Chapter III: Part 3

The creature can take no glory to itself, to whatever state it may arrive. O that you might comprehend what I cannot express--the sense I have of the goodness of God, to keep what is his own! How jealous, how watchful he is over the soul! God seems so truly all things to me, that I seem to see nothing, to love nothing, relish nothing, only what he causes me to see, love and relish in himself. I am only capable of loving and submitting to him, so much is he my life. I believe God blindfold, without questioning or reasoning. _God is_; this is sufficient. How immense is the freedom of the soul in him! O may you not doubt, that when all of self is taken away from the creature, there remains only God. O God, can I have any self-interest, or appropriate aught as mine? In what can I take it? How strange the thought! how far removed from the possession of God! I am lost. God is.

POWER OF CASTING OUT EVIL SPIRITS.

Although for many years, profound truths have been revealed to me, and God has manifested his power through me, in an extraordinary manner, my state has invariably been one of infancy, simplicity and candor. God's grace has rendered me equally willing to lie concealed, or to execute his will more publicly. During seven years, without my knowing how it was accomplished, as soon as I have approached some persons, possessed by demons, the evil spirits have departed. I have realised simply a desire to relieve them, and this desire, or prayer, has been answered in a way unknown to myself. Of myself, I have no goodness nor power at all. I have only the capacity of a child--of letting myself be used by God, as pleases Him. My life appears natural. I am encompassed with infirmities. My health is greatly impaired. My infirmities are a balance-wheel, a counterpoise to exaltation. Yet life is ever flowing, without any thought of the means of sustaining it, as we live in the air, without thinking of the air we breathe.

STATE OF A SOUL RE-UNITED TO GOD.

In reply to your enquiry, my dear children, concerning my state, I would say, that exteriorly, I am open, simple, childlike. My interior resembles a drop of water, mingling and lost in the ocean, and no more discerning itself,--the sea not only surrounding, but absorbing it. In this divine immensity, the soul discerns and enjoys all objects in God. All is darkness and obscurity in respect to itself; all is light on the part of God. Thus, _God is all_ to me. This has been my state more than thirty years, although in latter years I have realized greater depths in these experiences. Think of the bottomless sea; what is thrown therein, continues sinking, without ever reaching the end. Thus divine love is the weight of the soul, that sinks it deeper and deeper in God. "God is Love, and he who dwells in love, dwells in God, and God in him." O immensity!

Jesus Christ, the embodiment of truth and love, has explained the Scriptures by fulfilling them. So when the soul has passed into God, the Word is fulfilled in the soul, as it was in Christ. O Love! thou art thyself the pure, naked, simple truth, which is expressed, not by me, but by thyself, through me. Amen.

CONCISE VIEW OF THE INTERIOR WAY.

_The soul seeks God in faith not by the reasonings of the mind and labored efforts, but by the drawings of love; to which inclinations God responds, and instructs the soul, which co-operates actively. God then puts the soul in a passive state, where he accomplishes all, causing great progress, first by way of enjoyment, then by privation, and finally by pure Love._

What do we understand by the Interior way? It is to seek the kingdom of God within us. Luke 17, 21. We find this kingdom only where God has placed it, _within the soul_. It becomes necessary, then, to withdraw the eyes of the soul from external landmarks and observations, which man, in the pride of reason, has located around it, and rest the eye in faith, on the Word of the Lord,--"_Seek and ye shall find_." This seeking, involves an interior activity of the soul; a desire, a determination, and searching after what is hidden.

When the soul has thus earnestly sought the kingdom of God within, this kingdom is developed little by little. Interior recollection becomes less difficult, and the presence of God more perceptible and agreeable. Formerly it was supposed, that the presence of God was only the thought of God, and that it was necessary to force the mind--to concentrate the thoughts with violence to find God. This is true in some sense, but, as the soul cannot long endure this tension, and as the kingdom of God is not found in the external vestments of the soul, but in its depths, this labor is of little avail. So little progress is made, the soul becomes discouraged, and the evil one, who fears nothing so much as the reign of God in the soul, makes an effort to draw the soul to externalities.

In order to accomplish this object, he takes two methods, either by excessive labors, persuading the soul that this is the way to find God, and thus choking the internal process of the interior life, or, by this tension of the mind, of which I have spoken. Neither of these methods open in the soul, the interior way.

You reply, how, then, is this life accomplished? I answer, God, seeing the heart of him who seeks him within, draws near to him, and teaches him a just moderation in all things; and, by this retrenchment of all excess in externals, the soul begins to perceive the peaceful kingdom. It realizes within itself a guide, who provides for its necessities, according to divine laws, who takes away the burdens that sin imposes; a guide who does not foster corrupt nature, nor forbid innocent pleasures.

When the soul begins to perceive this kingdom, and that the King himself is manifested in some degree, it thus communes, (and we may call this the second step), O, my Beloved, I have sought thee with all the strength of my heart, in the place where thou hast taught me to seek thee, and I have there found thee! Days and nights have I passed in seeking thee. All the desires of my heart go after thee. But now I have found thee. I pray thee to reign as Sovereign, to establish thine empire in my soul. I will do thy will alone. I will resign to thee all the right I have to myself; all that thou, by thy goodness, hast given to me.

At this stage of progress, the soul ceases from self. Its work is to regard, lovingly, the operation of God, without a desire either to advance it, or place any obstacle in the way of its progress. The soul has been active, in the first stage, to destroy, with all its power, that which might hinder the kingdom of God within; and this was a great effort; for habit had rendered interior recollection very difficult, and the powers of the soul did not easily reunite themselves in one centre.

Now the soul seeks no longer to combat the obstacles, which hindered its return within, but lets God combat and act in the soul. Saying, it is time O, Lord, that thou shouldst take possession of thy kingdom! Do so, I pray thee, exclusively. I desire, on my part, only to observe thine operation.

This commencement of the reign of God, and of the passive way, is very highly relished by the soul. The soul passes days, and even years, separated from creature enjoyments without weariness. It advances very much more by this way, in little time, than by all the efforts of many years. It is not without faults and imperfections, but divine love diminishes them little by little, or does not permit the soul to become disturbed by them, lest it become discouraged and its love hindered. This state is called passive love. The soul sees no cause to fear; it supposes that all the work is done, and that it has only to pass into eternity, and to enjoy this good Sovereign, who already gives himself to the soul in so much fulness.

But in the onward progress of the soul, it becomes no longer doubtful, whether the soul is to remain in the passive enjoyment of God and his communications. The soul begins to feel a drawing, to let God not only be all things in the soul, but there to reign separate from the soul's enjoyment of his gifts. The soul now experiences what is called, by the author of the Imitation of Christ, _the exile of the heart_. It hears a voice in the depth of the soul, or, rather, has an impression, that God reigns there alone. This exile is at first very painful, for it is important to notice, that, from the commencement of seeking God in the depth of the soul to the possession of him, there are many trials, temptations, sorrows. _Every successive state is marked by a purifying process_. Persons often mistake, and take the first purification for the last. When God reigns alone in the soul, separate from the action of self, and self is destroyed, it is beyond any previous state.

When the soul has ceased from its own selfish operations, and the man of sin is exterminated, its defects become more apparent, because God wishes it to comprehend what it is by itself, and what it would be without him. The soul is thus afflicted, believing it has lost the virtues, acquired with so much care, and seems to have faults that it had not before perceived. It says, with the spouse in the Canticles, "I have washed my feet, how shall I sully them?" You do not perceive, O, soul beloved, that you do not sully them in going to "open to the spouse," and that if you contract some slight impurity, he will remove it so perfectly, that you will become more beautiful. In the mean time, it is not the desire of the spouse to become beautiful in her own eyes, but to see only the beauty of her Lover. When the soul is faithful in this state, and really desires to die to itself, she is pleased only with the beauty of her Beloved, and says his beauty shall be my beauty. But it is necessary to advance beyond this, for, after being despoiled of her beauty, it would be a selfishness much greater to appropriate to herself, the beauty of her Beloved. His beauty must remain untarnished, unappropriated by her; she must leave him all, and remain in her nothing, for the nothing is her proper place. This is Perfect Love, which regards God alone.

SELECTIONS FROM HER POETRY.

A LITTLE BIRD I AM.

"A little bird I am,
Shut from the fields of air;
And in my cage I sit and sing
To Him who placed me there;
Well pleased a prisoner to be,
_Because, my God, it pleases thee_.

"Nought have I else to do;
I sing the whole day long;
And He, whom most I love to please,
Doth listen to my song;
He caught and bound my wandering wing,
But still he bends to hear me sing.

"Thou hast an ear to hear;
A heart to love and bless;
And, though my notes were e'er so rude,
Thou wouldst not hear the less;
Because though knowest as they fall,
That Love, sweet Love, inspires them all.

"My cage confines me round,
Abroad I cannot fly;
But, though my wing is closely bound,
My heart's at liberty.
My prison walls cannot control
The flight, the freedom of the soul.

"Oh! it is good to soar,
These bolts and bars above,
To Him whose purpose I adore,
Whose Providence I love;
And in thy mighty will to find
The joy, the freedom of the mind."

GOD EVERYWHERE, TO THE SOUL THAT LOVES HIM.

"Oh! Thou by long experience tried,
Near whom no grief can long abide;
My Lord! how full of sweet content,
_I pass my years of banishment_.

"All scenes alike engaging prove,
To souls impressed with sacred love;
Where'er they dwell, they dwell in Thee,
In Heaven, in earth, or on the sea.

"To me remains nor place nor time,
My country is in every clime,
I can be calm and free from care
On any shore, since God is there.

"While place we seek, or place we shun,
The soul finds happiness in none;
But with a God to guide our way,
'Tis equal joy to go or stay.

"Could I be cast where Thou art not,
That were indeed a dreadful lot;
But regions none remote I call,
Secure of finding God in all.

"My country, Lord, art Thou alone;
No other can I claim or own;
The point where all my wishes meet,
My law, my love; life's only sweet.

"I love my God, but with no love of mine,
For I have none to give;
I love thee, Lord; but all the love is thine,
_For by thy life I live_.
I am as nothing, and rejoice to be
Emptied, and lost, and swallowed up in thee.

"Thou, Lord, alone, art all thy children need,
And there is none beside;
From thee the streams of blessedness proceed;
In thee the bless'd abide.
Fountain of life, and all-abounding grace,
Our source, our centre, and our dwelling-place."