Treatise on the Love of GodBook VI. The practice of holy love in prayer and meditation

There are two chief developments of our love towards God, one affective, the other effective, or, as S. Bernard says, active. By the first we give our affections to God and to that which He loves; by the second we serve Him, and obey His commands. The one unites us to His Goodness, the other causes us to fulfil His Will. The one inspires the love of complacence and benevolence, longings, and aspirations which tend to the union of our soul with God; the other fills us with the stedfast resolution, firm courage, and hearty obedience which are requisite to carry out God’s Will, to suffer and accept willingly whatever it may be His Good Pleasure to send us. The one makes us find pleasure in God, the other makes us please Him; by one we conceive, by the other we produce, By the one we “set God as a seal upon our heart,” as the standard round which all our affections rally; by the other “as a seal upon our arm,” as the sword wherewith we can do mighty deeds.

Now the first of these exercises consists mainly in meditation, wherein so many interior actions take place that it is impossible to express them all, not only from their number, but from their nature and quality, which being spiritual, cannot but be very subtle, and all but imperceptible to our understanding. The best trained hounds are apt to lose scent when the deer doubles and evades them by every device; and so we often lose insight of our hearts by its multiplicity of windings and doublings. God Alone in His Infinite Wisdom fathoms the depths and windings of our heart; He “understandeth my thoughts long before. He is about my path. . . and spiest out all my ways ... His Knowledge is too excellent for me; I cannot attain unto it.”² Were we to persist in trying to follow the course of our own minds and acts, we should involve ourselves in labyrinths without clue, and it would be an intolerable strain to think of our thoughts, consider our considerations, scan our spiritual vision, discern our perceptions, recall our recollections—a hopeless, useless entanglement! The handling of such matters is difficult, especially to one who is not greatly given to prayer. :

We do not here use the word prayer (orvaison) solely as the petition for some good thing, poured out before God by the faithful, as S. Basil defines it, but rather according to S. Bonaventura, who says that prayer (or meditation), generally speaking, includes all the contemplative acts; or S. Gregory Nyssen, who taught that prayer is intercourse of the soul with God; or S. Chrysostom, who calls it a parley with the Majesty of God; or, lastly, S. Augustine and S. Damascene, who say that prayer is an uplifting of the mind to God. And if prayer be an intercourse by which we hold converse with God, we aspire to Him and breathe in Him, while He inspires and breathes upon us.

But of what do we treat in prayer? what is the subject of that intercourse? Of what but God; for. who can excite and foster love save through the Beloved? And therefore prayer and mystical theology are one and the same thing. We call it theology because, just as speculative theology concerns God only, so this speaks but of Him, though with three points of difference,—i.e. I. That treats of God in that He is God, this in that He is to be loved above all things; in other words, one has reference to the Divinity of Supreme Goodness, the other to the Supreme Goodness of the Divinity. II. Speculative theology deals with God as referring to men; mystical theology speaks of God as of and in Himself. III. Speculative theology tends to the knowledge, mystical theology to the love, of God; so that while the one makes profound scholars and learned theologians, the other makes devout lovers of God.

It is called mystic because it is secret, and the intercourse between God and the soul which it fosters is appreciable only to those who practise it. The language of lovers is one unintelligible to all but themselves: “I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the Voice of my Beloved that knocketh.”³ Who would have supposed that the Bride while sleeping could commune with her Bridegroom? But where love is spoken words are needless, as well as all other external means of communication. Briefly, prayer and mystic theology are nothing else than a conversation by which the soul carries on a loving intercourse with God, through which to attain full union with Him. Prayer is a “manna” by reason of the countless sweetnesses it imparts to those who use it; but it is “hidden”? because it falls before the dawn of any earthly knowledge, in the mental wilderness where the soul comes Face to face with God.” “Who is this that cometh out of the wilderness like pillars of smoke, perfumed with myrrh and frankincense, with all powders of the merchant?”4 And so likewise the longing for secresy led the Bride to plead, “Come, my Beloved, let us go forth into the field, let us lodge in the villages ;”5 and for the same reason she is called a turtledove, loving solitary, shaded places, where she coos her plaintive notes for her mate alone, soliciting him while living, mourning him when dead. So in the Canticles the Heavenly Bride and Bridegroom show forth their love in continual intercourse; and if others break in, it is without hindering their converse. S. Teresa used to say that she specially loved to meditate on those Mysteries wherein our Lord was alone, as in the Garden of Olives, or sitting by the well of Sychar; because when alone she fancied He would suffer her to draw the closer to Him.

Love craves for privacy, and lovers, though they may have no secret to tell, yet delight in secresy; mainly, perhaps, because they care only to speak to each other, and their manner of converse is peculiar. They do not talk after the common fashion, but in a language of their own. The language of love may be ordinary as to words, but only lovers are familiar with its intonation and utterance.

The word friend, as commonly used, may not convey anything very special, but it becomes wondrously significant when whispered apart. Very wide indeed is the difference between the language of those primitive lovers of God; Ignatius, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Augustine, Hilary, Ephrem, Gregory, and Bernard,— and the drier, less loving theologians of our time! We use the same words; but with them those words breathed forth warmth and perfume, with us they are cold and savourless.

Love speaks not with the lips alone, but with the eyes and expression, and its very silence is eloquent. “My heart hath talked of Thee. . . Thy Face, Lord, will I seek.”⁸ ‘Mine eyes long sore for Thy Word, saying, O when wilt Thou comfort me?”? “Hear my prayer, O Lord, and with Thine Ears consider my calling; hold not Thy peace at my tears.”3 “Let not the apple of Thine Eye cease,” as the woful inhabitants of Jerusalem cried out.4 Thus the silence of the

' Ps, xxvii. 9. ? Ps. cxix. 82.

sorrowful lover speaks in tears. The main point of mystic theology is to speak with and hearken to God in the recesses of the heart; and forasmuch as this dialogue is carried on by very secret aspirations and inspirations, we call it the colloquy of silence. Eye speaks to eye, heart to heart, and none can understand save those devout lovers who take part.

This word is largely used in Holy Scripture, and means an attentive, oft-repeated thought, calculated to excite good or evil affections. In Psalm i. we are told that he is blessed whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who will exercise himself therein, or meditate thereupon day and night. And in the second the Psalmist asks, “Why do the heathen so furiously rage together, and why do the people imagine a vain thing?” whereby we see meditation used alike for good and evil. Generally, however, the word meditation is used in Holy Scripture to indicate the attention fixed on sacred things with a view to increase love for them; and it has been, so to say, canonized by the general consent of theologians, just as angel and zeal are, while demon and woe have been assigned to evil things. So now in speaking of meditation we mean that which is holy; and therein first, mystic theology.

Now all meditation is thought, but all thoughts are not meditation. We frequently are beset by thoughts which have no method or intention, but are altogether desultory, like flies hovering over a flower-bed without object, and this manner of thought cannot be called meditation. At other times we think attentively about somewhat with a view to understand its causes, effects, or quality, and this manner of thought is study, resembling the cockchafer, who buzzes about leaves and flowers that he may eat them. But when we think about sacred things, not in order to learn, but to kindle our affections, that is really meditating; and therein the mind resembles neither the fly amusing itself nor the chafer eating its fill, but the bee which goes from flower to flower amid sacred Mysteries, gathering up the honey of Divine Love.

Some there are who continually dwell upon useless thoughts, almost without knowing what they are about. They are attentive only by inadvertence, and do not seek so to cogitate; they are like Job when he said, “My purposes are broken off, even the thoughts of my heart.”* Others study, and laboriously heap up vanity, but there are few who really meditate with a view to kindling heavenly love within their souls. Thought and study may be bestowed on all manner of things, but the real meditation of which I am speaking has reference only to such matters as are calculated to make us earnest and devout. Practically, meditation is simply thought, attentive, repeated or sustained, with a view to excite the will to holy affections and resolutions. God’s Word describes such meditation by a very beautiful similitude: “I will cry out like a young swallow, and meditate like a dove.”? If you have ever watched the swallow broods, you will have seen how wide they open their beaks when chirping; while, on the contrary, doves keep their beaks closed more than any other bird, cooing within the throat and breast, alike in the expression of gladness or sadness. So Isaiah likens his vocal prayer to the cry of the young swallow, and his meditation to the dove, softly swelling within his heart until it be heard of God. Again, he says, “We roar all like bears, and mourn sore

‘Job xvii. 11.

2 The English version has, “Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter: I did mourn as a dove;” but in the Vulgate it is, “Sicut pullus hirundinis sic clamabo, meditabor ut columba” (Isa. xxxviii. 14). like doves;”¹ where again the roaring bear represents vocal prayer, and the mourning dove devout meditation. But that it may be remembered how the dove coos not in complaint only, but for joy likewise, the Bridegroom, when describing the spiritual springtide under the likeness of natural spring, says, “The voice of the turtle is heard in our land ;” and again, “O my dove. . . let me see thy countenance, let me hear thy voice; for sweet is thy voice, and thy countenance is comely ;”? showing thereby that the devout soul is acceptable to Him when it kindles its spiritual love through pious meditation. Thus he who had said that he would ‘meditate like the dove,” saith that he will review all his past years in the bitterness of his soul, for meditation and cogitation with a view to rousing the affections are one and the same thing. Therefore Moses, after exhorting the people of Israel to “consider in - their heart” what God had done for them, goes on to say, “Therefore thou shalt keep the commandments of the Lord thy God, to walk in His ways, and to fear Him.”4 And the Lord Himself gave the like precept to Joshua: “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do all the laws.”5 To “meditate” and to “consider” are used as synonymous in these two passages, and in both the end of consideration and meditation is to be “keeping and doing the law.” The Apostle says in the same sense, “Consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners against Himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your-minds ;”° where by “consider” he plainly means “meditate.” And why would he have us meditate upon the Passion? Not, surely, that we may become learned, but patient and brave in our heavenward path. “Lord, what love have I unto Thy law, all the day long is my study in it,” David cries out." He meditates upon the law because he loves it, and he loves it because he meditates thereupon.

Meditation is the mystic rumination of which we read in the Canticles, and it was thus that the pure and gentle Isaac “went out to meditate in the field at eventide,”3 to hold converse with his God.

The summer bee flits from flower to flower, not at haphazard, but designedly; not merely to recreate itself amid the garden’s pleasant diaper, but to seek honey, and carry it to its hive, to the symmetric comb where it stores its winter food. Even so the devout soul in meditation. It goes from mystery to mystery, not merely as dipping into the beauty of those wondrous matters, but deliberately seeking fresh motives for love and devout affections; and having found these, it feeds upon and imbibes them, and, storing them up within, condenses them into resolutions suitable to the time of temptation. Thus the Heavenly Bride of the Canticles hovers like a bee round the cheek, the lips, the locks of her Beloved, drawing thence ‘innumerable delights, until, kindled with sacred joy, she talks with Him, questions, hearkens, sighs, longs, marvels, while He fills her with content, opens her heart, and fills it with boundless light and sweetness, yet so secretly, that that may be said of this devout communing of the soul with God which we read of Moses: “Moses went up unto God, and God called to him out of the mountain, and they spake one with another.”

* Ps, cxix. 97.

? The English version loses this sense. The Vulgate is “Guttus tuum sicut vinum optimum, dignum dilecto meo ad potandum, labiisque et dentibus illius ad ruminandum” (vii. 9).

Contemplation is nothing else than a mental attitude of loving, simple, persistent attention to holy things, which you may readily understand by comparing it with meditation.

The young bees are called nympha, or grubs, until such time as they make honey; and in like manner we call prayer meditation until it produces the honey of devotion, after which it becomes contemplation. For just as the bee goes hither and thither picking up honey, the which when collected it works for the sake of the sweetness thereof; so we meditate in order to gather up God’s Love, and having gathered it, we contemplate Him and wait upon His Goodness in order to enjoy the sweetness which Love makes us feel therein. The desire to win Divine Love makes us meditate, but when won, that Love causes us to contemplate; for love shows us so much to admire in the object of our love, that we can never gaze or dwell upon it sufficiently.

Remember the Queen of Sheba, how, having beheld the wisdom of Solomon, the beauty of his house, the splendour of his table and household, the gorgeous raiment of his attendants, the service he had appointed in the Temple, and the like, she remained struck with astonishment, contemplating the whole with a sense of utter enchantment and delight. The sight of such marvels created a strong affection in her, and that affection produced a fresh desire to see and rejoice more and more in the presence of him who caused them, so that she cried out, “Happy are these thy servants, which stand continually before thee, and that hear thy wisdom.”¹ Even so men sometimes begin to eat by exciting their appetite; but when once that is excited, they go on eating to satisfy it. And we begin by meditating upon God’s Goodness in order to excite our will to love Him; but that love once roused in the heart, we contemplate the same Goodness in order to satisfy love, which can never sufficiently gaze on its object. In a word, meditation is the mother of love, but contemplation is the daughter; and consequently I called contemplation a loving attention, for we call children by their fathers’ names, not fathers by those of their children.

Truly, even as Joseph was of old the crown and glory of his father's old age, so contemplation is the crown and perfection of its parent love. For love, having kindled contemplative attention in the heart, that attention gives birth to a greater, more fervent love, which is finally crowned with perfection when it attains that which it loves. Love takes delight in beholding the Beloved, and the sight of Him makes us rejoice in His Holy Love; so that by this twofold action love beautifies the object of love, and beauty quickens love. Love has an imperceptible power of enhancing that beauty which we love, and as we gaze our love is quickened. Love gives eyes to see, and sight inflames the heart.

Which, I would ask, is strongest—love which causes us to gaze upon the Beloved, or sight which makes us love Him? Surely knowledge is essential to the production of love—we cannot love that which we know not; and in proportion as our knowledge of good increases, love profits by the growth, provided nothing hinders its action. Nevertheless it often happens that knowledge having given birth to holy love, that love, unfettered by the limits of human knowledge, reaches out far beyond it, so that even in this life love may greatly exceed our knowledge of God, and therefore S. Thomas affirms that often simple women and unlearned persons are capable of and abound more greatly in love than the learned.

The celebrated Andrea de Vercelli, S. Anthony of Padua’s master, says several times in his commentary on S. Denys, that love reaches hidden places where external science can never penetrate, illustrating the proposition by his own disciple S. Anthony, who was so profound a mystic theologian that, like S. John Baptist, he might well be called “a burning and shining light.” Brother Egidio, one of the first saintly companions of S. Francis, exclaimed once to S. Bonaventura, “O thrice happy ye who are learned, for ye best know how to praise God! but what can we poor ignorant men do?” To which S. Bonaventura made answer, “Grace to love God is enough.” “But, father,” Brother Egidio persisted, “can an ignorant man love God as well as one who is learned?” “Verily, yes,” replied S. Bonaventura; “I tell you, a poor ignorant woman can love God as well as a doctor of theology.” Whereupon Brother Egidio cried out, “O poor unlearned woman, love thy Saviour, and thou mayest be even as Brother Bonaventura!” and so engrossed was he by the thought, that for the space of three hours he remained as one rapt!

It is true that the will becomes aware of that which is good by means of the understanding, but having once perceived it, the understanding is not necessary to the exercise of love, for the attraction of that which is good is so strong that the will is powerfully drawn to it, and thus knowledge gives birth to love, though it does not fix the limit thereof. Thus we see that as the knowledge of an insult rouses anger, which if not forthwith repressed generally becomes disproportionately great; so the passions are not governed by the knowledge which excites them, but push on without limit towards their object. And this occurs specially in sacred love, the rather that therein the will is turned to it, not by natural knowledge, but by the light of faith, which, convincing us of the infinitude of God’s Goodness, gives a sufficient cause for loving Him with all our might. Men dig the earth to seek gold and silver, expending present labour on a gain as yet only hoped for, so that an uncertain knowledge produces a present real labour. And as by degrees they discover the vein of metal, they seek more earnestly. A very little matter serves to stimulate their search, and so a feeble knowledge, enveloped in many mists, as is our faith, attracts us infinitely to the love of that Goodness which it lets us see afar off. And thus what S. Augustine says—that the feeble win heaven, while wise men sink to hell—comes true. .

Which would best love the light, a man born blind, who had learnt all that philosophers teach concerning its theories, or the labourer who sees and feels the glorious brightness of the rising sun? The one has more knowledge, the other more enjoyment; and that enjoyment creates a far more lively love than mere information, for the experience of a good thing is infinitely more attractive than any possible amount of knowledge about it. We begin to love through that knowledge of God’s Goodness which faith imparts, and which we proceed to realise by enjoyment; until love quickens enjoyment, and enjoyment intensifies love; until, just as the wind and the waves seem to swell one another, so do love and enjoyment, as it is written, “They that eat Me shall yet be hungry, and they that drink Me shall yet be thirsty.”²

Whether of the twain loved God best, the most subtle of all theologians, or S. Catherine of Genoa, a simple woman? Surely the theologian might know God best as to mere knowledge, but she by experience; and her experience led her on to seraphic love, whereas all science never has attained that perfection.

S. Thomas says that men are greatly attracted to the sciences by a mere vague admiration before realising them, and we may say the same of that knowledge of God’s Goodness by which the will is attracted to Divine Love; but when once the will is roused, love grows by reason of the very enjoyment which it feels. Before babies have tasted sugar or honey they will scarce touch it, but having once tasted thereof, they are greedily eager to get more.

Still we must confess that the will is more powerfully drawn to union with the object of its delight when the understanding urges its virtues, for then it is both drawn and urged; so that knowledge, far from being opposed, is very helpful to devotion, and when combined they are a great mutual support, although often through our infirmity knowledge hinders the birth of devotion, by puffing up and kindling men’s pride, and pride, the foe of all virtue, is absolute ruin to devotion. Assuredly the great wisdom of a Cyprian, an Augustine, Hilary, Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory, Bonaventura, or a Thomas, was not merely a noble accessory, but a mighty quickener of their devotion, as on the other hand their devotion not merely was a stimulant, but a great addition to their knowledge.

MEDITATION dwells, so to say, bit by bit, upon upon the subjects best calculated to touch the soul, but contemplation takes an entire collective view of its object, and such joint consideration results in a vigorous action. Just as one may look upon a brilliant crown from two points of view, either examining all its beauties in detail, or looking at the general effect of its enamelled gorgeousness. The first of these processes resembles meditation, wherein we consider, eg., the effects of Divine Mercy in order to kindle our love. But the second is like contemplation, by which we look at the result of all these effects as a whole, and by one act survey the beauty of many things in a single mass. In meditation we count, so to say, the Divine Perfections contained in a Mystery, in contemplation we sum up the total. The companions of the Bride asked, “What is thy Beloved more than another?” And she describes one by one the details of His perfect Beauty: “My Beloved is white and ruddy, His Head is as the most fine gold; His locks are bushy, and black as a raven; His Eyes as the eyes of doves, His cheeks as a bed of spices, His lips like lilies, dropping sweet-smelling myrrh, His Hands as gold rings set with beryls, His legs as pillars of marble.” And after thus detailing His Beauty as in meditation, she sums up the whole as it were in contemplation: “His Mouth is sweet, yea, He is altogether lovely. This is my Beloved, and this is my Friend.”?

Meditation is as though one smelt the pink, rose, thyme, jessamine, rosemary, and orange flowers severally and distinctly; but contemplation is like the sweet water distilled from all these collectively, for he who smells this receives all these perfumes combined which the other had inhaled separately, and unquestionably the combined scent of all is sweeter than any one taken apart. Blessed are they who, after dilating upon the various reasons they have for loving God, centre all their gaze on one point, all their thoughts on one conclusion, and abide in simple contemplation, like S. Augustine or S. Bruno, crying out continually, “O Goodness, ever old and ever new!” or like S. Francis, who spent whole nights on his knees repeating, “O God, Thou art my God and my All!” or again, S. Bernard, who having meditated the Passion in detail, gathered up the whole into a cluster of loving sorrow for contemplation, and cried out with the Bride, “A bundle of myrrh is my Well-beloved unto me!”?

Or again, devoutly gaze upon the world’s Creator, how He first meditated upon the excellence of His works in detail, the light, the heavens, and earth, and all living creatures, that they “were good;” until when at last the creation of the universe was achieved, Divine meditation changed, so to say, to contemplation; and looking as it were in contemplation upon His work as a whole, “He saw everything that He had made, and behold, it was very good.” Each several part, seen as in meditation, was “good,” but contemplated all together they were “very good ;” even as many rivulets form one river capable of floating mighty vessels which none of them singly could have borne.

So having roused sundry devout affections by the various considerations which make up meditation, we gather up their essence into a livelier affection than any one taken apart, which though single, combines the virtue of all other affections, and is called contemplative love.

Thus theologians say that the highest among the angels have a more simple knowledge of God than the lower angels, and their perceptions are more universal; so that that which the lower angels see through various processes, the higher orders see more simply and at once. And S. Augustine, followed by S. Thomas, says that in Heaven we shall not be subject to these great vicissitudes and varying processes of thought, but that by a single process we shall be able to appreciate all things. As water flows farther from its source its waves become more broken and divided; and so perfections divide and evaporate as they depart from God, their Fount; but near to Him they unite, and are finally lost in that one sovereign perfection which is the “one thing needful” which Mary chose, and which “shall never be taken away” from those who attain to it. - ;

Simple contemplation is carried out by one or other of these three processes. One while we simply gaze upon some Perfection of God, e.g. His Infinite Goodness, without dwelling upon any other attributes. As a bridegroom gazing in admiration upon the beauty of his bride’s complexion, who while so doing would gaze upon her whole face, although he did not dwell upon any special feature; so the soul contemplating God’s sovereign Goodness sees therein His Justice, Wisdom, and Power, although specially dwelling upon His Goodness alone.

Another time we may contemplate several of God’s wondrous Perfections, but under one comprehensive glance; as the bridegroom who might cast his glance over his gorgeously arrayed bride from head to foot, seeing her attire as a whole, without dwelling upon the detail of her ornaments or expression, only knowing that all is beautiful and gracious. And again at other times we may contemplate not any of these Divine Perfections, but some special act, as e.g., the Mercy whereby God forgives sins, the creation, the resurrection of Lazarus, or the conversion of S. Paul, herein resembling the bridegroom who should dwell, not on the eyes of his bride, but on the gentle glances she cast on him, not on her lips, but the sweet words which came forth from them. And then the soul bursts forth in love, not only with reference to the act contemplated, but to Him whence it proceeds: “Thou art good and gracious: O teach me Thy statutes ;”¹ “His Mouth is most sweet; yea, He is altogether lovely ;”*.“O how sweet are Thy words unto my throat; yea, sweeter than honey unto my mouth.”3 It cries out with S. Thomas, “My Lord and my God!” and with Mary Magdalene, “Master !”

By whichever of these processes contemplation is carried on, all alike it has this quality, viz. it is performed with delight, because the groundwork is having found God and His Holy. Love, and rejoicing therein, saying, “I found Him Whom my soul loveth: I held Him, and would not let Him go.”4 And in this it differs from meditation, which is almost always a work of toil and effort; the mind working out one consideration after another, and laboriously seeking either the object of its love or the love of its Beloved. Jacob toiled in meditation to win Rachel, but when he rejoiced in her possession he forgot all his toil in contemplation. The Divine Bridegroom in His character of Shepherd made ready a feast for His Bride, in which He describes all the mysteries of man’s redemption: “I am come into My garden, My sister, My spouse: I have gathered My myrrh with My spice; I have eaten My honeycomb with My honey; I have drunk My wine with My milk: eat, O friends; drink, yea, drink abundantly.”5 Did not our Lord come into His garden when He entered into the most pure womb of His Mother? did He not gather His myrrh and spices in His Passion and Death on the Cross, heaping up merits and treasure on behalf of His spiritual progeny? Did not He eat His honeycomb with His honey when He rose from the dead, and His most pure Soul came again into His pierced Body? And what was His Ascension into Heaven, into the fulness of His Glory, but a drinking of the wine of His Glory together with the milk of His raised Body, after a more perfect fashion than before? And in all these Divine Mysteries, which seem to sum up all else, there is wherewithal to eat and drink for all His friends, yea, to drink abundantly for His best friends. The one eat and drink, but they eat more than they drink, and are not inebriated; the others eat and drink, but they drink far more than they eat, and these are they which are inebriated.5 Now “eating” is meditation, for meditating we chew, and suck the spiritual food the better to digest it, which is not done without toil. “Drinking” is contemplation, which is done without trouble or effort, easily and with pleasure. But “inebriation” is such constant and ardent contemplation as lifts us altogether out of self into God: a holy and blessed intoxication, which, unlike that of this world, severs us not from the spiritual sense, but from that which is material; does not abase or brutalise us, but rather makes us angelic, not to say Divine; carries us out of self, not to lower us to mere animals like earthly drunkenness, but to lift us above self to the rank of purified spirits, so that we live in God more than in ourselves, being fast bound by love to gaze upon His Beauty and find full union with Him.

And forasmuch as in order to attain to contemplation men need the help of hearing God’s Word, of spiritual communing one with another, of reading devout books, of prayer, meditation, singing offices, pondering good thoughts; all these have that end in view, and those who give themselves up to such pursuits we call contemplatives; and the life they lead “the contemplative life,” because of that act of the understanding whereby we study the truth and beauty of God’s Goodness with loving attention, which daily increases the measure of our love for the Infinite ‘Sweetness of our Dear Lord. :

I do not mean by this the recollection which they practise who seek to place themselves in God’s Presence, retiring, as it were, within their own heart in order the better to commune with God. Such recollection is the fruit of love, moving us to prayer, and adopting this method of promoting it, so that it is a voluntary act. But the recollection of which I speak is not effected at the bidding of love, but by ‘love itself; that is to say, we do not perform it by our own choice, for it is not in our power to do so when we will, but God performs it in us by His Holy Grace when He pleases. S. Teresa says that it was a happy similitude which compared the prayer of recollection to a hedgehog or tortoise shrinking within itself, except that those creatures can so retire whensoever they will, but recollection does not depend on our will, but on God's Grace.

It is really thus: nothing is more natural to Him Who is All-good than to attract and absorb whatever can appreciate Him, as our souls, which always tend towards their best treasure, are able to do. And so from time to time our Dear Lord sheds an unseen sweetness into the heart, manifesting His Presence; and then the faculties gravitate irresistibly there where the Beloved of the soul is. Just as a fresh swarm of bees when on the wing is gathered together by the tinkling of metal or the scent of honey, or even of certain sweet herbs, and thus coaxed into the hive destined for it; even so our Dear Lord, by some word

of love, or some sweet odour more precious than honey issuing from the hem of His garment, i.e. some spark of heavenly comfort within the heart, causes His Presence to be felt, and absorbs all the soul’s faculties, centring them on Himself as their One Great Object. And just as if you put a loadstone amid sundry needles all would immediately turn to the attraction of that magnet, and cling to it; so when our Lord makes known His most sweet Presence in the midst of the soul, all its faculties turn thereto, and fain would unite themselves to that incomparable sweetness.

Then indeed the soul cries out with St. Augustine, “Whither do I call Thee, since I am in Thee? I sought Thee afar off, and Thou wert within my heart !” Mary Magdalene’s whole thoughts and affections were lavished around the Sepulchre as she sought her Saviour. And even when He came and spoke to her she did not collect them, because she perceived not His Presence; but so soon as He called her by her name, she recollected herself, and held Him by the Feet—one word brought recollection to her.

Think of the Blessed Virgin after she had conceived the Son of God, how her whole soul would be gathered together upon the precious fruit of her womb; how all the faculties of her soul would be collected like bees within their hive; how, in proportion as that Divine Greatness was narrowed and compressed within her pure breast, her soul “magnified” His Praise, and her spirit “rejoiced in God her Saviour.” She went not forth beyond herself, inasmuch as all her treasure and joy were contained within her.

Now this holy content may be devoutly imitated by those who in sacramental communion feel, through the conviction of faith, that which is revealed to them, “not of flesh and blood, but of the Father Which is in Heaven ;”'—namely, that their Saviour is verily present in their souls and bodies by means of the most Blessed Sacrament. And even as the mother-of-pearl closes after receiving its sweet drops of dew, not merely to avoid all pollution from the sea, but also to enjoy the precious gift which falls from heaven with it; so there are devout souls which, having received that most Precious Sacrament which contains the dew of all heavenly blessings, remain fixed in recollection, not merely in adoration of their Lord present within them, but basking in the unspeakable warmth and refreshment created by that very essence of immortality dwelling with them. Wherein you perceive such recollection is the work of love, which, realising the Presence of the Beloved through the sweetness He brings, draws with all its force and a most willing compliance to Him Who binds hearts to Himself just as men bind the body with cords.

But this precious recollection of the soul is not produced only by the consciousness of a Divine Presence within, but by anything whatsoever whereby we place ourselves under the influence of that Presence. Sometimes all the inner being recollects itself through the intense reverence and holy fear which comes over us at the thought of His sovereign Majesty Who is with us, even as the appearance of some great prince would impress us with respect and awe.

There is a flower which may be said to recollect itself before the sun, which causes it to close its petals, whereas it expands them at night. This manner of recollection is somewhat similar, for the mere Presence of God, or sense thereof, causes all the faculties to collect themselves in adoration of that Divine Majesty, for which love rouses a venerating awe. I once knew a person who was so urgently moved by any word or allusion which brought God’s Presence at all more vividly than usual before her, whether in confession or ordinary conversation, that she was almost unable to break the spell by speaking, but was wont to remain as in a trance until the Bridegroom set her free, which was sometimes sooner, sometimes later.

God, it is wont to become so peacefully absorbed in its Beloved One as to be scarcely conscious even that it is absorbed; just as certain rivers flow so smoothly that those who sail upon them hardly realise their motion, seeing no waves or currents. It is this sweet calm which S. Teresa calls the prayer of quietude, which is much the same as what she elsewhere calls a sleep of the active powers.

We all know how earthly lovers can rest in the sight of the person they love without speaking, wholly satisfied in the enjoyment of the beloved presence, not through any definite process of thought, but by the stillness and peace which the spirit finds therein. “A bundle of myrrh is my Well-Beloved unto me; He shall lie all night betwixt my breasts.”¹ “My Beloved is mine, and I am His; He feedeth among the lilies, until the day break, and the shadows flee away.”“Tell me, O Thou Whom my soul loveth, where Thou feedest, where Thou makest Thy flock to rest at noon.’^ The Sulamite Bride is content that her Beloved be with her, or elsewhere, so long as she knows where ‘He is; and so knowing, she is at rest.

At times this rest reaches such a point that the soul and all its powers are as though asleep, the will alone possessing any motion, and it merely accepts the satisfaction which that Presence of the Beloved imparts. And what is more marvellous still, the will receives this satisfaction unconsciously, because it is thinking solely of the Presence which blesses it, not of self; just as sometimes, when half asleep, we almost unconsciously receive the caresses or hear the words of those around.

But however passive the soul may be in this exquisite repose, it testifies clearly to the preciousness of its joy if anything threatens to take away the Beloved Presence, for then indeed the bereaved soul cries out, like a babe rudely wakened from its sleep. And so the Bride exclaims, “I charge you, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, by the roes, and by the hinds of the field, that ye stir not up, nor awake my Love, till He please;”⁴ that is, until self-aroused. Be sure that the soul thus hushed in its God would not exchange that rest for the greatest of earthly treasures.

This was the repose which the holy Mary enjoyed when she sat at the Feet of her Lord and heard His Word.⁵ There she sat perfectly still, not speaking or weeping, not even praying. Martha was flitting about, cumbered with many things, to which Mary gave no heed. What did she? Nought save listen. And what was it so to listen? It was to be, as it were, a chosen vessel, receiving, drop by drop, the sweet-smelling myrrh which fell from the Lips of her Beloved, and He, jealous for her loving repose, rebuked Martha when she would have roused Mary: “Thou art careful and troubled about many things; but one thing is needful, and Mary has chosen that better part, which shall not be taken away from her.” What was that “better part”? Resting peacefully and in calmness in the Presence of Jesus. Painters have often represented S. John, not merely leaning, but actually sleeping on Jesus’ Breast at the Last Supper, sitting, as he did, in Oriental fashion. Assuredly it was in no mere material slumber, but who may doubt that, being given thus to approach the Source of everlasting blessedness, he slept a mystic sleep, even as the babe which hangs to its mother’s breast, feeding and sleeping at the same time. Joy indeed to that Benjamin, favoured child of his Saviour, thus to sleep in a Father’s Arms, even as the next day he was to be a very Benoni, the child of sorrow, commended to a mother’s love. What sweeter to a babe, sleeping or waking, than to rest on a parent’s bosom?

If then you attain to such simple filial trust in our Lord, abide therein, without seeking any activity, either of intellect or will, for such loving confidence, and slumber in the Saviour’s Arms, combine above all whatever else you could possibly seek. Better far to sleep on that Dear Breast, than to wake under any other possible conditions.

Who has not seen a hungry infant clinging with an almost painful tenacity to its mother’s breast, and then, its appetite satisfied, closing its eyes and falling asleep while yet mechanically sucking, unconsciously imbibing her milk, and yet, while unconscious, ready to wake up and cry were the grateful flow checked? Just so with the soul hushed in rest before God: almost unconsciously it sucks in the sweetness of that Presence without any mental process; only the will is alive, and serves, so to say, as a mouth whereby that sweetness is received, and if aught disturbs that soul, all asleep as it seems, it is evident that it is not asleep to such interruption, which it keenly resents. This is S. Teresa’s similitude.

What, indeed, can disturb the soul which is recollected in its God? Surely it has good reason to be at rest, for it has found that which it seeks: “I found Him Whom my soul loveth; I held Him, and would not let Him go.”¹ No need to exercise the understanding; it beholds the Bridegroom present, and all words are superfluous. Even if the understanding sees Him not, the soul is at rest, realising His Presence by the sweetness it imparts. Our Lady did not see her Divine Child before His Birth, but she felt Him in her womb, and rejoiced. S. Elisabeth rejoiced in that same Presence at the Visitation without seeing Him. Neither does the soul need any effort of memory, for its Beloved is present; nor of imagination, for who wants to represent that which it actually enjoys? And so the will only is active, sucking, as it were, the milk of that Gracious Presence, all else in the soul being stilled by the sweetness of that delight. Men use a mixture of honey and wine to lure bees to their hive, and also to quiet them when any excitement prevails therein. If they get excited, the scent of such a mixture stills them, and they are soothed by the luscious food. O my God, when Thy Gracious Presence fills man’s heart with sweet perfumes, sweeter far than honey and wine, then every faculty of his soul is hushed in a grateful repose, lulled so utterly to rest, that no power save that of the will is awake, and that is unconsciously absorbed in the inconceivable bliss of its Present God!

Some minds are active, fertile, brimming over with thoughts; others are plastic and impressionable, prone to self-dissection, continually taking the measure of their own progress. Others, again, are not content, being satisfied, unless they can continually taste and finger, so to say, their satisfaction; like one who was not content to be well armed against the cold unless he knew exactly how many coverings he bore; or who could not rest, knowing himself to be rich, unless he could reckon the precise number of pieces of money he possessed.

Now all such as these are wont to be uneasy in their meditation, for if God vouchsafes them the blessed rest of His Presence, they are ready to forsake it in order to investigate how they are using it, whether they are really satisfied, whether their tranquillity is tranquil, and the like; so that instead of surrendering their will to the sweetness of the Divine Presence, they employ their minds in weighing feelings, as though a bride trifled with her wedding ring instead of devoting herself to the husband who gave it her. There is a wide difference between being occupied with God Who satisfies us, and trifling with the satisfaction He bestows.

‘The soul, then, to which God gives a holy, loving quietude in prayer, should abstain, as far as may be, from inspecting self or that rest, which is in danger of being lost by overmuch contemplation, and the true way of prizing it is not to pay too much heed to it. The babe which has turned from its mother’s breast to see where it abides, is in haste to lay its head again on that pillow; and so if we find that curiosity to know what progress we make in prayer has disturbed us, the safest course is to turn back quietly to God’s Presence, and seek to rest therein once more.

There is no fear, however, of losing that holy quietude by such activity, mental or bodily, as does not spring from carelessness or indiscretion. S. Teresa says that it is mere superstition to be afraid of any physical movement as likely to disturb it; for God, Who gives this peace, will not take it away because of unavoidable movements, or because of involuntary distractions, and when once the will is firmly set to seek God’s Presence, it will enjoy His Sweetness even if the memory or understanding should wander. Of course the soul’s peace is not so entire as if these were at one with the will, but still there is a very real spiritual peace when the will, which is ruler of all other faculties, is at rest. I have seen a soul very really united to God, which nevertheless had both memory and understanding fully alive and clear to surrounding circumstances, although unable to let go its hold upon God through the will, and that to such an extent, that any effort to loosen this hold produced lamentation, like to a babe torn from the breast. But unquestionably the soul’s peace would be greater and sweeter if there were no disturbance, mental or bodily, presented to it. Its longing is to be wholly engrossed by the Divine Presence; but when inevitably distracted as to the other faculties, at all events the will remains at peace. Observe, too, that the will is not even roused to recall the other wandering faculties; for were it to be so roused it would lose its own peace, and run the risk of distraction from its true aim while pursuing those uncertain powers. Nor can they ever be so profitably recalled to duty as by the perseverance of the will in holy quietude, for gradually all the faculties become enthralled by the pleasure which the will receives in this loving rest, a pleasure which it imparts to the whole being, attracting it to share that delight.

Thus we see that holy quietude may be of different degrees; sometimes in all the faculties united to the will, sometimes in the will only, and in it either sensibly or imperceptibly; the soul one time enjoying an inexpressibly sweet interior sense of God’s Presence, as S. Elisabeth in the Visitation; at another an intensely blessed craving for God, like the disciples at Emmaus, who only recognised the Lord’s Presence in the breaking of bread. Sometimes the soul does not merely perceive God’s Presence, but hears Him speak through certain interior lights which take the place of words; another time it feels Him speaking, and answers again so secretly, so gently, that its peace is nowise broken, so that without waking it watches, like the Bride in the Canticles ;¹ and again at times it hears the Bridegroom speaking, but is kept silent itself by very joy and reverence, or by an exhaustion which leaves it power only to hear, not to speak, as one who is feeble with illness, or just falling asleep.

Again, sometimes the soul neither hears nor speaks to, nor has any conscious sign of the Beloved, but simply realises that it is in God’s Presence, and that He wills it so to be. Supposing S. John to have slept in actual physical slumber on his Dear Lord’s Breast at Supper, and by His command, surely he had then been in his Master’s Presence without feeling conscious of it in any way.

Observe, too, that we need more care in order to place ourselves in God’s Presence than to abide there when once so placed, because thought and actual attention are needed, as I have already said, to place ourselves in His Presence. But once in it, we maintain the position by various means: through the understanding or will, by doing something in or for God; by gazing on Him, or on something for love of Him; hearing Him, or those who speak on His behalf; speaking to Him, or His representatives; doing somewhat for His honour and service. And by these means we abide in God’s Presence, not merely listening, watching, or speaking to Him, but waiting till He may vouchsafe to look upon or speak to us, or it may be, simply abiding where He would have us, because it is His Will. And if to such abiding He vouchsafes to add some conscious feeling that we are His and He is ours, great and precious indeed is the gift.

Let us indulge in a passing illustration. Suppose some statue in a royal gallery to be gifted with understanding, and to be asked, “Wherefore art thou in this niche?” it would reply, “Because my master placed me here.” “Wherefore abidest thou passively there?” “Because my master put me here, not to do anything, but to stand passive.” And did the questioner proceed to ask, “Alas, poor statue! what good is it to thee thus to dwell?” it would surely answer, “I am not here on my own behalf, but in obedience to the will of my maker and master, and that is enough.” “But thou beholdest him not, how then canst thou take pleasure in serving him?” “I see him not,” the answer would be, “for my eyes are not given to see, nor my feet to walk; but I am well content to know that my dear lord sees me where I am, and is satisfied.” Did we press the matter yet a little further, and ask, “Wouldst not thou fain be able to walk towards thy maker, and do him worthier service?” doubtless the statue would reply that it wished for nought save what its master willed. * Askest thou then nothing save to be a motionless statue in thy niche?” And the statue would say, “I desire nought save to be a statue, and abide in my niche, so long as the sculptor wills it so; it contents me wholly, inasmuch as it contents him whose I am, and who made me what I am.”

Verily, it is a blessed way of abiding in God’s Presence! and thereby, come what may, we are safe to be ever most really in it, even in sleep. For if we love Him, we fall asleep not merely in His Sight, but at His Will, and our Creator and Divine Sculptor lays us down upon our beds as a statue in its niche or a bird in its nest, and, waking, we shall find that God was ever present, and that we have been neither removed nor separated from Him. We were present to His Holy Will and Pleasure, though without our own consciousness, so that we may say with Jacob, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not.”² And this quietude wherein the will acts merely by simple acquiescence in God’s good Pleasure is very excellent, inasmuch as it is totally disinterested, because neither the faculties nor the will seek any satisfaction therein, save in entire and absolute submission to God, in Whom they find total rest. The very climax of a loving extasy is to merge the will, not in one’s own content, but in that of God; not to find contentment in one’s own will, but in the Will of God.

Fluids readily accept the limits assigned them, inasmuch as they. have no solidity or firmness wherewith to create a limit for themselves. Pour water into a vessel, and it will assume the limits of that vessel, being neither round nor square itself, but according to the shape of the vessel.

It is not thus with the soul naturally, for it has its own form and natural measure. The first comes from its habits and inclinations, the latter from its will, and when it cleaves persistently to its likings and will we call it hard—that is to say, obstinate. “I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh,” God says ;¹ that is, I will remove your obstinacy. To change the form of stone, iron, or wood, we need the help of axe, hammer, and fire; and so the epithet of iron, or stony, or wooden, heart is given to him who does not willingly receive Divine impressions, but cleaves to his own will and to the inclinations of a depraved nature. On the contrary, a gentle, tractable heart we call a melting heart. David, speaking typically of our Lord upon the Cross, says, “My heart in the midst of my body. is like melting wax.”? Cleopatra, striving to exceed Mark Antony in the lavishness of her banquet, threw a pearl earring, valued at a mighty price, into a vessel of vinegar to dissolve, and swallowed it, proceeding to ‘deal after the same fashion with its fellow, had not Lucius Plautus hindered her. The Heart of the ‘Saviour, the pearl of priceless value, cast as it was into an ocean of incomparable bitterness in His Passion, was voluntarily melted, and flowed away in a stream of grief beneath His mortal Anguish; but love, which is stronger than death, softens and melts the heart sooner than aught beside. The Bride in the Canticles says that her soul melted within her when she heard the Bridegroom’s Voice.*. And what was that melting, save that she was no longer self-contained, but flowed out to her Divine Lover? ,

God bade Moses “speak unto the rock,” and it should bring forth water ;? so no wonder if He melted the soul of her who loved Him with the sweetness of His Words. Balm is naturally so thick that it does not flow, and by dint of keeping it will become hard and transparent, but heat melts and liquefies it. And so with love; even as the Bride says, “Thy Name is as ointment poured forth.”3 Moreover, she herself melted with very love: “My soul melted [E.V. ‘failed ’] -when He spake.”4 Love of the Bridegroom was in her breast like new wine in a vessel, bursting forth by reason of its vehemence: “Thy love is better than wine... as’ointment poured forth,’—each flowed into the heart of the other. When the sun’s rays fall upon a polished blade it seems to lose its form, and melt into that dazzling brilliancy; and so the soul of the Bride melts into that of the Bridegroom when she hears His Voice, and is drawn wholly into Him.

How does this outpouring of the soul into the Beloved take place? A lover's intense delight in the object of his love produces a certain spiritual powerlessness which deprives the soul of any self-restraint, and therefore, like melted balm, it flows into Him it loves. It is not casting itself in, or pressing up to Him, but a gentle outpour into the Divine Being Who is its Sole Delight. Even as the clouds which rise up on the south wind can no longer contain themselves, but fall on the earth in rain, and mingle with the earth into which they sink, until they are lost in it; so the soul flows forth in this holy outpour, and loses itself, not merely by union with the Beloved, but by being utterly mingled with and merged in Him.

Thus the flowing forth of the soul to God is practically an extasy by means of which it is carried wholly beyond its natural limits, by which it is swallowed up and absorbed in God. And therefore those who have attained to so great a height of sacred love, on coming to themselves again, finding nothing to satisfy them on earth, seem to hang to it by a mere thread, and cry out perpetually with S. Teresa, “That which is not God is nothing to me!” Such as this was the passionate love of S. Paul when he exclaimed, “I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me ;”“Our life is hid with Christ in God.”? Supposing a single drop of rain to be thrown into an ocean of distilled water, and to be able to speak, we could fancy it crying out, “Verily, I live, but not in myself, but it is this ocean which lives in me, and my life is hidden in its abyss.” The soul which has flowed into God dies not :—how could it die when swallowed up of life? But it lives, not as of itself; for even as the stars do not shine in the presence of the sun, albeit they retain their light, and that because it comes from the sun, and is hidden by the sun’s greater light ;—so the soul yet lives, but only as flowing into God, so that God lives in it. This, doubtless, was what those saintly men Philip Neri and Francis Xavier meant when, literally overwhelmed by the sweetness of heavenly bliss, they intreated God to hold His Hand if He willed them yet awhile to live in the world, for verily their life seemed wellnigh hidden and swallowed up in God. “. * ® Gal. ii. 20. * Col. iii. 3.

Such expressions are borrowed from the similitude we find between the heart’s affections and the passions of the body. Sadness, fear, hope, hate, and the like affections of the soul, do not enter the heart save as they are drawn in by love. We do not hate evil save because it is opposed to that good which we love; we fear a future evil only because it will deprive us of that good. However great an evil, we only hate it in proportion to our value for its opponent good. He who cares not deeply for the welfare of his country will be indifferent to its ruin, neither will he who loves not God truly hate sin sincerely. Love is the first and chief principle of all passions, and so it first finds entrance in the heart; and inasmuch as it penetrates and pierces to the very depths of the will where it reigns, we say that love wounds the heart. Love is sharp, and penetrates the inmost recesses of the mind. Other affections may enter in, but only by means of love, which pierces and opens a way for them only. The point of the dart wounds; all that follows does but increase the wound and the smart.

That which wounds gives pain. S. Gregory says that the pomegranate with its bright hue, its serried rows of seeds, and its crown, is a fit emblem of holy love,—red with ardent love to God, full of all manner of virtues, and crowned with an eternal reward. But the juice of the pomegranate, grateful as it is to all, is so mixed up of bitter and sweet that one can scarce say which it is which pleases the taste. And even so love is bitter-sweet; and while in this world we shall find no joy wholly sweet, because none is perfect or thoroughly satisfying, although sharpness and sweetness are so blended as to cause us infinite delight. How can these things be?

Verily we have all seen a youth enter society, vigorous and free, who in his heedlessness is captured before he goes forth by love disguised beneath the glance of some frail, foolish being, whose shafts have touched his heart, and he becomes sorrowful and sad. Wherefore? Because he is wounded. But who has wounded him? Love. Yet if love be the offspring of delight, how can it wound and pain? Because sometimes the loved one is absent, and then love wounds the heart with longings, and these, when unsatisfied, grievously torment the mind.

If a child is stung by a bee, it is vain to tell it that the bee which has made the wound makes likewise that luscious honey which pleases its palate. * The honey is very sweet,” he will reply, “but this sting hurts, and my face is swollen!” Assuredly love is a delight, and in so far acceptable, provided it does not leave behind the sting of desire; but when that remains, pain must exist. Assuredly there is somewhat soothing in the smarting which comes of love. Listen to the outcries of the royal lover: “My soul is athirst for God, yea, even for the Living God; when shall I come to appear before the Presence of God? My tears have been my meat day and night, while they daily say unto me, Where is now thy God?” and the Bride of the Canticles says, “I charge you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if ye find my Beloved, that ye tell Him that I am sick of love ;”? “Hope deferred maketh the heart sick.”2

There are various wounds of love. Its first shafts ‘we call wounds, because the heart which seemed whole and healthy before, begins, so soon as it is struck, to break up and flow over to the beloved object. And such separation cannot be painless, since the very essence of pain is the division of living parts one from the other.

Then desire continually pricks and wounds the heart which experiences it. But in Divine Love there is a special wound which God sometimes inflicts Himself upon the heart He designs to perfect. To such He gives intense longings and cravings after His matchless Goodness, until the heart bounds vehemently towards Him, when, forced to stop short, and unable to love as it fain would do, it suffers proportionately. While so powerfully drawn to take wing, it is as powerfully withheld by the infirmities of this mortal life and its own frailty; it longs for the wings of a dove that it may win rest, but finds them not. Thus it is distracted between the impulses of love and its own powerlessness. “O wretched man that I am!” one thus tried exclaimed; “who shall deliver me from the’ body of this death?”* Here, you will observe, the wound is not a desire for that which is absent, for the soul feels its God present, and already possesses Him; He has already “brought it to His banqueting-house, and His banner over it is love.”? But though already conqueror, He further lets fly endless shafts of love, displaying in a succession of loving ways how great His Grace is, and the soul, unable to mount up whither it would attain, and seeing how contemptible all its efforts are in proportion to that love it would fain duly return, is distracted with pain, for every futile effort to rise higher is a fresh pang.

The heart which craves after an infinite love realises its incapacity to love or long enough; and this unsuccessful craving is as a barbed arrow in the generous soul, while yet its very pain is sweet, because he who longs to love is glad to long, and would indeed be most miserable if he ceased to crave continually for that which is to be loved beyond all things. Longing to love, he suffers; but loving to long, he rejoices.

The very blessed in Paradise, beholding the Infinite Beauty of God, would faint and fail from longing to love Him more if His most Holy Will did not fill them

x Rom. vii. 24. ? Cant. ii. 4.

with His Own sweet Rest. But they love His sovereign Will so entirely that theirs is wholly merged in it, and they rest content in His Content, willing to submit to the limit Love puts to love. Were it not so, their love would be alike delicious and poignant—delicious in the possession of so great a gift, poignant in the intensity of desire for more. Thus God in His Wisdom sends perpetual shafts into the heart of those who love Him, to teach them that they do not love Him nearly so much as He deserves to be loved. And be sure that the man who does not crave to love God more does not as yet love Him well enough. There is no “enough ;” and he who would stop short in what he has attained has attained but little, be sure.

Nothing so wounds the loving heart as beholding another heart wounded by love for it. The pelican makes her nest on the ground, so that her chicks are often bitten by serpents. Then the mother-bird, with instinctive surgery, pricks her young with her beak, to let the venom forth with their blood, and to get rid of all the venom she lets all their blood flow, and so the brood perishes. But when she sees them dead she pierces her own body, and pours out her own blood upon them, and restores them to a better life; her love wounded them, and by that same love she wounds herself. We can never wound any heart with love without being forthwith wounded ourselves; so when the soul beholds its God pierced with love for it, it cannot fail to be pierced itself. “Thou hast ravished [or pierced] my heart,” says the Divine Bridegroom :' “Tell :ye my Beloved that I am sick of love.”³ When a bee stings it always dies. Even so look upon the Saviour of souls wounded for love of us unto the death of the Cross, and how can ye not be wounded for love of Him, and that with a wound more sorely loving than His was lovingly sore, forasmuch as we can never love Him in proportion to what His Love and Death demand?

There is another wound of love, when the soul is conscious of loving its God, and yet He treats it as though He did not recognise or mistrusted that love. The merest shadow of such a trial is wellnigh insupportable to a loving soul. Thus S. Peter was brimming over with love when the Lord asked, “Lovest thou Me more than these? He saith unto Him, Yea, Lord; Thou knowest that I love Thee. . . . He saith to him again the second time, Lovest thou Me? .. . Yea, Lord; Thou knowest that I love Thee.” And then, in order to prove him, once more the Lord asked, “Lovest thou Me?” Ah, Dear Lord, how sharply dost Thou wound that grieving heart which cries out in sorrowing love, “Lord, Thou knowest all things, Thou knowest that I love Thee” !?

One suffering from possession was being exorcised in the presence of S. Catherine of Genoa, when, on bidding the evil spirit tell his name, he replied that he was “the wretch that had lost love,” whereupon the Saint wellnigh swooned at the thought; for just as evil spirits so abhor Divine Love that they tremble at the Name of Jesus or the Sign of the Cross, so those who greatly love the Lord tremble at any sight or sound implying the deprivation of that Holy Love.

S. Peter knew well that our Lord, knowing all things, could not fail to know his love; but inasmuch as the repeated query, “Lovest thou Me?” implied mistrust, he was sorely grieved. Verily, he who knows it would rather perish than offend God, yet is devoid of any spark of fervour, and only feels the chilling, numbing sense of his own imperfections; he is deeply wounded for his love mourns because God makes as though He saw not that love, and he feels as though God reproached him for that coldness and those imperfections. Yet all the while be sure he would not fear to be counted loveless did he not really love.

Sometimes the wound comes merely from a remembrance of the time when we did not love God. “Oh, how late have I learnt to love Thee, Divine Beauty ever new and ever old!” exclaimed S. Augustine. That past life without God is abhorrent to him who has at length learnt to adore God’s sovereign Goodness and Love.

Sometimes, too, love wounds the soul with the mere recollection of the multitudes who despise God’s Love; as David, when he cried out, “My zeal hath even consumed me, because mine enemies have forgotten Thy words.”⁴ And S. Francis, being, as he thought, alone, was heard sobbing so piteously, that one, hearing, hurried to his succour, and finding him alone, asked, “Why criest thou out thus?” to which the answer came, “I wept to think how great things our Lord bore for love of us, and no man heeds it.” Whereupon he began to weep anew, and the other to weep with him.

‘Yet, be the wounds what they may, one thing is notable, namely, that their pain is acceptable, and all those who bear it do so willingly, and would not change that sorrow for all earthly joys. There is no bitterness in love, or at least it is a cherished bitterness. A seraph once cast a golden dart, with a point as of flame, into the heart of S. Teresa, who, when he would have withdrawn it, felt as though she were being torn asunder, so sharp was the pain, and yet so sweet that she would fain have borne it for ever. And similar was the dart of love which God winged at the heart of S. Catherine of Genoa in the beginning of her conversion, whereby she became as one dead to the world and all created things, living only to her Creator. The Beloved One is truly a bundle of myrrh, and the bundle of myrrh is the Beloved Who lies ever in the breast of the loving soul, best beloved among all created things.

It is a recognised fact that earthly love will not merely pierce the heart, but make the body sick ‘unto death, and that because, just as physical passion and temperament greatly influence the soul, so the -soul’s affections have great power over the body. And -beyond that, ardent love drives the soul so forcibly towards the object of its affection, and so engrosses it, that it falls short in all else, whether sensitive or intellectual; so that by reason of that love the soul neglects all other objects, itself included.

Plato says that love is poor, ragged, miserable, homeless: poor, because it leaves all for the object of its love; homeless, because it goes forth to follow that object; pale and miserable, because it forgets to eat, drink, or sleep; ragged and bare, because it casts aside everything to clothe itself with the beloved one; it lies like a beggar at the door, ever watching the eyes and lips of that beloved, begging, so to say, one scrap of notice; and ever poor, because if it were once satiated it would cease to be ardent, and so cease to be love.

Of course Plato speaks only of the poor worthless love which worldlings bear, but it is just the same with Heavenly Love. Listen to what one of the first teachers of evangelic love has said: “Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place

. . we are made as the filth of the world, and are the off-scouring of all things unto this day.” As though he said, We are so abject, that if the world be a palace we are as its dust, if the world be a fruit we are as its rind. But what save love had made them thus? It was love which caused S. Francis to kneel bare before his Bishop, and to die on the naked earth; it was love which caused him to be a beggar all his life; it was love which drove S. Francis Xavier forth amid poverty and nakedness to convert the Indies; it was love which reduced S. Carlo Borromeo, Archbishop of Milan, to such poverty amid the wealth belonging to his birth and position, that, as a great orator tells us, he was as a dog in his master’s house, eating nought save a crust of bread, drinking water only, and sleeping on a handful of straw.

Listen to the Bride of the Canticles, how she exclaims that, all-beautiful as she is by reason of the Bridegroom’s favour, yet she is “black” by reason of the wounds of love: “Look not upon me, because I am black, because the sun hath looked upon me,”? rays of love so penetrating and scorching that they consumed her. Love makes her “mother’s children angry with her;” she, princess though she be, is as a humble vinedresser, unable to “keep her own vineyard.”

Yes, verily, when the wounds of love are many and sharp, they cause us to faint and fail with the gracious sickness of love. Who can describe the loving maladies of S. Catherine of Sienna, or her of Genoa, S. Angela di Foligni, S. Christina, S. Teresa, S. Bernard, or S. Francis, whose life was, so to say, one long swoon of love, and who received from his Dear Lord the precious marks of His Passion in the stigmata? Many a time I have pondered that marvel, and with this result. I believe that that great servant of God, angelic as he was, beholding the Living Image of his Crucified Lord, as shown him by an angel of light, was moved beyond all we can imagine with love and — 7 1 Cor. iv. II, 13. 3 Cant. i. 6. tenderness at that glorious sight on which the angels cannot fitly gaze; while, on the other hand, beholding the wounds of that Dear Lord, he felt the sword which had pierced the Blessed Virgin’s soul ' even as though he were literally crucified with his Master. And surely if a picture of Abraham about to sacrifice his son, painted by a mere man, could cause S. Gregory of Nyssa to weep every time he looked thereon, how great might S. Francis’ emotion well be on beholding the representation of the Saviour's’ Sacrifice traced by an angel’s hand! Thus that loving soul, melting with pity and tenderness, was well prepared to receive the stamp of His Beloved in love and sorrow. His memory was steeped in that sorrow, his imagination was filled with its details; his understanding accepted them, while love disposed all the faculties of his will to entire conformity with the Passion. And so the empire of the soul over the body became so urgent that it stamped the impression of the Saviour’s wounds on the corresponding members of His adoring servant.

Love knows how to quicken imagination till it pierces through and through, and love sharpened the interior sufferings of that most loving Saint until they pierced to the surface, and his body bore the marks of that same sorrow which had wounded his heart. Yet that inner love could not actually pierce the flesh; and therefore the seraphim, casting the rays of his burning brightness on the Saint, actually marked on his outer members those wounds which love had printed inwardly on his soul, making it a very crucifix. Even so we read how when the Prophet Isaiah knew not how to speak the Lord’s message, one of the seraphim flew to him, and with a live coal touched his lips, thereby purifying and strengthening him.” Myrrh oozes forth from its parent stem as a gum, but to obtain the produce there must be incisions duly made. Even so Divine Love continually transpired through S. Francis’ life, but to bring forth its full abundance there needed the seraphim to pierce and wound him. And that we might know those wounds to be of Heaven, they were made, not with steel, but with rays of light. Verily, they were wounds of love, and all the rest of his days the Saint went softly, as one dying of love.

The Blessed Philip Neri, when twenty-four, was so physically affected by Divine Love that the enlargement of his heart caused a fracture in his ribs; and S. Stanislas Kotzka, when only fourteen, was wont to faint under the pressure of his love for his Lord, so that it ‘was needful to lay cold bandages upon his breast to still its burning heat.

How, indeed, should the soul which has once tasted the sweetness of Divine Love bear to live on amid this miserable world without a continual pain and longing? S. Francis Xavier used to be heard crying out, “Enough, Lord, enough!” and asking that so great an overflow of sweetness might take him to .Paradise, for it was too much to bear on earth. If God grants a free outpour of His Divine Blessings to the soul, and then holds His Hand, it is sore wounded by the privation, and cries out with David, “When shall I come to appear before the Presence of God ?”? or with S. Paul, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death ?”?

* Ps, xlii. 2. 3 Rom. vii: 24.

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