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While I was beseeching Our Lord today that He would
speak through me, since I could find nothing to say
and had no idea how to begin to carry out the
obligation laid upon me by obedience, a thought
occurred to me which I will now set down, in order to
have some foundation on which to build.
I began to
think of the soul as if it were a castle made of a
single diamond or of very clear crystal, in which
there are many rooms,[17] just as in Heaven there are
many mansions.[18] Now if we think carefully over
this, sisters, the soul of the righteous man is
nothing but a paradise, in which, as God tells us, He
takes His delight.[19] For what do you think a room
will be like which is the delight of a King so
mighty, so wise, so pure and so full of all that is
good?
I can find nothing with which to compare the
great beauty of a soul and its great capacity. In
fact, however acute our intellects may be, they will
no more be able to attain to a comprehension of this
than to an understanding of God; for, as He Himself
says, He created us in His image and likeness.[20]
Now if this is so -- and it is -- there is no point
in our fatiguing ourselves by attempting to
comprehend the beauty of this castle; for, though it
is His creature, and there is therefore as much
difference between it and God as between creature and
Creator, the very fact that His Majesty says it is
made in His image means that we can hardly form any
conception of the soul's great dignity and
beauty.[21]
It is no small pity, and should cause us no little
shame, that, through our own fault, we do not
understand ourselves, or know who we are. Would it
not be a sign of great ignorance, my daughters, if a
person were asked who he was, and could not say, and
had no idea who his father or his mother was, or from
what country he came?
Though that is great stupidity,
our own is incomparably greater if we make no attempt
to discover what we are, and only know that we are
living in these bodies, and have a vague idea,
because we have heard it and because our Faith tells
us so, that we possess souls. As to what good
qualities there may be in our souls, or Who dwells
within them, or how precious they are -- those are
things which we seldom consider and so we trouble
little about carefully preserving the soul's beauty.
All our interest is centred in the rough setting of
the diamond, and in the outer wall of the castle --
that is to say, in these bodies of ours.
Let us now imagine that this castle, as I have said,
contains many mansions,[22] some above, others below,
others at each side; and in the centre and midst of
them all is the chiefest mansion where the most
secret things pass between God and the soul. You must
think over this comparison very carefully; perhaps
God will be pleased to use it to show you something
of the favours which He is pleased to grant to souls,
and of the differences between them, so far as I have
understood this to be possible, for there are so many
of them that nobody can possibly understand them all,
much less anyone as stupid as I.
If the Lord grants
you these favours, it will be a great consolation to
you to know that such things are possible; and, if
you never receive any, you can still praise His great
goodness. For, as it does us no harm to think of the
things laid up for us in Heaven, and of the joys of
the blessed, but rather makes us rejoice and strive
to attain those joys ourselves, just so it will do us
no harm to find that it is possible in this our exile
for so great a God to commune with such malodorous
worms, and to love Him for His great goodness and
boundless mercy. I am sure that anyone who finds it
harmful to realize that it is possible for God to
grant such favours during this our exile must be
greatly lacking in humility and in love of his
neighbour; for otherwise how could we help rejoicing
that God should grant these favours to one of our
brethren when this in no way hinders Him from
granting them to ourselves, and that His Majesty
should bestow an understanding of His greatness upon
anyone soever? Sometimes He will do this only to
manifest His power, as He said of the blind man to
whom He gave his sight, when the Apostles asked Him
if he were suffering for his own sins or for the sins
of his parents.[23]
He grants these favours, then,
not because those who receive them are holier than
those who do not, but in order that His greatness may
be made known, as we see in the case of Saint Paul
and the Magdalen, and in order that we may praise Him
in His creatures.
It may be said that these things seem impossible and
that it is better not to scandalize the weak. But
less harm is done by their disbelieving us than by
our failing to edify those to whom God grants these
favours, and who will rejoice and will awaken others
to a fresh love of Him Who grants such mercies,
according to the greatness of His power and majesty.
In any case I know that none to whom I am speaking
will run into this danger, because they all know and
believe that God grants still greater proofs of His
love. I am sure that, if any one of you does not
believe this, she will never learn it by experience.
For God's will is that no bounds should be set to His
works. Never do such a thing, then, sisters, if the
Lord does not lead you by this road.
Now let us return to our beautiful and delightful
castle and see how we can enter it. I seem rather to
be talking nonsense, for, if this castle is the soul,
there can clearly be no question of our entering it.
For we ourselves are the castle: and it would be
absurd to tell someone to enter a room when he was in
it already! But you must understand that there are
many ways of "being" in a place. Many souls remain in
the outer court of the castle, which is the place
occupied by the guards; they are not interested in
entering it, and have no idea what there is in that
wonderful place, or who dwells in it, or even how
many rooms it has. You will have read certain books
on prayer which advise the soul to enter within
itself: and that is exactly what this means.
A short time ago I was told by a very learned man
that souls without prayer are like people whose
bodies or limbs are paralysed: they possess feet and
hands but they cannot control them. In the same way,
there are souls so infirm and so accustomed to
busying themselves with outside affairs that nothing
can be done for them, and it seems as though they are
incapable of entering within themselves at all.
So
accustomed have they grown to living all the time
with the reptiles and other creatures to be found in
the outer court of the castle that they have almost
become like them; and although by nature they are so
richly endowed as to have the power of holding
converse with none other than God Himself, there is
nothing that can be done for them. Unless they strive
to realize their miserable condition and to remedy
it, they will be turned into pillars of salt for not
looking within themselves, just as Lot's wife was
because she looked back.[24]
As far as I can understand, the door of entry into
this castle is prayer and meditation: I do not say
mental prayer rather than vocal, for, if it is prayer
at all, it must be accompanied by meditation. If a
person does not think Whom he is addressing, and what
he is asking for, and who it is that is asking and of
Whom he is asking it, I do not consider that he is
praying at all even though he be constantly moving
his lips. True, it is sometimes possible to pray
without paying heed to these things, but that is only
because they have been thought about previously; if a
man is in the habit of speaking to God's Majesty as
he would speak to his slave, and never wonders if he
is expressing himself properly, but merely utters the
words that come to his lips because he has learned
them by heart through constant repetition, I do not
call that prayer at all -- and God grant no Christian
may ever speak to Him so! At any rate, sisters, I
hope in God that none of you will, for we are
accustomed here to talk about interior matters, and
that is a good way of keeping oneself from falling
into such animal-like habits.[25]
Let us say no more, then, of these paralysed souls,
who, unless the Lord Himself comes and commands them
to rise, are like the man who had lain beside the
pool for thirty years:[26] they are unfortunate
creatures and live in great peril. Let us rather
think of certain other souls, who do eventually enter
the castle.
These are very much absorbed in worldly
affairs; but their desires are good; sometimes,
though infrequently, they commend themselves to Our
Lord; and they think about the state of their souls,
though not very carefully. Full of a thousand
preoccupations as they are, they pray only a few
times a month, and as a rule they are thinking all
the time of their preoccupations, for they are very
much attached to them, and, where their treasure is,
there is their heart also.[27]
From time to time,
however, they shake their minds free of them and it
is a great thing that they should know themselves
well enough to realize that they are not going the
right way to reach the castle door. Eventually they
enter the first rooms on the lowest floor, but so
many reptiles get in with them that they are unable
to appreciate the beauty of the castle or to find any
peace within it. Still, they have done a good deal by
entering at all.
You will think this is beside the point, daughters,
since by the goodness of the Lord you are not one of
these. But you must be patient, for there is no other
way in which I can explain to you some ideas I have
had about certain interior matters concerning prayer.
May it please the Lord to enable me to say something
about them; for to explain to you what I should like
is very difficult unless you have had personal
experience; and anyone with such experience, as you
will see, cannot help touching upon subjects which,
please God, shall, by His mercy, never concern us.
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