Conclusion of the Subject. Pain of the Awakening.
Light Against Delusions.
1. To bring this matter to an end, I say that it is not necessary
for the soul to give its consent here; it is already given: the
soul knows that it has given up its will into His hands, [1] and
that it cannot deceive Him, because He knoweth all things. It is
not here as it is in the world, where all life is full of deceit
and double-dealing. When you think you have gained one man's
good will, because of the outward show he makes, you afterwards
learn that all was a lie. No one can live in the midst of so
much scheming, particularly if there be any interests at stake.
2. Blessed, then, is that soul which our Lord draws on to the
understanding of the truth! Oh, what a state for kings!
How much better it would be for them if they strove for this,
rather than for great dominions! How justice would prevail under
their rule! What evils would be prevented, and might have been
prevented already! Here no man fears to lose life or honour for
the love of God. What a grand thing this would be to him who is
more bound than those beneath him to regard the honour of our
Lord!--for it is kings whom the crowd must follow. To make one
step in the propagation of the faith, and to give one ray of
light to heretics, I would forfeit a thousand kingdoms. And with
good reason: for it is another thing altogether to gain a kingdom
that shall never end, because one drop of the water of that
kingdom, if the soul but tastes it, renders the things of this
world utterly loathsome.
3. If, then, the soul should be wholly engulfed, what then?
O Lord, if Thou wert to give me the right to publish this abroad,
people would not believe me--as they do not believe many who are
able to speak of it in a way very different from mine; but I
should satisfy myself, at least. I believe I should count my
life as nothing, if I might make others understand but one of
these truths. I know not what I shall do afterwards, for I
cannot trust myself; though I am what I am, I have a violent
desire, which is wasting me, to say this to those who are in
authority. And now that I can do no more, I betake myself to
Thee, O my Lord, to implore a remedy for all. Thou knowest well
that I would gladly divest myself of all the graces which Thou
hast given me,--provided I remained in a condition never to
offend Thee,--and give them up to those who are kings; for I know
it would then be impossible for them to allow what they allow
now, or fail to receive the very greatest blessings.
4. O my God, make kings to understand how far their obligations
reach! Thou hast been pleased to distinguish them on earth in
such a way that--so I have heard--Thou showest signs in the
heavens when Thou takest any of them away. Certainly, when I
think of this, my devotion is stirred, because Thou wilt have
them learn, O my King, even from this, that they must imitate
Thee in their lives, seeing that, when they die, signs are
visible in the heavens, as it was when Thou wert dying Thyself.
5. I am very bold; if it be wrong, you, my father, will tear this
out: only believe that I should speak much more to the purpose in
the presence of kings,--if I might, or thought they would listen
to me,--for I recommend them greatly to God, and I wish I might
be of service to them. All this makes one risk life; for I long
frequently to lose mine,--and that would be to lose a little for
the chance of gaining much; for surely it is not possible to
live, when we see with our eyes the great delusion wherein we are
walking, and the blindness in which we are living.
6. A soul that has attained to this is not limited to the desires
it has to serve God; for His Majesty gives it strength to bring
those desires to good effect. Nothing can be put before it into
which it will not throw itself, if only it thinks that God may be
served thereby: and yet it is doing nothing, because, as I said
before, [2] it sees clearly that all is nothing, except pleasing
God. The trial is, that those who are so worthless as I am, have
no trial of the kind. May it be Thy good pleasure, O my God,
that the time may come in which I may be able to pay one farthing
at least, of the heavy debt I owe Thee! Do Thou, O Lord, so
dispose matters according to Thy will, that this Thy servant may
do Thee some service. Other women there have been who did heroic
deeds for Thee; I am good only to talk; and so it has not been
Thy pleasure, O my God, that I should do any thing: all ends in
talk and desires--that is all my service. And yet even in this I
am not free, because it is possible I might fail altogether.
7. Strengthen Thou my soul, and prepare it, O Good of all good;
and, my Jesus, then ordain Thou the means whereby I may do
something for Thee, so that there may be not even one who can
bear to receive so much, and make no payment in return. Cost
what it may, O Lord, let me not come before Thee with hands so
empty, [3] seeing that the reward of every one will be according
to his works. [4] Behold my life, behold my good name and my
will; I have given them all to Thee; I am Thine: dispose of me
according to Thy will. I see well enough, O Lord, how little I
can do; but now, having drawn near to Thee,--having ascended to
this watchtower, from which the truth may be seen,--and while
Thou departest not from me, I can do all things; but if Thou
departest from me, were it but for a moment, I shall go thither
where I was once--that is, to hell. [5]
8. Oh, what it is for a soul in this state to have to return to
the commerce of the world, to see and look on the farce of this
life, [6] so ill-ordered; to waste its time in attending to the
body by sleeping and eating! [7] All is wearisome; it cannot run
away,--it sees itself chained and imprisoned; it feels then most
keenly the captivity into which the body has brought us, and the
wretchedness of this life. It understands the reason why
St. Paul prayed to God to deliver him from it. [8] The soul
cries with the Apostle, and calls upon God to deliver it, as I
said on another occasion. [9] But here it often cries with so
much violence, that it seems as if it would go out of the body in
search of its freedom, now that they do not take it away. It is
as a slave sold into a strange land; and what distresses it most
is, that it cannot find many who make the same complaint and the
same prayer: the desire of life is more common.
9. Oh, if we were utterly detached,--if we never placed our
happiness in anything of this world,--how the pain, caused by
living always away from God, would temper the fear of death with
the desire of enjoying the true life! Sometimes I consider, if a
person like myself--because our Lord has given this light to me,
whose love is so cold, and whose true rest is so uncertain, for I
have not deserved it by my works--frequently feels her banishment
so much, what the feelings of the Saints must have been.
What must St. Paul and the Magdalene, and others like them, have
suffered, in whom the fire of the love of God has grown so
strong? Their life must have been a continual martyrdom.
It seems to me that they who bring me any comfort, and whose
conversation is any relief, are those persons in whom I find
these desires--I mean, desires with acts. I say with acts, for
there are people who think themselves detached, and who say so of
themselves,--and it must be so, for their vocation demands it, as
well as the many years that are passed since some of them began
to walk in the way of perfection,--but my soul distinguishes
clearly, and afar off, between those who are detached in words,
and those who make good those words by deeds. The little
progress of the former, and the great progress of the latter,
make it plain. This is a matter which a person of any experience
can see into most clearly.
10. So far, then, of the effects of those raptures which come
from the Spirit of God. The truth is, that these are greater or
less. I say less, because in the beginning, though the effects
are wrought, they are not tested by works, and so it cannot be
clear that a person has them; and perfection, too, is a thing of
growth, and of labouring after freedom from the cobwebs of
memory; and this requires some time. Meanwhile, the greater the
growth of love and humility in the soul, the stronger the perfume
of the flowers of virtues is for itself and for others. The truth
is, that our Lord can so work in the soul in an instant during
these raptures, that but little remains for the soul to do in
order to attain to perfection. No one, who has not had
experience of it, will ever be able to believe what our Lord now
bestows on the soul. No effort of ours--so I think--can ever
reach so far.
11. However, I do not mean to say that those persons who during
many years make use of the method prescribed by writers on
prayer,--who discuss the principles thereof, and the means
whereby it may be acquired,--will not, by the help of our Lord,
attain to perfection and great detachment with much labour; but
they will not attain to it so rapidly as by the way of raptures,
in which our Lord works independently of us, draws the soul
utterly away from earth, and gives it dominion over all things
here below, though the merits of that soul may not be greater
than mine were: I cannot use stronger language, for my merits are
as nothing. Why His Majesty doeth this is, because it is His
pleasure, and He doeth it according to His pleasure; even if the
soul be without the fitting disposition, He disposes it for the
reception of that blessing which He is giving to it. Although it
be most certain that He never fails to comfort those who do well,
and strive to be detached, still He does not always give these
effects because they have deserved them at His hands by
cultivating the garden, but because it is His will to show His
greatness at times in a soil which is most worthless, as I have
just said, and to prepare it for all good: and all this in such a
way that it seems as if the soul was now, in a manner, unable to
go back and live in sin against God, as it did before.
12. The mind is now so inured to the comprehension of that which
is truth indeed, that everything else seems to it to be but
child's play. It laughs to itself, at times, when it sees grave
men--men given to prayer, men of religion--make much of points of
honour, which itself is trampling beneath its feet. They say
that discretion, and the dignity of their callings, require it of
them as a means to do more good; but that soul knows perfectly
well that they would do more good in one day by preferring the
love of God to this their dignity, than they will do in ten years
by considering it.
13. The life of this soul is a life of trouble: the cross is
always there, but the progress it makes is great. When those who
have to do with it think it has arrived at the summit of
perfection, within a little while they see it much more advanced;
for God is ever giving it grace upon grace. God is the soul of
that soul now; it is He who has the charge of it; and so He
enlightens it; for He seems to be watching over it, always
attentive to it, that it may not offend Him,--giving it grace,
and stirring it up in His service. When my soul reached this
state, in which God showed me mercy so great, my wretchedness
came to an end, and our Lord gave me strength to rise above it.
The former occasions of sin, as well as the persons with whom I
was accustomed to distract myself, did me no more harm than if
they had never existed; on the contrary, that which ordinarily
did me harm, helped me on. Everything contributed to make me
know God more, and to love Him; to make me see how much I owed
Him, as well as to be sorry for being what I had been.
14. I saw clearly that this did not come from myself, that I had
not brought it about by any efforts of my own, and that there was
not time enough for it. His Majesty, of His mere goodness, had
given me strength for it. From the time our Lord began to give
me the grace of raptures, until now, this strength has gone on
increasing. He, of His goodness, hath held me by the hand, that
I might not go back. I do not think that I am doing anything
myself--certainly I do not; for I see distinctly that all this is
the work of our Lord. For this reason, it seems to me that the
soul in which our Lord worketh these graces,--if it walks in
humility and fear, always acknowledging the work of our Lord, and
that we ourselves can do, as it were, nothing,--may be thrown
among any companions, and, however distracted and wicked these
may be, will neither be hurt nor disturbed in any way; on the
contrary, as I have just said, that will help it on, and be a
means unto it whereby it may derive much greater profit.
15. Those souls are strong which are chosen by our Lord to do
good to others; still, this their strength is not their own.
When our Lord brings a soul on to this state, He communicates to
it of His greatest secrets by degrees. True revelations--the
great gifts and visions--come by ecstasies, all tending to make
the soul humble and strong, to make it despise the things of this
world, and have a clearer knowledge of the greatness of the
reward which our Lord has prepared for those who serve Him. [10]
16. May it please His Majesty that the great munificence with
which He hath dealt with me, miserable sinner that I am, may have
some weight with those who shall read this, so that they may be
strong and courageous enough to give up everything utterly for
God. If His Majesty repays us so abundantly, that even in this
life the reward and gain of those who serve Him become visible,
what will it be in the next?
1. Ch. xx. § 30.
2. Ch. xx. § 34.
3. Exod. xxiii. 15: "Non apparebis in conspectu meo vacuus."
4. Apoc. ii. 23: "Dabo unicuique vestrum secundum opera sua."
5. See ch. xxxii. § 1.
6. "Farsa de esta vida tan mal concertada."
7. Inner Fortress, iv. ch. i. § 11.
8. Rom. vii. 24: "Quis me liberabit de corpore mortis hujus?"
9. Ch. xvi. § 7.
10. 1 Cor. ii. 9: "Quæ præparavit Deus his qui diligunt Illum."