[327]. See [Note] on p. [240].
[328]. Autobiography, part I. c. xxviii. p. 163.
[329]. This spontaneity she likens to a fountain, as compared with a pump; love in the heart prompts every issue of life: outward occasions and stimulants are no longer awaited; and a glad inward readiness gives facility in every duty, patience under every trial. Such also is the teaching of Fénélon here—the genuine doctrine of spiritual life. But the enemies of Quietism were not slow to represent this ‘practising the virtues no longer as virtues,’ as a dangerous pretence for evading the obligations of virtue altogether.
[330]. Upham, vol. I. pp. 262, 263.
[331]. This Prayer of Silence became hers at an early period in her religious career, not as the result of direct effort in pursuance of a theory, but simply as the consequence of overpowering emotion. She says, ‘I had a secret desire given me from that time to be wholly devoted to the disposal of my God, let it be what it would. I said, ‘What couldst Thou demand of me, that I would not willingly sacrifice or offer Thee? Oh, spare me not.’ I could scarce hear speak of God, or our Lord Jesus Christ, without being almost ravished out of myself. What surprised me the most, was the great difficulty I had to say the vocal prayers I had been used to say. As soon as I opened my lips to pronounce them, the love of God seized me so strongly that I was swallowed up in a profound silence, and a peace not to be expressed. I made fresh essays, but still in vain. I began, but could not go on. And as I had never before heard of such a state, I knew not what to do. My inability therein still increased, because my love to God was still growing more strong, more violent, and more overpowering. There was made in me, without the sound of words, a continual prayer, which seemed to me to be the prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself; a prayer of the Word, which is made by the Spirit, which, according to St. Paul, ‘asketh for us that which is good, perfect, and conformable to the will of God.’—Autobiography, part I. c. xiii.
Here we find genuine devout fervour, emancipating itself, very naturally in private, from allotted forms of prayer; but no mysticism, till we come to the last sentence—even that, admitting a favourable explanation.
[332]. Autobiography, part II. c. xvii. ‘God supplied me,’ she adds, ‘with what was pertinent and satisfactory to them all, after a wonderful manner, without any share of my study or meditation therein. Nothing was hid from me of their interior state, and of what passed within them. Here, O my God! thou madest an infinite number of conquests, known to Thyself only. They were instantly furnished with a wonderful facility of prayer. God conferred on them His grace plentifully, and wrought marvellous changes in them. The most advanced of these souls found, when with me, in silence, a grace communicated to them, which they could neither comprehend nor cease to admire. The others found an unction in my words, and that they operated in them what I said to them. They said they had never experienced anything like it. Friars of different orders, and priests of merit, came to see me, to whom our Lord granted very great favours, as indeed he did to all without exception, who came in sincerity. One thing was surprising, and that was, that I had not a word to say to such as came only to watch my words and to criticise them. Even when I thought to try to speak to them, I felt that I could not, and that God would not have me do it.... I felt that what I spoke flowed from the fountain, and that I was only the instrument of Him who made me speak.’—P. 86.
[333]. The little book to which she gave the name of The Torrents, was written, she tells us, at the suggestion of La Combe. When she took up her pen she knew not what she was to say, but soon came thoughts and words abundantly—as, indeed, they were sure to do. She compares the different kinds of spiritual progress to the mountain streams she had seen hurrying down the sides of the Alps. She describes the varieties in the gravitation of devout souls toward God—the ocean which they seek. Some proceed slowly, by means of meditations, austerities, and works of charity,—dependent mostly on outward appliances,—deficient in spontaneity and ardour,—little exercised by inward experience. Another class flow in a fuller stream,—grow into laden rivers—haste with more strength and speed; but these are apt to dwell, with too much complacence, on those rich gifts for which they are conspicuous. A third order (and to these she herself belonged) dash out from the poverty of the rocks, impetuous, leaping over every obstacle, unburdened by wealthy freightage, inglorious in the eyes of men, but simple, naked, self-emptied, with resistless eagerness foaming up out of abysmal chasms that seemed to swallow them, and finding, soonest of all, that Sea divine, wherein all rivers rest.
Her commentaries on Scripture were written with extraordinary rapidity. The fact that she consulted no book except the Bible in their composition must doubtless have contributed to their speed: certainly not, as she fancied, to their excellence. No writers are so diffuse as the mystics, because no others have written so fast, imagining headlong haste an attribute of inspiration. The transcriber could not copy in five days what she had written in one night. We may conjecture that the man must have been paid by the day. The commentary on the Canticles was written in a day and a half, and several visits received beside.—Autobiography, part II. c. xxi.
[334]. O man, wouldst thou be grafted, and to the heavenly soil transplanted? then must thou first thy branches wild hew quite away, that kindly fruits may come forth in God’s image.