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The effects of this kind of prayer are numerous;
some of them I shall explain. First of all, I will
say something (though not much, as I have dealt with
it elsewhere)[98] about another kind of prayer, which
almost invariably begins before this one. It is a
form of recollection which also seems to me
supernatural for it does not involve remaining in the
dark, or closing the eyes, nor is it dependent upon
anything exterior. A person involuntarily closes his
eyes and desires solitude; and, without the display
of any human skill there seems gradually to be built
for him a temple in which he can make the prayer
already described; the senses and all external things
seem gradually to lose their hold on him, while the
soul, on the other hand, regains its lost control.
It is sometimes said that the soul enters within
itself and sometimes that it rises above itself;[99]
but I cannot explain things in that kind of language,
for I have no skill in it. However, I believe you
will understand what I am able to tell you, though I
may perhaps be intelligible only to myself. Let us
suppose that these senses and faculties (the
inhabitants, as I have said, of this castle, which is
the figure that I have taken to explain my meaning)
have gone out of the castle, and, for days and years,
have been consorting with strangers, to whom all the
good things in the castle are abhorrent. Then,
realizing how much they have lost, they come back to
it, though they do not actually re-enter it, because
the habits they have formed are hard to conquer. But
they are no longer traitors and they now walk about
in the vicinity of the castle. The great King, Who
dwells in the Mansion within this castle, perceives
their good will, and in His great mercy desires to
bring them back to Him. So, like a good Shepherd,
with a call so gentle that even they can hardly
recognize it, He teaches them to know His voice and
not to go away and get lost but to return to their
Mansion; and so powerful is this Shepherd's call that
they give up the things outside the castle which had
led them astray, and once again enter it.
I do not think I have ever explained this before as
clearly as here. When we are seeking God within
ourselves (where He is found more effectively and
more profitably than in the creatures, to quote Saint
Augustine, who, after having sought Him in many
places, found Him within)[100] it is a great help if
God grants us this favour. Do not suppose that the
understanding can attain to Him, merely by trying to
think of Him as within the soul, or the imagination,
by picturing Him as there. This is a good habit and
an excellent kind of meditation, for it is founded
upon a truth -- namely, that God is within us. But it
is not the kind of prayer that I have in mind, for
anyone (with the help of the Lord, you understand)
can practise it for himself. What I am describing is
quite different.
These people are sometimes in the castle before
they have begun to think about God at all. I cannot
say where they entered it or how they heard their
Shepherd's call: it was certainly not with their
ears, for outwardly such a call is not audible. They
become markedly conscious that they are gradually
retiring[101] within themselves; anyone who
experiences this will discover what I mean: I cannot
explain it better. I think I have read that they are
like a hedgehog or a tortoise withdrawing into
itself[102]; and whoever wrote that must have
understood it well. These creatures, however, enter
within themselves whenever they like; whereas with us
it is not a question of our will -- it happens only
when God is pleased to grant us this favour.
For my own part, I believe that, when His Majesty
grants it, He does so to people who are already
leaving the things of the world. I do not mean that
people who are married must actually leave the world
-- they can do so only in desire: His call to them is
a special one and aims at making them intent upon
interior things. I believe, however, that if we wish
to give His Majesty free course, He will grant more
than this to those whom He is beginning to call still
higher.
Anyone who is conscious that this is happening within
himself should give God great praise, for he will be
very right to recognize what a favour it is; and the
thanksgiving which he makes for it will prepare him
for greater favours. One preparation for listening to
Him, as certain books tell us, is that we should
contrive, not to use our reasoning powers, but to be
intent upon discovering what the Lord is working in
the soul; for, if His Majesty has not begun to grant
us absorption, I cannot understand how we can cease
thinking in any way which will not bring us more harm
than profit, although this has been a matter of
continual discussion among spiritual persons.
For my own part, I confess my lack of humility,
but their arguments have never seemed to me good
enough to lead me to accept what they say. One person
told me of a certain book by the saintly Fray Peter
of Alc�ntara (for a saint I believe he is), which
would certainly have convinced me, for I know how
much he knew about such things; but we read it
together, and found that he says exactly what I say,
although not in the same words; it is quite clear
from what he says that love must already be
awake.[103] It is possible that I am mistaken, but I
base my position on the following reasons.
First, in such spiritual activity as this, the
person who does most is he who thinks least and
desires to do least:[104] what we have to do is to
beg like poor and needy persons coming before a great
and rich Emperor and then cast down our eyes in
humble expectation. When from the secret signs He
gives us we seem to realize that He is hearing us, it
is well for us to keep silence, since He has
permitted us to be near Him and there will be no harm
in our striving not to labour with the understanding
-- provided, I mean, that we are able to do so. But
if we are not quite sure that the King has heard us,
or sees us, we must not stay where we are like
ninnies, for there still remains a great deal for the
soul to do when it has stilled the understanding; if
it did nothing more it would experience much greater
aridity and the imagination would grow more restless
because of the effort caused it by cessation from
thought. The Lord wishes us rather to make requests
of Him and to remember that we are in His presence,
for He knows what is fitting for us. I cannot believe
in the efficacy of human activity in matters where
His Majesty appears to have set a limit to it and to
have been pleased to reserve action to Himself. There
are many other things in which He has not so reserved
it, such as penances, works of charity and prayers;
these, with His aid, we can practise for ourselves,
as far as our miserable nature is capable of them.
The second reason is that all these interior
activities are gentle and peaceful, and to do
anything painful brings us harm rather than help. By
"anything painful" I mean anything that we try to
force ourselves to do; it would be painful, for
example, to hold our breath. The soul must just leave
itself in the hands of God, and do what He wills it
to do, completely disregarding its own advantage and
resigning itself as much as it possibly can to the
will of God.
The third reason is that the very effort
which the soul makes in order to cease from thought
will perhaps awaken thought and cause it to think a
great deal. The fourth reason is that the most
important and pleasing thing in God's eyes is our
remembering His honour and glory and forgetting
ourselves and our own profit and ease and pleasure.
And how can a person be forgetful of himself when he
is taking such great care about his actions that he
dare not even stir, or allow his understanding and
desires to stir, even for the purpose of desiring the
greater glory of God or of rejoicing in the glory
which is His?
When His Majesty wishes the working of the
understanding to cease, He employs it in another
manner, and illumines the soul's knowledge to so much
higher a degree than any we can ourselves attain that
He leads it into a state of absorption, in which,
without knowing how, it is much better instructed
than it could ever be as a result of its own efforts,
which would only spoil everything. God gave us our
faculties to work with, and everything will have its
due reward; there is no reason, then, for trying to
cast a spell over them -- they must be allowed to
perform their office until God gives them a better
one.
As I understand it, the soul whom the Lord has been
pleased to lead into this Mansion will do best to act
as I have said. Let it try, without forcing itself or
causing any turmoil, to put a stop to all discursive
reasoning, yet not to suspend the understanding, nor
to cease from all thought, though it is well for it
to remember that it is in God's presence and Who this
God is. If feeling this should lead it into a state
of absorption, well and good; but it should not try
to understand what this state is, because that is a
gift bestowed upon the will. The will, then, should
be left to enjoy it, and should not labour except for
uttering a few loving words, for although in such a
case one may not be striving to cease from thought,
such cessation often comes, though for a very short
time.
I have explained elsewhere[105] the reason why this
occurs in this kind of prayer (I am referring to the
kind which I began to explain in this Mansion). With
it I have included this Prayer of Recollection which
ought to have been described first, for it comes far
below the consolations of God already mentioned, and
is indeed the first step towards attaining them. For
in the Prayer of Recollection it is unnecessary to
abandon meditation and the activities of the
understanding. When, instead of coming through
conduits, the water springs directly from its source,
the understanding checks its activity, or rather the
activity is checked for it when it finds it cannot
understand what it desires, and thus it roams about
all over the place, like a demented creature, and can
settle down to nothing. The will is fixed so firmly
upon its God that this disturbed condition of the
understanding causes it great distress; but it must
not take any notice of this, for if it does so it
will lose a great part of what it is enjoying; it
must forget about it, and abandon itself into the
arms of love, and His Majesty will teach it what to
do next; almost its whole work is to realize its
unworthiness to receive such great good and to occupy
itself in thanksgiving.
In order to discuss[106] the Prayer of Recollection I
passed over the effects or signs to be observed in
souls to whom this prayer is granted by God Our Lord.
It is clear that a dilation or enlargement of the
soul takes place, as if the water proceeding from the
spring had no means of running away, but the fountain
had a device ensuring that, the more freely the water
flowed, the larger became the basin.
So it is in this kind of prayer, and God works
many more wonders in the soul, thus fitting and
gradually disposing it to retain all that He gives
it. So this gentle movement and this interior
dilation cause the soul to be less constrained in
matters relating to the service of God than it was
before and give it much more freedom. It is not
oppressed, for example, by the fear of hell, for,
though it desires more than ever not to offend God
(of Whom, however, it has lost all servile fear), it
has firm confidence that it is destined to have
fruition of Him.
A person who used to be afraid of doing penance
lest he should ruin his health now believes that in
God he can do everything, and has more desire to do
such things than he had previously. The fear of
trials that he was wont to have is now largely
assuaged, because he has a more lively faith, and
realizes that, if he endures these trials for God's
sake, His Majesty will give him grace to bear them
patiently, and sometimes even to desire them, because
he also cherishes a great desire to do something for
God. The better he gets to know the greatness of God,
the better he comes to realize the misery of his own
condition; having now tasted the consolations of God,
he sees that earthly things are mere refuse; so,
little by little, he withdraws from them and in this
way becomes more and more his own master.
In short, he finds himself strengthened in all the
virtues and will infallibly continue to increase in
them unless he turns back and commits offenses
against God -- when that happens, everything is lost,
however far a man may have climbed towards the crest
of the mountain. It must not be understood, however,
that all these things take place because once or
twice God has granted a soul this favour; it must
continue receiving them, for it is from their
continuance that all our good proceeds.
There is one earnest warning which I must give those
who find themselves in this state: namely, that they
exert the very greatest care to keep themselves from
occasions of offending God. For as yet the soul is
not even weaned but is like a child beginning to suck
the breast. If it be taken from its mother, what can
it be expected to do but die? That, I am very much
afraid, will be the lot of anyone to whom God has
granted this favour if he gives up prayer; unless he
does so for some very exceptional reason, or unless
he returns to it quickly, he will go from bad to
worse.
I am aware how much ground there is for fear about
this and I have been very much grieved by certain
people I know, in whom I have seen what I am
describing; they have left Him Who in His great love
was yearning to give Himself to them as a Friend, and
to prove His friendship by His works. I earnestly
warn such people not to enter upon occasions of sin,
because the devil sets much more store by one soul in
this state than by a great number of souls to whom
the Lord does not grant these favours. For those in
this state attract others, and so they can do the
devil great harm and may well bring great advantage
to the Church of God. He may see nothing else in them
except that His Majesty is showing them especial
love, but this is quite sufficient to make him do his
utmost to bring about their perdition. The conflict,
then, is sterner for such souls than for others and
if they are lost their fate is less remediable. You,
sisters, so far as we know, are free from these
perils. May God free you from pride and vainglory and
grant that the devil may not counterfeit these
favours. Such counterfeits, however, will be
recognizable because they will not produce these
effects, but quite contrary ones.
There is one peril of which I want to warn you,
though I have spoken of it elsewhere; I have seen
persons given to prayer fall into it, and especially
women, for, as we are weaker than men, we run more
risk of what I am going to describe. It is this: some
women, because of prayers, vigils and severe
penances, and also for other reasons, have poor
health. When they experience any spiritual
consolation, therefore, their physical nature is too
much for them; and as soon as they feel any interior
joy there comes over them a physical weakness and
languor, and they fall into a sleep, which they call
"spiritual", and which is a little more marked than
the condition that has been described. Thinking the
one state to be the same as the other, they abandon
themselves to this absorption; and the more they
relax, the more complete becomes this absorption,
because their physical nature continues to grow
weaker. So they get it into their heads that it is
arrobamiento, or rapture. But I call it abobamiento,
foolishness;[107] for they are doing nothing but
wasting their time at it and ruining their health.
One person was in this state for eight hours; she was
not unconscious, nor was she conscious of anything
concerning God. She was cured by being told to take
more food and sleep and to do less penance; for,
though she had misled both her confessor and other
people and, quite involuntarily, deceived herself,
there was one person who understood her. I believe
the devil would go to any pains to gain such people
as that and he was beginning to make good progress
with this one.
It must be understood that although, when this state
is something that really comes from God, there may be
languor, both interior and exterior, there will be
none in the soul, which, when it finds itself near
God, is moved with great joy. The experience does not
last long, but only for a little while. Although the
soul may become absorbed again, yet this kind of
prayer, as I have said, except in cases of physical
weakness, does not go so far as to overcome the body
or to produce in it any exterior sensation.
Be advised, then, and, if you experience anything
of this kind, tell your superior, and relax as much
as you can. The superior should give such persons
fewer hours of prayer -- very few, indeed -- and
should see that they sleep and eat well, until their
physical strength, if it has become exhausted, comes
back again. If their constitution is so weak that
this does not suffice, they can be certain that God
is not calling them to anything beyond the active
life.
There is room in convents for people of all kinds;
let anyone of this type, then, be kept busy with
duties, and let care be taken that she is not left
alone very much, or her health will be completely
ruined. This sort of life will be a great
mortification to her, but it is here that the Lord
wishes to test her love for Him by seeing how she
bears His absence and after a while He may well be
pleased to restore her strength; if He is not, her
vocal prayer and her obedience will bring her as much
benefit and merit as she would have obtained in other
ways, and perhaps more.
There may also be some who are so weak in intellect
and imagination -- I have known such -- that they
believe they actually see all they imagine. This is
highly dangerous and perhaps we shall treat of it
later, but no more shall be said here; for I have
written at great length of this Mansion, as it is the
one which the greatest number of souls enter. As the
natural is united with the supernatural in it, it is
here that the devil can do most harm; for in the
Mansions of which I have not yet spoken the Lord
gives him fewer opportunities. May He be for ever
praised. Amen.
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