She continues the same subject and tells how her soul went on improving, once she had begun to obey; also how little use it was for her to resist God’s favours, since His Majesty went on giving them to her in more liberal measure.
THIS confession left my soul so amenable that I thought there could be nothing which I should not be prepared to do. So I began to make many changes in my habits, although my confessor did not press me, and indeed appeared to make very light of the whole matter. I was deeply influenced by his treatment, however, because he led me by way of the love of God, which brought me, not oppression, as it would have done if I had not acted out of love, but freedom; and I remained in this condition for almost two months, doing everything in my power to resist God’s gifts and favours. The change in me was visible even superficially, for the Lord was already giving me the courage to suffer things which those who knew me, and even the nuns of my own house, considered and described as extreme. Compared with what I had been doing before, these could rightly be called extreme, but they fell short of what was required of me by my habit and profession.
By resisting God’s gifts and favours, I gained one thing: instruction from His Majesty Himself. Previously I had thought that if I wished to receive favours in prayer, I must often remain apart, and so I had scarcely dared to stir. Then I saw how little this had to do with it; for the more I tried to turn my mind to other things, the more the Lord enveloped me in that sweetness and glory, until I felt entirely surrounded by it, I could not flee from it in any direction, and so things went on. All this so concerned me that I was quite distressed. But the Lord was much more concerned on my behalf in those two months; He granted me favours and revealed Himself to me to a far greater degree than He had done before, in order to show me that resistance was no longer within my power. I began to feel a new love for the most sacred Humanity; my prayers began to settle, like a house that now had some foundations; and I began to be more addicted to penances, which I had neglected because of my severe illnesses.
That holy man who heard my confessions told me that there were certain things that could not hurt me, and that perhaps God was giving me my ill-health because I did not perform penances. His Majesty, he suggested, might possibly have decided to inflict some penances on me Himself. He ordered me, therefore, to practise certain mortifications, which I did not find very pleasant. But I performed them all because they seemed to be commanded by the Lord; and I thanked Him for giving them to me in such a way as to make me obey Him. My soul was so sensitive to any tiny offence I might be committing against the Lord that, if I had any superfluous possession, I could not become recollected until I had got rid of it. I prayed frequently that the Lord would take me in His hand and, now that I was on terms with His servants, would not allow me to fall again. For to fall now, I thought, would be a very great failure, since they would lose credit through me.
During this time Father Francis, who was once Duke of Gandia,1 came here. He had given everything up some years before and entered the Company of Jesus. My confessor and the gentleman I have spoken of arranged for him to visit me, so that I might talk to him and give him an account of my experiences; for they knew that he was very advanced in prayer and that he received great favours and graces from God, as rewards, even in this life, for all that he had given up for Him. When he had heard my story, he told me that my experiences came from the spirit of God and that I should be wrong to struggle any longer against them. Up to now, he said, I had been right in resisting. But henceforth I must always begin my prayer with a meditation on some incident in the Passion; and then if the Lord should transport my spirit I should not struggle against Him, but should allow His Majesty to take it, since the rapture was not of my seeking. He gave me this medicine and advice as one who had made great progress himself; and experience counts for a great deal in such matters. He insisted that it would be a mistake for me to go on resisting. I was greatly comforted by this, and so was that gentleman, who was delighted that Father Francis had found my experiences to be the work of God, and who continued to help and advise me to the best of his ability, which was very great.
At this moment my confessor was moved away from the town; and this very much grieved me, because I thought I was bound to return to my wickedness, and felt it would be impossible to find another like him. My soul was, as it were, in a desert, very disconsolate and fearful, and I did not know what would become of me. But a relation of mine arranged for me to go and stay with her, and I immediately managed to obtain another Jesuit confessor. It pleased our Lord that I should strike up a friendship with a widowed lady1 of good family who was greatly given to prayer and had much to do with the Fathers. She got me to confess to her confessor and I stayed in her house, which was quite close, for quite a few days. I was delighted by the many conversations I had with the Jesuits, for my soul profited greatly by observing the holiness of their way of life.
This Father2 began to lead me towards greater perfection. He told me to leave nothing undone that might make me entirely pleasing to God; and he treated me with great skill, though gently at the same time. For my soul was not at all strong, but very sensitive, especially in respect to abandoning certain friendships. Although these were not the cause of any offence against God, they involved a great deal of affection, and I thought that I should be ungrateful if I were to give them up. I asked my confessor why I must behave so ungratefully since I was committing no sin. He told me to put the matter before God for some days, and to recite the hymn Veni, Creator, that God might show me the better course. Having spent a great part of one day in prayer, beseeching the Lord to help me content Him in every way, I began the hymn; and as I was reciting it a rapture came on me so suddenly that it almost carried me away; it was so plain that I could make no mistake about it. This was the first time that the Lord had granted me this grace of ecstasy, and I heard these words: ‘I want you to converse now not with men but with angels’. This absolutely amazed me, for my soul was greatly moved and these words were spoken to me in the depths of the spirit. They made me afraid therefore, though on the other hand they brought me much comfort, after the fear – which seems to have been caused by the novelty of the experience – had departed.
These words have been fulfilled. For I have never since been able to form a firm friendship, or to take any comfort in, or to feel particular love for, any people except those whom I believe to love God and to be trying to serve Him. This has been something beyond my control; and it has made no difference if the people have been relatives or friends. Unless I know that a person loves God or practises prayer, it is a painful cross to me to have to do with him. There have been, so far as I can remember, no exceptions to this rule.
Since that day I have had the courage to give up everything for God, who in that moment – for I think it was no more than a moment – was pleased to make His servant another person. So there was no need for my confessor to give me any more commands. When he had found me so firmly attached to these friendships, he had not ventured to tell me definitely to give them up. He had been forced to wait until our Lord did the work, which He did. For myself, I had never thought that I should be able to break with them, since I had already tried, and the attempt had afforded me such distress that I had abandoned it on the grounds that there was really nothing wrong with these attachments. But now the Lord set me free and gave me strength to do the work. So I told my confessor, and gave everything up, as he had commanded me to. It did the people in question a great deal of good to see my determination.
Blessed be God for ever, for giving me in one moment the freedom that I had been unable to attain for myself, despite all my efforts during so many years, in which I had sometimes done such violence to myself as to affect my health. As this was the work of One who is almighty and the true Lord of all, it gave me no pain at all.