OF THE SECOND WAY OF THE RETURN OF THE SOUL TO GOD, WHICH IS THE PASSIVE
WAY, BUT ONE OF LIGHT, AND OF TWO KINDS OF INTRODUCTION TO
IT--DESCRIPTION OF THIS CLASS, AND OF THEIR STRIKING ADVANTAGES--VARIOUS
NECESSARY PRECAUTIONS AND OBSERVATIONS CONCERNING THIS CLASS, THEIR
CONDUCT, PERFECTIONS, IMPERFECTIONS, AND EXPERIENCES.
The second class are like those large rivers which move with a slow and
steady course. They flow with pomp and majesty; their course is direct
and easily followed; they are charged with merchandise, and can go on to
the sea without mingling with other rivers; but they are late in
reaching it, being grave and slow. There are even some who never reach
it at all, and these, for the most part, lose themselves in other larger
rivers, or else turn aside to some arm of the sea. Many of these rivers
serve to carry merchandise, and are heavily laden with it. They may be
kept back by sluices, and turned off at certain points. Such are the
souls in the _passive way of sight_. Their strength is very abundant;
they are laden with gifts, and graces, and celestial favours; they are
the admiration of their generation; and numbers of saints who shine as
stars in the Church have never passed this limit. This class is composed
of two kinds. The first commenced in the ordinary way, and have
afterwards been drawn to passive contemplation. The others have been, as
it were, taken by surprise; they have been seized by the heart, and they
feel themselves loving without having learned to know the object of
their love. For there is this difference between divine and human love,
that the latter supposes a previous acquaintance with its object,
because, as it is outside of it, the senses must be taken to it, and the
senses can only be taken to it because it is communicated to them: the
eyes see and the heart loves. It is not so with divine love. God, having
an absolute power over the heart of man, and being its origin and its
end, it is not necessary that He should make known to it what He is. He
takes it by assault, without giving it battle. The heart is powerless
to resist Him, even though He may not use an absolute and violent
authority, unless it be in some cases where He permits it to be so, in
order to manifest His power. He takes hearts, then, in this way, making
them burn in a moment; but usually He gives them flashes of light which
dazzle them, and lift them nearer to Himself. These persons appear much
greater than those of whom I shall speak later, to those who are not
possessed of a divine discernment, for they attain outwardly to a high
degree of perfection, God eminently elevating their natural capacity,
and replenishing it in an extraordinary manner; and yet they are never
really brought to a state of annihilation to self, and God does not
usually so draw them out of their own being that they become lost in
Himself. Such characters as these are, however, the wonder and
admiration of men. God bestows on them gifts upon gifts, graces upon
graces, visions, revelations, inward voices, ecstasies, ravishments, &c.
It seems as though God's only care was to enrich and beautify them, and
to communicate to them His secrets. All joys are theirs.
This does not imply that they bear no heavy crosses, no fierce
temptations: these are the shadows which cause their virtues to shine
with greater brilliancy; for these temptations are thrust back
vigorously, the crosses are borne bravely; they even desire more of
them: they are all flame and fire, enthusiasm and love. God uses them to
accomplish great things, and it seems as though they only need to desire
a thing in order to receive it from God, He finding His delight in
satisfying all their desires and doing all their will. Yet in the same
path there are various degrees of progression, and some attain a far
higher standard of perfection than others; their danger lies in fixing
their thoughts upon what God has done for them, thus stopping at the
gifts, instead of being led through them to the Giver.
The design of God in the bestowal of His grace, and in the profusion
with which He gives it, is to bring them nearer to Himself; but they
make use of it for an utterly different end: they rest in it, reflect
upon it, look at it, and appropriate it; and hence arise vanity,
complaisance, self-esteem, the preference of themselves to others, and
often the destruction of religious life. These people are admirable, in
themselves considered; and sometimes by a special grace they are made
very helpful to others, particularly if they have been brought from
great depths of sin. But usually they are less fitted to lead others
than those who come after; for being near to God themselves, they have a
horror of sin, and often a shrinking from sinners, and never having
experienced the miseries they see in others, they are astonished, and
unable to render either help or advice. They expect too great
perfection, and do not lead on to it little by little, and if they meet
with weak ones, they do not aid them in proportion to their own
advancement, or in accordance with God's designs, but often even seek to
avoid them. They find it difficult to converse with those who have not
reached their own level, preferring a solitary life to all the ministry
of love. If such persons were heard in conversation by those not
divinely enlightened, they would be believed equal to the last class, or
even more advanced. They make use of the same terms--of DEATH, LOSS OF
SELF, ANNIHILATION, &c.; and it is quite true that they do die in their
own way, that they are annihilated and lose themselves, for often their
natural sensibilities are lost or suspended in their seasons of
devotion; they even lose the habit of making use of them. Thus these
souls are passive, but they have light, and love, and strength in
themselves; they like to retain something of their own, it may be even
their virtues, but in so delicate a form that only the Divine eye can
detect it. Such as these are so laden with merchandise that their course
is very slow. What must be done with them, then, to lead them out of
this way? There is a more safe and certain path for them, even that of
faith: they need to be led from the sensible to the supernatural, from
that which is known and perceived to the very deep, yet very safe,
darkness of faith. It is useless to endeavour to ascertain whether these
things be of God or not, since they must be surpassed; for if they are
of God, they will be carried on by Him, if only we abandon ourselves to
Him; and if they are not of God, we shall not be deceived by them, if we
do not stay at them.
This class of people find far greater difficulty in entering the way of
faith than the first, for as what they already possess is so great, and
so evidently from God, they will not believe that there is anything
higher in the Church of God. Therefore they cling to it.
O God! how many spiritual possessions there are which appear great
virtues to those who are not divinely enlightened, and which appear
great and dangerous defects to those who are so! For those in this way
regard as virtues what others look upon as subtle faults; and even the
light to see them in their true colours is not given to them. These
people have rules and regulations for their obedience, which are marked
by prudence; they are strong and vigorous, though they appear dead. They
are indeed dead as to their own wants, but not as to their foundation.
Such souls as these often possess an inner silence, certain sinkings
into God, which they distinguish and express well; but they have not
that secret longing to be nothing, like the last class. It is true they
desire to be nothing by a certain perceptible annihilation, a deep
humility, an abasement under the immense weight of God's greatness. All
this is an annihilation in which they dwell without being annihilated.
They have the feeling of annihilation without the reality, for the soul
is still sustained by its feelings, and this state is more satisfactory
to it than any other, for it gives more assurance. This class usually
are only brought into God by death, unless it be some privileged ones,
whom God designs to be the lights of His Church, or whom He designs to
sanctify more eminently; and such He robs by degrees of all their
riches. But as there are few sufficiently courageous to be willing,
after so much blessedness, to lose it all, few pass this point, God's
intention perhaps being that they should not pass it, and that, as in
the Father's house there are many mansions, they should only occupy this
one. Let us leave the causes with God.