destroying the most essential
law of our moral nature, viz., that irresistible inclination which
leads us to seek our happiness? How could love of God require that we
rob God of one of His attributes--the one which makes Him the supreme
object of our beatitude? How could one of the theological virtues
be contrary to another, and charity exclude hope? What is eternal
happiness if not the eternal reign of pure love? and how could the
pure love of time consist in excluding, even hypothetically, from our
desires the pure love of eternity?
That which perfect abandonment asks is that we observe in our desires
the order of God’s designs. God created all things for His glory
first; and secondly, but inseparably, for our happiness. Let us do as
He does: let us never separate the interest of His glory from that of
our happiness, but let us always make the second subordinate to the
first. Let us love God as the object of our beatitude, but let us love
Him above all for His infinite goodness. Let us desire and hope for our
eternal happiness; but since this happiness, when we shall enjoy it,
must result from the love of God for Himself, let us begin now to seek
it as it must be when we realize it, and refer the desire of it, as we
will one day refer its enjoyment, to the glory of this great God who
desires to be all in all things.
Thus, at one and the same time, we can practise charity and hope,
seek the glory of God and our own happiness, fill the designs of our
Creator, and satisfy the deepest and most imperative needs of our
nature.
The saints did not do otherwise; and Father Caussade, in one of his
letters, proves very clearly that the formulas of apparent despair that
they have sometimes used in the transports of their cruel sufferings
contained in reality acts of the most meritorious confidence. Elsewhere
he also shows most perfectly how ill-founded is this even hypothetic
separation between God’s interests and our true interests; and he
justly concludes therefrom that perfection cannot consist in supposing
this separation and sacrificing the interest of our eternal happiness
to that of the divine glory.
II.
We have no reason, therefore, to fear that in reading Father Caussade’s
treatise we are liable to confound, at least in this respect, the
abandonment he recommends with the Quietism condemned in Fénelon.
Is our author equally irreproachable in all the other points of his
doctrine? Might he not be accused of turning his readers from duties
which require labor and effort to keep them in an indolent repose?
There would be ground for this reproach if Father Caussade promised
to give his readers a complete treatise on Christian and religious
perfection; but this he does not do. He addresses himself to souls
already advanced in virtue and accustomed not only to faithfully
fulfil the essential precepts of Christianity, but also to observe
the prescriptions of religious discipline. Like the young man in
the Gospel who from his youth had kept the commandments, and who
begged our Saviour to show him a higher perfection, these souls ask
Father Caussade what they must do to sanctify themselves after having
accomplished all the duties imposed upon their free will. The man
of God answers them like our Saviour: If you would be perfect, rid
yourself of all that may still cling to you of attachment to your
own interests, your own ideas, your own will, and abandon yourself
completely to God. Practise the virtue of abandonment; practise it so
habitually that it will become the constant state of your soul: thus
you will cease to live to yourself, to live only in God.
This is a summary of the book we are re-editing to-day. To understand
it we must bear in mind, as we read it, the situation of the author,
and that of the souls to whom his counsels are addressed; viz., that
it is not, as we have already said, a complete treatise of Christian
perfection which he has claimed to write; his only object was to set
forth the advantages of a special virtue and a particular state. It is
true that this virtue is one of the most essential bases of sanctity,
and that this state is sanctity itself as far as it is attainable on
earth. But it is no less true that Father Caussade had no idea whatever
of telling all Christians what they should do to save their souls.
Therefore it would be a serious mistake to believe ourselves dispensed
from all duties of which he makes no mention, in order to devote
ourselves only to this great duty of abandonment, the importance of
which he so justly and eloquently portrays.
To avoid this dangerous error, and reap all the profit of this true
and very consoling doctrine of Father Caussade, it will be sufficient
to cast a general glance over the divine economy in the salvation of
souls, and to see what place abandonment to divine Providence occupies
in this great work.
We all know that sanctification is a work both divine and human. It is
divine through its immediate principle, the Holy Spirit; through its
meritorious cause, the Incarnation and the death of the Son of God;
through its end, the happiness of the Holy Trinity, in which holy souls
are to participate for all eternity; finally, through its chief means,
the teachings and the graces of Jesus Christ transmitted to men through
the Church.
But this work is human also, since the graces of the Holy Spirit, the
merits of the Son of God, the designs of the Holy Trinity, and all
the efforts of Providence can bear fruit in a soul only as far as she
freely co-operates with them.
This co-operation in our sanctification which God requires of us is
composed of three parts.
It consists first of all in the destruction of everything in our
corrupt nature which is an obstacle to the divine action: sins, vices,
sensible inclinations, defects, imperfections. This first labor is
what the masters of the spiritual life call the _purgative way_. It
is accomplished by examinations of conscience, works of penance and
mortification, and the various practices in use in the Church.
The second part of the labor which God imposes on the soul desirous
to attain sanctity is less painful, and easier. It is what is called
the _illuminative way_. The soul that God introduces therein exercises
herself in producing the interior acts of virtue with which grace
inspires her, and in practicing the good works to which this same grace
impels her.
Finally, when the obstacles are removed and the soul’s preparation
is completed, God unites Himself to her, fills her with His grace,
inflames her with His love, and uses her as a docile instrument for the
accomplishment of His designs: this is the _unitive way_.
But let us not misapprehend this condition. Even in this perfect state
in which God is fully master of His reasonable creature, He does not
act in her without her co-operation; He requires of her great fidelity
in avoiding the smallest faults, great vigilance over her affections,
great generosity in denying herself in all things, great fervor in
prayer. So far from dispensing her from the works of the illuminative
way by which she prepared herself for the divine union, He causes her
to accomplish them with greater perfection and merit.
Among these works common to the two ways of which we have just spoken,
there are some which are strictly of obligation, either because they
are prescribed to all Christians by the commandments of God and
the Church, or because they are imposed on each one by the special
circumstances of his state. There are others which are simply of
counsel, or even purely of supererogation, and which each one embraces
according to his more or less ardent desire of sanctification. In the
same way, among the works of penance which form the purgative way there
are some from which no one can dispense himself; but there are others
which, without being of absolute necessity, are more or less useful, or
even relatively necessary to certain souls, because of their particular
position, and the violence of the inclinations which impel them to
evil.
Such is man’s threefold part in the beginning, progress, and
consummation of the eminently divine work of sanctification--a part
essentially active, and so necessary that without it God’s part would
be hopelessly sterile. Father Caussade, however, says very little of
it in his book. Does he doubt its immense importance and absolute
necessity? Far from it. On the contrary, in many passages he is careful
to warn us that the _passiveness_ which he recommends to the soul in
no way dispenses her from the very active accomplishment of all that
is _duty_, whether general or special. He adds that the souls who walk
in the ordinary ways should not dispense themselves from the practices
of supererogation in use in the Church among pious persons, and from
following the rules traced by the masters of the spiritual life.
Even upon persons who have reached the passive state he imposes the
obligation of actively following the inspirations of grace when they
lead to action, and of doing all to which they are impelled by grace.
Why, then, after making these reservations in some parts of his
work does he seem to forget them, to solely extol the advantages of
abandonment to the divine action? We have already said why: because the
souls to whom he addressed himself, long exercised in the practice of
active virtue, had special need to perfect themselves in this passive
abandonment.
How many such souls there are in religious communities, or even in
the midst of the world, who have no need to be urged to activity in
the pursuit of sanctity, but who, on the contrary, need above all
things to learn to let God act in them! Father Caussade addresses
himself specially to these souls. Had his book no other result than
to enlighten them upon God’s real designs concerning them, to deliver
them from their disquieting agitation in order to introduce them into
a broad and peaceful path, and enable them to find powerful means of
salvation in unfortuitous events which they regard as obstacles, we
should still believe that in offering this work to them we are doing
them an eminent service.
But the salutary teaching of this book is not limited to a special
class of persons. Though written specially for souls who have already
attained a high degree of perfection, the doctrine it develops is
suited to all Christians. It makes it clear to all that if God does
not dispense them from laboring actively for their salvation, He takes
upon Himself the greatest part of this work; that He unceasingly labors
thereon; that He employs all creatures and all events to further it;
and that if they will only permit Him to do His will,--without doing
any more than they are doing, without suffering any more than they are
suffering, but only by recognizing and loving God’s action in things
which He obliges them to do and suffer, they will amass infinite merits
and attain great perfection.
Thus Father Caussade does not suppress our active co-operation in the
work of our sanctification, but he teaches us to profit much better
than we do of God’s part therein, by abandoning ourselves more to
Him. In events where too frequently we see only misfortunes, because
we regard them as more or less reprehensible effects of the malice
or the imperfection of creatures, he teaches us to see the divine
love using these same creatures as instruments either to correct our
vices or to cause us to practise virtue. Therefore he changes the
principal obstacles to the success of this great work into means of
sanctification, and teaches us the art of changing creatures the most
indifferent or the most hostile into powerful auxiliaries. With good
reason does he desire to be able to inculcate this doctrine in men of
all conditions; for there is no doubt that, if they understood it well,
sanctity would seem to them much more attainable; and that, seeing
God laboring unceasingly upon this work, they would fulfil with much
greater courage the duties imposed upon their free will.
H. RAMIÈRE, S.J.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
PREFACE BY REV. H. RAMIÈRE, S.J. 3
BOOK FIRST.
_OF THE NATURE AND EXCELLENCE OF THE
VIRTUE OF HOLY ABANDONMENT._
CHAPTER
I. The sanctity of the righteous of the Old Law,
and of Joseph and of Mary herself, consisted
in fidelity to the order of God 31
II. The duties of each moment are the shadows
which veil the divine action 33
III. How much easier sanctity becomes when
studied from this point of view 36
IV. Perfection does not consist in knowing the
order of God, but in submitting to it 42
V. Reading and other exercises only sanctify us
in so far as they are the channels of the
divine action 44
VI. The mind and other human means are useful
only in so far as they are the instruments of
the divine action 49
VII. There is no enduring peace but in submission
to the divine action 52
VIII. The perfection of souls and the excellence of
different states are in proportion to their conformity
to the order of God 54
IX. All the riches of grace are the fruit of purity of
heart and perfect self-abandonment 62
BOOK SECOND.
_THE DIVINE ACTION AND THE MANNER IN
WHICH IT UNCEASINGLY WORKS THE
SANCTIFICATION OF SOULS._
CHAPTER PAGE
I. The divine action is everywhere and always
present, though only visible to the eye of
Faith 69
II. The divine action is all the more visible to the
eye of Faith when hidden under appearances
most repugnant to the senses 74
III. The divine action offers us at each moment
infinite blessings which we receive in proportion
to our faith and love 79
IV. God reveals Himself to us as mysteriously, as
adorably, and with as much reality in the
most ordinary events as in the great events of
history and the Holy Scriptures 82
V. The divine action continues in our hearts the
revelation begun in Holy Scripture; but the
characters in which it is written will be only
visible at the last day 86
VI. Divine love is communicated to us through
the veil of creatures, as Jesus communicates
Himself to us through the veil of the Eucharistic
species 92
VII. The divine action, the will of God, is as unworthily
treated and disregarded, in its daily
manifestation, by many Christians, as was
Jesus in the flesh by the Jews 94
VIII. The revelation of the present moment is the
more profitable that it is addressed directly
to us 97
IX. The revelation of the present moment is an inexhaustible
source of sanctity 99
X. The present moment is the manifestation of the
name of God and the coming of His kingdom 101
XI. The divine will imparts the highest sanctity
to souls; they have but to abandon themselves
to its divine action 106
XII. The divine action alone can sanctify us, for
it forms us after the divine Model of our
perfection 114
BOOK THIRD.
_THE PATERNAL CARE WITH WHICH GOD
SURROUNDS SOULS WHOLLY ABANDONED
TO HIM._
CHAPTER PAGE
I. God Himself guides souls who wholly abandon
themselves to Him 119
II. The more God seems to withdraw light from
the soul abandoned to His direction, the more
safely He guides her 125
III. The afflictions with which God visits the soul
are but loving artifices at which she will one
day rejoice 129
IV. The more God seems to take from a soul wholly
abandoned to Him, the more generous He is
to her 133
V. The less capable the faithful soul is of defending
herself, the more powerfully does God
defend her 136
VI. The soul abandoned to the will of God, so far
from resisting its enemies, finds in them useful
auxiliaries 140
VII. The soul that abandons itself to God has no
need to justify herself by words or actions;
the divine action abundantly justifies her 142
VIII. God gives life to the soul abandoned to Him
by means which apparently lead only to
death 144
IX. Love holds the place of all things to souls who
walk in the way of abandonment 149
X. The faithful soul finds in submission to the will
of God more force and strength than the
proudest of those who resist Him 154
XI. The soul abandoned to God learns to recognize
His will, even in the proud who resist Him.
All creatures, whether good or evil, reveal
Him to her 158
XII. God assures to faithful souls a glorious victory
over the powers of earth and hell 160
APPENDIX.
PAGE
I. A very easy means of acquiring peace of heart,
by Fr. Surin 165
II. On perfect abandonment, by Bossuet 172
III. A short and easy method of making the prayer
of faith, and of the simple presence of God,
by Bossuet 173
IV. Exercise of loving union of our will with that
of God, by St. Francis de Sales 185
V. Acts of abandonment 188
Book First.
The Nature and Excellence of the Virtue of Holy Abandonment.
_CHAPTER I._
The Sanctity of the Righteous of the Old Law, and of Joseph and of
Mary herself, consisted in Fidelity to the Order of God.
God speaks to-day as He spoke to our fathers, when directors were
not so numerous, nor methods of direction so well defined. All their
spirituality consisted in simple fidelity to the order of God; but
it was not reduced to a science which explained it so sublimely or
minutely, or contained so many precepts, so many maxims, so much
instruction. Our present wants, no doubt, require this explanation. It
was not so in the first ages of the Church, when men were more simple
and upright. Each moment brought a duty to be faithfully fulfilled:
this was sufficient for interior souls of that day. Their whole
attention was concentrated simply upon the duty of each successive
moment with the fidelity of the hour-hand of a clock which steadily
traverses stroke by stroke the circle in which it is appointed to move.
The mind, unceasingly moved by divine grace, turned insensibly to the
new duty which presented itself in the order of God every hour. Such
were the hidden springs of Mary’s life, the most perfect example of
simple and absolute self-abandonment to the will of God. The simple
words, _Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum_, with which she was content to
answer the angel, expressed all the mystic theology of the ancients.
Then, as now, it was all reduced to the simplest and most absolute
abandonment of the soul to the will of God under whatever form it
manifested itself. This noble and exalted disposition, the basis of
all Mary’s spirituality, is brilliantly manifested in the words _Fiat
mihi_. Observe how perfectly they accord with those which our Lord
would have ever on our lips and in our hearts: _Fiat voluntas tua_.
True, the duty required of Mary at that supreme moment was a glorious
one for her. But all the splendor of that glory would have made no
impression upon her if the divine will, alone capable of influencing
her, had not arrested her attention. It was this divine will which
guided her in everything. Her occupations, whether ordinary or exalted,
were in her eyes but shadows more or less obscure in which she found
equal means of glorifying God and recognizing the workings of the
Almighty. She joyfully accepted the duty or suffering of each moment
as a gift from Him who fills with good things the hearts which are
nourished by Him alone, and not by appearances or created things.
_CHAPTER II._
The Duties of each Moment are the Shadows which veil the Divine Action.
“_The power of the Most High shall overshadow thee_,” said the angel to
Mary.
This shadow, behind which the power of God effects the entrance and
growth of Jesus Christ in our souls, is the form assumed by the duties,
attractions, and crosses of each moment.
They are in truth but shadows like those to which we give the name in
the order of nature, and which envelop sensible objects and hide them
from our view. Thus in the moral and supernatural order the duties
of each moment under their obscure appearances conceal the truth of
the divine will, which alone merits our attention. Thus Mary regarded
them. Therefore these shadows passing before her senses, so far from
deceiving her, filled her with faith in Him who is always the same.
Withdraw, Archangel; thy moment passes; thou vanishest. Mary passes
beyond thee; she is ever in advance; but the Holy Ghost, with whom she
has been filled through the sensible appearances of thy mission, will
never abandon her.
There are few extraordinary events in the exterior life of Mary. At
least it is not to these that Holy Scripture calls our attention.
Her exterior life is represented as very simple, very ordinary. She
did and suffered as did others of her condition. She goes to visit
her cousin Elizabeth: the other relatives go also. She retires to a
stable: it is a consequence of her poverty. She returns to Nazareth:
the persecution of Herod had driven her forth. Jesus and Joseph lived
there with her, by the labor of their hands. Behold the daily bread of
the holy family! But with what bread was the faith of Mary and Joseph
nourished? What was the sacrament of all their sacred moments? What
did they discover under the ordinary appearance of the events which
filled their lives? Exteriorly, nothing more than was happening to the
rest of mankind; interiorly, faith discovers and develops nothing less
than God working great things. O bread of angels! Heavenly manna! Pearl
of the Gospel! Sacrament of the present moment! Thou givest God under
appearances as poor and mean as the manger, the hay, and the straw!
But to whom dost thou give Him? _Esurientes reples bonis._ God reveals
Himself to the humble in little things; and the proud, regarding only
the exterior, find Him not even in great things.
_CHAPTER III._
How much Easier Sanctity becomes when studied from this Point of View.
If the work of our salvation offers obstacles apparently so
insurmountable, it is because we have not a just idea of it. In truth,
sanctity consists in but one thing--fidelity to the order of God; and
this fidelity is equally within the reach of all, whether in its active
or in its passive part.
The active part of fidelity consists in fulfilling the duties imposed
upon us either by the general commands of God and the Church, or by the
particular state we have embraced.
Its passive part consists in lovingly accepting all that God sends us
each moment.
Which of these two parts of sanctity is above our strength? Not the
active part, since the duties it enjoins cease to be duties for us the
moment our strength is really unequal to them. Will not the state of
your health permit you to hear Mass? You are no longer obliged to do
so. And so it is with all positive obligations which prescribe duties
to be fulfilled. Only those precepts which forbid things evil in
themselves admit of no exception, for it is never permitted to do evil.
Is there anything easier or more reasonable? What excuse can be urged
against it? Yet this is all the co-operation God requires of the soul
in the work of its sanctification.
He requires it of great and small, of strong and weak; in a word, of
all, at all times, in all places.
Therefore He only requires of us what is easy, since to attain eminent
sanctity requires but a simple good-will.
If over and above the commandments He shows us the counsels as the more
perfect end of our efforts, He is ever careful to accommodate their
observance to our position and character. As the chief mark of our
vocation for the counsels He sends us the attractions and graces which
facilitate the practice of them. He urges no one but in proportion to
his strength and according to his attainments. Again I ask, what could
be more just?
O you who aspire to perfection and are tempted to discouragement by
what you read in the lives of the saints and find prescribed in certain
pious books! O you who are overwhelmed by the terrible ideas that you
form of perfection! It is for your consolation that God permits that I
write this.
Learn what you seem not to know.
In the order of nature, necessary things, as air, water, earth, the God
of all goodness has made common and easy of attainment. Nothing is more
necessary than breath, sleep, food, and nothing is more common. Love
and fidelity are no less necessary in the spiritual order; therefore
the difficulty of acquiring them cannot be as great as you represent it
to yourselves.
Observe your life; of what does it consist? Of a multitude of
unimportant actions. Yet with these same unimportant actions God deigns
to be content. This is the co-operation required of the soul in the
work of its perfection. God Himself expresses it too clearly to admit
of doubt: “Fear God, and keep His commandments: for this is all man”
(Eccles. xii. 13). That is to say, this is all that is required on
man’s part; in this consists his active fidelity. Let him fulfil his
part; God will do the rest. Grace, working by itself, effects marvels
which surpass the intelligence of man. For ear has not heard, eye has
not seen, heart has not felt, what God conceives in His mind, resolves
in His will, executes by His power in souls wholly abandoned to Him.
The passive part of sanctity is still easier, since it consists in
accepting what very often we cannot avoid, and bearing with love, that
is, with consolation and sweetness, what we too frequently endure
with weariness and irritation. Again let me repeat, herein lies all
sanctity. It is the grain of mustard-seed the fruits of which we do not
gather, because we fail to recognize it in its littleness. It is the
drachma of the Gospel, the treasure which we do not find, do not seek,
because we imagine it too far beyond us.
Ask me not the secret of finding this treasure, for secret there is
none. This treasure is everywhere; it is offered to all, at all times,
in all places.
Through creatures, friends, and enemies it flows plentifully; it
flows over the faculties of our bodies, of our souls, and into the
very centre of our hearts. Let us but open our mouths and they will
be filled. The divine action floods the universe; it penetrates all
creatures; it floats above them, about them; it is ever present with
them; it precedes them; it accompanies them; it follows them, and they
have but to allow themselves to be borne onward on its tide.
Would to God kings and their ministers, princes of the Church and of
the world, priests, soldiers, peasants, laborers, in a word, all men,
knew how easily they can attain eminent sanctity! They have but to
fulfil the simple duties of religion and their state in life, and bear
with submission the crosses these duties bring, and accept with faith
and love the work and suffering which unsought and unceasingly come to
them through the order of Providence. This is the spirituality which
sanctified the patriarchs and prophets before there were so many
methods and so many masters in the spiritual life.[1]
[1] It would be a gross misapprehension of the author’s words to
suppose that he wishes to urge souls to enter the paths of the
spiritual life without a director. He himself expressly states
elsewhere that to be able to do without a director, one must have been
long and skilfully directed. Still less does he wish to discourage
the practices adopted by the Church for the extirpation of vice and
the acquisition of virtue. What he desires to say, and what we cannot
impress too much upon Christians, is that the first of all directions
is the guidance of Providence, and that the most necessary and the
most perfect of all practices is the faithful accomplishment and
loving acceptance of all that this fatherly Providence sends us to do
and suffer.
This is the spirituality of all ages and of all states, which cannot be
more surely sanctified, or in a manner more noble, more extraordinary,
more easy, than by the simple use of that which God, the Sovereign
Director of souls, gives them each moment to do or suffer.
_CHAPTER IV._
Perfection does not consist in knowing the Order of God, but in
submitting to it.
The order of God, the good pleasure of God, the will of God, the action
of God, the grace of God, all these are one and the same thing in this
life. It is God laboring to render the soul like unto Him. Perfection
is nothing but the soul’s faithful co-operation in this labor of
God. This work is silently effected in our souls, where it thrives,
increases, and is consummated unconsciously to ourselves.
Theology is full of conceptions and expressions which explain the
wonders of this work effected in individual souls according to their
capacity.
We may know all the theory of this work, admirably write and speak
thereon, and instruct and direct souls; but if our knowledge be only
theoretical, then I say that in comparison with souls which live and
act by the order of God and are guided by His divine will, though
ignorant of the theory of its operations or its different effects,
and unable to speak thereof, we are like a sick physician compared to
ordinary persons in perfect health.
The order of God, His divine will, received with simplicity by a
faithful soul, effects this divine work in her unconsciously to
herself, just as a remedy submissively taken restores the health of a
sick man, although he have not, and need not have, any knowledge of
medicine.
It is the fire which warms us, and not the philosophical knowledge of
the element and its effects; so it is the order of God, His divine
will, and not the curious speculation on its principles and its
methods, which produces the sanctification of our souls.
If we thirst, we must drink; theoretical explanations will not quench
our thirst. Curiosity for knowledge only makes us thirst still more.
Therefore, if we thirst for sanctification, curious speculations only
keep us farther from it. We must abandon all theories and drink in
simplicity of all that the will of God sends us of work and suffering.
That which comes to us each moment by the order of God is best and
holiest and most divine for us.
_CHAPTER V._
Reading and other Exercises only sanctify us in so far as they are the
Channels of the Divine Action.
All our science consists in recognizing God’s will in regard to the
present moment. All reading pursued in any other spirit than that of
submission to the order of God is injurious. The will of God, the order
of God, is the grace which works in the depths of our hearts by means
of our readings and by all our other works. Without it our readings
are but shadows, vain appearances, which, coming to us devoid of the
vivifying virtue of the order of God, serve only to empty the heart by
the very plenitude they cause in the mind.
The virtue of this divine will flowing into the soul of a simple,
ignorant girl by means of suffering or ordinary actions, effects in
the depths of her heart this mysterious work of the supernatural Being
without filling her mind with any idea likely to awaken pride; while
the proud man who studies spiritual books only through curiosity, and
does not unite his reading to the will of God, receives into his mind
the letter without the spirit, and becomes colder and more hardened
than ever.
The order of God, His divine will, is the life of the soul under
whatever appearances the soul receives it or applies it to herself.
Whatever may be the relation of the divine will to the mind, it
nourishes the soul, and unceasingly strengthens her growth by giving
her each moment what is best for her. Nor is one thing more efficacious
than another in producing these happy effects; no, it is simply the
duty of the present moment which comes to us by the order of God. That
which was best for us in the past moment is no longer best for us, for
it is stripped of the will of God, which has passed on to other things
from which it creates for us the duty of the present moment; and it is
this duty, under whatever appearance it is manifested, which will now
most perfectly sanctify our souls.
If the divine will make reading the duty of the present moment, the
reading will effect His mysterious work in the depths of the soul. If,
in obedience to the divine will, we leave the reading for the duty
of contemplation, this duty will create the new man in the depths of
the heart, and reading would then be injurious and useless. If the
divine will withdraw us from contemplation to hear confessions or to
other duties, and that during a considerable time, these duties form
Jesus Christ in the depths of the heart, and all the sweetness of
contemplation would only serve to banish Him.
The order of God is the fulness of all our moments. It flows under a
thousand different appearances which, successively becoming our present
duty, form, increase, and complete the new man in us, in all the
fulness which the divine wisdom has destined for us. This mysterious
growth of Jesus Christ in us is the work produced by the order of God;
it is the fruit of His grace and of His divine will.
This fruit, as we have said, is germinated, increased, and nourished by
the succession of our present duties filled with the virtue of this
same divine will.
In fulfilling these duties we are always sure of possessing the “better
part,” for this holy will is itself the better part. We have but to
yield to it, blindly abandon ourselves to it with perfect confidence.
It is infinitely holy, infinitely wise, infinitely powerful, for souls
which unreservedly hope in it, which love and seek but it alone, and
which believe with unfaltering faith that what it assigns to each
moment is best without seeking elsewhere for more or less, and without
pausing to consider the relation of material things with the order of
God, which is the seeking of pure self-love.
The will of God is the essential, the reality and virtue, of all
things; it is that which adapts and renders them suitable to the soul.
Without it all is emptiness, nothingness, falsehood, the empty husk,
the letter without the spirit, vanity, death.
The will of God is the health, the life, the salvation of soul and
body, whatever its manifestation or ways of reaching us.
Therefore we must not judge of the virtue of things by the relations
they bear to mind or body, for these relations are unimportant. It is
the will of God alone which gives to all things, whatever they may be,
the power to form Jesus Christ in the depth of our hearts. We must
frame no laws for this will and place no limit to its action, for it is
all-powerful.
Whatever the ideas which fill the mind, whatever the feelings which the
body experiences, were it for the mind but distractions and trouble,
for the body but sickness and death, the divine will nevertheless is
ever for the present moment the life of body and soul; for both one and
the other, whatever their condition, are sustained by it alone. Bread
without it is poison; and through it poison becomes a salutary remedy.
Without it, books but confuse and trouble us; with it, darkness is
turned into light. It is the wisdom, the truth, of all things. In all
things it gives us God: and God is the infinite Being who holds the
place of all things to the soul which possesses Him.
_CHAPTER VI._
The Mind and other Human Means are Useful only in as far as they are
the Instruments of the Divine Action.
The mind with all its powers would hold the first place among the
instruments of the divine will; but it must, like a dangerous slave, be
reduced to the last.
The simple of heart who know how to use it can derive great profit
therefrom; but it can also do much injury when not kept in subjection.