A TREATISE OF DISCRETION
How the affection should not
place reliance chiefly on penance, but rather on virtues; and how discretion
receives life from humility, and renders to each man his due.
"These are the holy and sweet works which I
seek from My servants; these are the proved intrinsic virtues of the soul, as I
have told you. They not only consist of those virtues which are done by means
of the body, that is, with an exterior act, or with diverse and varied
penances, which are the instruments of virtue; works of penance performed alone
without the above-mentioned virtues would please Me little; often, indeed, if
the soul perform not her penance with discretion, that is to say, if her affection
be placed principally in the penance she has undertaken, her perfection will be
impeded; she should rather place reliance on the affection of love, with a holy
hatred of herself, accompanied by true humility and perfect patience, together
with the other intrinsic virtues of the soul, with hunger and desire for My
honor and the salvation of souls. For these virtues demonstrate that the will
is dead, and continually slays its own sensuality through the affection of love
of virtue. With this discretion, then, should the soul perform her penance,
that is, she should place her principal affection in virtue rather than in
penance. Penance should be but the means to increase virtue according to the
needs of the individual, and according to what the soul sees she can do in the
measure of her own possibility. Otherwise, if the soul place her foundation on
penance she will contaminate her own perfection, because her penance will not
be done in the light of knowledge of herself and of My goodness, with
discretion, and she will not seize hold of My truth; neither loving that which
I love, nor hating that which I hate. This virtue of discretion is no other
than a true knowledge which the soul should have of herself and of Me, and in
this knowledge is virtue rooted. Discretion is the only child of
self-knowledge, and, wedding with charity, has indeed many other descendants,
as a tree which has many branches; but that which gives life to the tree, to
its branches, and its root, is the ground of humility, in which it is planted,
which humility is the foster-mother and nurse of charity, by whose means this
tree remains in the perpetual calm of discretion. Because otherwise the tree
would not produce the virtue of discretion, or any fruit of life, if it were
not planted in the virtue of humility, because humility proceeds from
self-knowledge. And I have already said to you, that the root of discretion is
a real knowledge of self and of My goodness, by which the soul immediately, and
discreetly, renders to each one his due. Chiefly to Me in rendering praise and
glory to My Name, and in referring to Me the graces and the gifts which she
sees and knows she has received from Me; and rendering to herself that which
she sees herself to have merited, knowing that she does not even exist of
herself, and attributing to Me, and not to herself, her being, which she knows
she has received by grace from Me, and every other grace which she has received
besides.
"And she seems to herself to be ungrateful for
so many benefits, and negligent, in that she has not made the most of her time,
and the graces she has received, and so seems to herself worthy of suffering;
wherefore she becomes odious and displeasing to herself through her guilt. And
this founds the virtue of discretion on knowledge of self, that is, on true
humility, for, were this humility not in the soul, the soul would be
indiscreet, indiscretion being founded on pride, as discretion is on humility.
"An indiscreet soul robs Me of the honor due
to Me, and attributes it to herself, through vainglory, and that which is
really her own she imputes to Me, grieving and murmuring concerning My
mysteries, with which I work in her soul and in those of My other creatures;
wherefore everything in Me and in her neighbor is cause of scandal to her. Contrariwise
those who possess the virtue of discretion. For, when they have rendered what
is due to Me and to themselves, they proceed to render to their neighbor their
principal debt of love, and of humble and continuous prayer, which all should
pay to each other, and further, the debt of doctrine, and example of a holy and
honorable life, counseling and helping others according to their needs for
salvation, as I said to you above. Whatever rank a man be in, whether that of a
noble, a prelate, or a servant, if he have this virtue, everything that he does
to his neighbor is done discreetly and lovingly, because these virtues are
bound and mingled together, and both planted in the ground of humility which
proceeds from self-knowledge."
A parable showing how love,
humility, and discretion are united; and how the soul should conform herself to
this parable.
"Do you know how these three virtues stand
together? It is, as if a circle were drawn on the surface of the earth, and a
tree, with an off-shoot joined to its side, grew in the center of the circle.
The tree is nourished in the earth contained in the diameter of the circle, for
if the tree were out of the earth it would die, and give no fruit. Now,
consider, in the same way, that the soul is a tree existing by love, and that
it can live by nothing else than love; and, that if this soul have not in very
truth the divine love of perfect charity, she cannot produce fruit of life, but
only of death. It is necessary then, that the root of this tree, that is the
affection of the soul, should grow in, and issue from the circle of true
self-knowledge which is contained in Me, who have neither beginning nor end,
like the circumference of the circle, for, turn as you will within a circle,
inasmuch as the circumference has neither end nor beginning, you always remain
within it.
"This knowledge of yourself and of Me is found
in the earth of true humility, which is as wide as the diameter of the circle,
that is as the knowledge of self and of Me (for, otherwise, the circle would
not be without end and beginning, but would have its beginning in knowledge of
self, and its end in confusion, if this knowledge were not contained in Me).
Then the tree of love feeds itself on humility, bringing forth from its side
the off-shoot of true discretion, in the way that I have already told you, from
the heart of the tree, that is the affection of love which is in the soul, and
the patience, which proves that I am in the soul and the soul in Me. This tree
then, so sweetly planted, produces fragrant blossoms of virtue, with many
scents of great variety, inasmuch as the soul renders fruit of grace and of
utility to her neighbor, according to the zeal of those who come to receive
fruit from My servants; and to Me she renders the sweet odor of glory and
praise to My Name, and so fulfills the object of her creation.
"In this way, therefore, she reaches the term
of her being, that is Myself, her God, who am Eternal Life. And these fruits
cannot be taken from her without her will, inasmuch as they are all flavored
with discretion, because they are all united, as has been said above."
How penance and other corporal
exercises are to be taken as instruments for arriving at virtue, and not as the
principal affection of the soul; and of the light of discretion in various
other modes and operations.
"These are the fruits and the works which I
seek from the soul, the proving, namely, of virtue in the time of need. And yet
some time ago, if you remember, when you were desirous of doing great penance
for My sake, asking, 'What can I do to endure suffering for You, oh Lord?' I
replied to you, speaking in your mind, 'I take delight in few words and many
works.' I wished to show you that he who merely calls on me with the sound of
words, saying: 'Lord, Lord, I would do something for You,' and he, who desires
for My sake to mortify his body with many penances, and not his own will, did
not give Me much pleasure; but that I desired the manifold works of manly
endurance with patience, together with the other virtues, which I have
mentioned to you above, intrinsic to the soul, all of which must be in activity
in order to obtain fruits worthy of grace. All other works, founded on any
other principle than this, I judge to be a mere calling with words, because
they are finite works, and I, who am Infinite, seek infinite works, that is an
infinite perfection of love.
"I wish therefore that the works of penance,
and of other corporal exercises, should be observed merely as means, and not as
the fundamental affection of the soul. For, if the principal affection of the
soul were placed in penance, I should receive a finite thing like a word,
which, when it has issued from the mouth, is no more, unless it have issued
with affection of the soul, which conceives and brings forth virtue in truth;
that is, unless the finite operation, which I have called a word, should be
joined with the affection or love, in which case it would be grateful and
pleasant to Me. And this is because such a work would not be alone, but
accompanied by true discretion, using corporal works as means, and not as the
principal foundation; for it would not be becoming that that principal
foundation should be placed in penance only, or in any exterior corporal act,
such works being finite, since they are done in finite time, and also because
it is often profitable that the creature omit them, and even that she be made
to do so.
"Wherefore, when the soul omits them through
necessity, being unable through various circumstances to complete an action
which she has begun, or, as may frequently happen, through obedience at the
order of her director, it is well; since, if she continued then to do them, she
not only would receive no merit, but would offend Me; thus you see that they
are merely finite. She ought, therefore, to adopt them as a means, and not as
an end. For, if she takes them as an end she will be obliged, some time or
other, to leave them, and will then remain empty. This, My trumpeter, the
glorious Paul, taught you when he said in his epistle, that you should mortify
the body and destroy self-will, knowing, that is to say, how to keep the rein
on the body, macerating the flesh whenever it should wish to combat the spirit,
but the will should be dead and annihilated in everything, and subject to My
will, and this slaying of the will is that due which, as I told you, the virtue
of discretion renders to the soul, that is to say, hatred and disgust of her
own offenses and sensuality, which are acquired by self-knowledge. This is the
knife which slays and cuts off all self-love founded in self-will. These then
are they who give Me not only words but manifold works, and in these I take
delight. And then I said that I desired few words, and many actions; by the use
of the word 'many' I assign no particular number to you, because the affection
of the soul, founded in love, which gives life to all the virtues and good
works, should increase infinitely, and yet I do not, by this, exclude words, I
merely said that I wished few of them, showing you that every actual operation,
as such, was finite, and therefore I called them of little account; but they
please Me when they are performed as the instruments of virtue, and not as a
principal end in themselves.
"However, no one should judge that he has
greater perfection, because he performs great penances, and gives himself in
excess to the slaying of his body, than he who does less, inasmuch as neither
virtue nor merit consists therein; for otherwise he would be in an evil case,
who, from some legitimate reason, was unable to do actual penance. Merit
consists in the virtue of love alone, flavored with the light of true
discretion, without which the soul is worth nothing. And this love should be
directed to Me endlessly, boundlessly, since I am the Supreme and Eternal
Truth. The soul can therefore place neither laws nor limits to her love for Me;
but her love for her neighbor, on the contrary, is ordered in certain
conditions. The light of discretion (which proceeds from love, as I have told
you) gives to the neighbor a conditioned love, one that, being ordered aright,
does not cause the injury of sin to self in order to be useful to others, for,
if one single sin were committed to save the whole world from Hell, or to
obtain one great virtue, the motive would not be a rightly ordered or discreet
love, but rather indiscreet, for it is not lawful to perform even one act of
great virtue and profit to others, by means of the guilt of sin. Holy
discretion ordains that the soul should direct all her powers to My service
with a manly zeal, and, that she should love her neighbor with such devotion
that she would lay down a thousand times, if it were possible, the life of her
body for the salvation of souls, enduring pains and torments so that her
neighbor may have the life of grace, and giving her temporal substance for the
profit and relief of his body.
"This is the supreme office of discretion
which proceeds from charity. So you see how discreetly every soul, who wishes
for grace, should pay her debts, that is, should love Me with an infinite love
and without measure, but her neighbor with measure, with a restricted love, as
I have said, not doing herself the injury of sin in order to be useful to
others. This is St. Paul's counsel to you when he says that charity ought to be
concerned first with self, otherwise it will never be of perfect utility to
others. Because, when perfection is not in the soul, everything which the soul
does for itself and for others is imperfect. It would not, therefore, be just
that creatures, who are finite and created by Me, should be saved through
offense done to Me, who am the Infinite Good. The more serious the fault is in
such a case, the less fruit will the action produce; therefore, in no way
should you ever incur the guilt of sin.
"And this true love knows well, because she
carries with herself the light of holy discretion, that light which dissipates
all darkness, takes away ignorance, and is the condiment of every instrument of
virtue. Holy discretion is a prudence which cannot be cheated, a fortitude
which cannot be beaten, a perseverance from end to end, stretching from Heaven
to earth, that is, from knowledge of Me to knowledge of self, and from love of
Me to love of others. And the soul escapes dangers by her true humility, and,
by her prudence, flies all the nets of the world and its creatures, and, with
unarmed hands, that is through much endurance, discomfits the devil and the
flesh with this sweet and glorious light; knowing, by it, her own fragility,
she renders to her weakness its due of hatred.
"Wherefore she has trampled on the world, and
placed it under the feet of her affection, despising it, and holding it vile,
and thus becoming lord of it, holding it as folly. And the men of the world
cannot take her virtues from such a soul, but all their persecutions increase
her virtues and prove them, which virtues have been at first conceived by the
virtue of love, as has been said, and then are proved on her neighbor, and
bring forth their fruit on him. Thus have I shown you, that, if virtue were not
visible and did not shine in the time of trial, it would not have been truly
conceived; for, I have already told you, that perfect virtue cannot exist and
give fruit except by means of the neighbor, even as a woman, who has conceived
a child, if she do not bring it forth, so that it may appear before the eyes of
men, deprives her husband of his fame of paternity. It is the same with Me, who
am the Spouse of the soul, if she do not produce the child of virtue, in the
love of her neighbor, showing her child to him who is in need, both in general
and in particular, as I have said to you before, so I declare now that, in
truth, she has not conceived virtue at all; and this is also true of the vices,
all of which are committed by means of the neighbor."
How this soul grew by means of
the divine response, and how her sorrows grew less, and how she prayed to God
for the Holy Church, and for her own people.
"Then that soul, thirsting and burning with
the very great desire that she had conceived on learning the ineffable love of
God, shown in His great goodness, and, seeing the breadth of His charity, that,
with such sweetness, He had deigned to reply to her request and to satisfy it,
giving hope to the sorrow which she had conceived, on account of offenses
against God, and the damage of the Holy Church, and through His own mercy,
which she saw through self-knowledge, diminished, and yet, at the same time,
increased her sorrow.
"For, the Supreme and Eternal Father, in
manifesting the way of perfection, showed her anew her own guilt, and the loss
of souls, as has been said more fully above. Also because in the knowledge
which the soul obtains of herself, she knows more of God, and knowing the
goodness of God in herself, the sweet mirror of God, she knows her own dignity
and indignity. Her dignity is that of her creation, seeing that she is the
image of God, and this has been given her by grace, and not as her due. In that
same mirror of the goodness of God, the soul knows her own indignity, which is
the consequence of her own fault. Wherefore, as a man more readily sees spots
on his face when he looks in a mirror, so, the soul who, with true knowledge of
self, rises with desire, and gazes with the eye of the intellect at herself in
the sweet mirror of God, knows better the stains of her own face, by the purity
which she sees in Him.
"Wherefore, because light and knowledge
increased in that soul in the aforesaid way, a sweet sorrow grew in her, and at
the same time, her sorrow was diminished by the hope which the Supreme Truth
gave her, and, as fire grows when it is fed with wood, so grew the fire in that
soul to such an extent that it was no longer possible for the body to endure it
without the departure of the soul; so that, had she not been surrounded by the
strength of Him who is the Supreme Strength, it would not have been possible
for her to have lived any longer. This soul then, being purified by the fire of
divine love, which she found in the knowledge of herself and of God, and her
hunger for the salvation of the whole world, and for the reformation of the
Holy Church, having grown with her hope of obtaining the same, rose with
confidence before the Supreme Father, showing Him the leprosy of the Holy
Church, and the misery of the world, saying, as if with the words of Moses, 'My
Lord, turn the eyes of Your mercy upon Your people, and upon the mystical body
of the Holy Church, for You will be the more glorified if You pardon so many
creatures, and give to them the light of knowledge, since all will render You
praise when they see themselves escape through Your infinite goodness from the
clouds of mortal sin, and from eternal damnation; and then You will not only be
praised by my wretched self, who have so much offended You, and who am the
cause and the instrument of all this evil, for which reason I pray Your divine
and eternal love to take Your revenge on me, and to do mercy to Your people,
and never will I depart from before Your presence until I see that you grant
them mercy. For what is it to me if I have life, and Your people death, and the
clouds of darkness cover Your spouse, when it is my own sins, and not those of
Your other creatures, that are the principal cause of this? I desire, then, and
beg of You, by Your grace, that You have mercy on Your people, and I adjure You
that You do this by Your uncreated love which moved You Yourself to create man
in Your image and similitude, saying, "Let us make man in our own
image," and this You did, oh eternal Trinity, that man might participate
in everything belonging to You, the most high and eternal Trinity.'
"Wherefore You gave him memory in order to
receive Your benefits, by which he participates in the power of the Eternal
Father; and intellect that he might know, seeing Your goodness, and so might
participate in the wisdom of Your only-begotten Son; and will, that he might
love that which his intellect has seen and known of Your truth, thus
participating in the clemency of Your Holy Spirit. What reason had You for
creating man in such dignity? The inestimable love with which You saw Your
creature in Yourself, and became enamored of him, for You created him through
love, and destined him to be such that he might taste and enjoy Your Eternal
Good. I see therefore that through his sin he lost this dignity in which You
originally placed him, and by his rebellion against You, fell into a state of
war with Your kindness, that is to say, we all became Your enemies.
"Therefore, You, moved by that same fire of
love with which You created him, willingly gave man a means of reconciliation,
so that after the great rebellion into which he had fallen, there should come a
great peace; and so You gave him the only-begotten Word, Your Son, to be the
Mediator between us and You. He was our Justice, for He took on Himself all our
offenses and injustices, and performed Your obedience, Eternal Father, which
You imposed on Him, when You clothed Him with our humanity, our human nature
and likeness. Oh, abyss of love! What heart can help breaking when it sees such
dignity as Yours descend to such lowliness as our humanity? We are Your image,
and You have become ours, by this union which You have accomplished with man,
veiling the Eternal Deity with the cloud of woe, and the corrupted clay of
Adam. For what reason? -- Love. Wherefore, You, O God, have become man, and man
has become God. By this ineffable love of Yours, therefore, I constrain You,
and implore You that You do mercy to Your creatures."
How God grieves over the
Christian people, and particularly over His ministers; and touches on the
subject of the Sacrament of Christ's Body, and the benefit of the Incarnation.
Then God, turning the eye of His mercy towards her,
allowing Himself to be constrained by her tears, and bound by the chain of her
holy desire, replied with lamentation -- "My sweetest daughter, your tears
constrain Me, because they are joined with My love, and fall for love of Me,
and your painful desires force Me to answer you; but marvel, and see how My
spouse has defiled her face, and become leprous, on account of her filthiness
and self- love, and swollen with the pride and avarice of those who feed on
their own sin.
"What I say of the universal body and the
mystical body of the Holy Church (that is to say the Christian religion) I also
say of My ministers, who stand and feed at the breasts of Holy Church; and, not
only should they feed themselves, but it is also their duty to feed and hold to
those breasts the universal body of Christian people, and also any other people
who should wish to leave the darkness of their infidelity, and bind themselves
as members to My Church. See then with what ignorance and darkness, and
ingratitude, are administered, and with what filthy hands are handled this
glorious milk and blood of My spouse, and with what presumption and irreverence
they are received. Wherefore, that which really gives life, often gives,
through the defects of those who receive it, death; that is to say, the
precious Blood of My only-begotten Son, which destroyed death and darkness, and
gave life and truth, and confounded falsehood. For I give this Blood and use It
for salvation and perfection in the case of that man who disposes himself
properly to receive it, for It gives life and adorns the soul with every grace,
in proportion to the disposition and affection of him who receives It;
similarly It gives death to him who receives It unworthily, living in iniquity
and in the darkness of mortal sin; to him, I say, It gives death and not life;
not through defect of the Blood, nor through defect of the minister, though
there might be great evil in him, because his evil would not spoil nor defile
the Blood nor diminish Its grace and virtue, nor does an evil minister do harm
to him to whom he gives the Blood, but to himself he does the harm of guilt,
which will be followed by punishment, unless he correct himself with contrition
and repentance. I say then that the Blood does harm to him who receives it
unworthily, not through defect of the Blood, nor of the minister, but through
his own evil disposition and defect inasmuch as he has befouled his mind and
body with such impurity and misery, and has been so cruel to himself and his
neighbor. He has used cruelty to himself, depriving himself of grace, trampling
under the feet of his affection the fruit of the Blood which he had received in
Holy Baptism, when the stain of original sin was taken from him by virtue of
the Blood, which stain he drew from his origin, when he was generated by his
father and mother.
"Wherefore I gave My Word, My only-begotten
Son, because the whole stuff of human generation was corrupted through the sin
of the first man Adam. Wherefore, all of you, vessels made of this stuff, were
corrupted and not disposed to the possession of eternal life -- so I, with My
dignity, joined Myself to the baseness of your human generation, in order to
restore it to grace which you had lost by sin; for I was incapable of
suffering, and yet, on account of guilt, My divine justice demanded suffering.
But man was not sufficient to satisfy it, for, even if he had satisfied to a
certain extent, he could only have satisfied for himself, and not for other
rational creatures, besides which, neither for himself, nor for others, could
man satisfy, his sin having been committed against Me, who am the Infinite
Good. Wishing, however, to restore man, who was enfeebled, and could not
satisfy for the above reason, I sent My Word, My own Son, clothed in your own
very nature, the corrupted clay of Adam, in order that He might endure
suffering in that self-same nature in which man had offended, suffering in His body
even to the opprobrious death of the Cross, and so He satisfied My justice and
My divine mercy. For My mercy willed to make satisfaction for the sin of man
and to dispose him to that good for which I had created him. This human nature,
joined with the divine nature, was sufficient to satisfy for the whole human
race, not only on account of the pain which it sustained in its finite nature,
that is in the flesh of Adam, but by virtue of the Eternal Deity, the divine
and infinite nature joined to it. The two natures being thus joined together, I
received and accepted the sacrifice of My only-begotten Son, kneaded into one
dough with the divine nature, by the fire of divine love which was the fetter
which held him fastened and nailed to the Cross in this way. Thus human nature
was sufficient to satisfy for guilt, but only by virtue of the divine nature.
And in this way was destroyed the stain of Adam's sin, only the mark of it
remaining behind, that is an inclination to sin, and to every sort of corporeal
defect, like the cicatrice which remains when a man is healed of a wound. In
this way the original fault of Adam was able still to cause a fatal stain;
wherefore the coming of the great Physician, that is to say, of My
only-begotten Son, cured this invalid, He drinking this bitter medicine, which
man could not drink on account of his great weakness, like a foster- mother who
takes medicine instead of her suckling, because she is grown up and strong, and
the child is not fit to endure its bitterness. He was man's foster-mother,
enduring, with the greatness and strength of the Deity united with your nature,
the bitter medicine of the painful death of the Cross, to give life to you
little ones debilitated by guilt. I say therefore that the mark alone of
original sin remains, which sin you take from your father and your mother when
you were generated by them. But this mark is removed from the soul, though not
altogether, by Holy Baptism, which has the virtue of communicating the life of
grace by means of that glorious and precious Blood. Wherefore, at the moment
that the soul receives Holy Baptism, original sin is taken away from her, and
grace is infused into her, and that inclination to sin, which remains from the
original corruption, as has been said, is indeed a source of weakness, but the
soul can keep the bridle on it if she choose. Then the vessel of the soul is
disposed to receive and increase in herself grace, more or less, according as
it pleases her to dispose herself willingly with affection, and desire of loving
and serving Me; and, in the same way, she can dispose herself to evil as to
good, in spite of her having received grace in Holy Baptism. Wherefore when the
time of discretion is come, the soul can, by her free will, make choice either
of good or evil, according as it pleases her will; and so great is this liberty
that man has, and so strong has this liberty been made by virtue of this
glorious Blood, that no demon or creature can constrain him to one smallest
fault without his free consent. He has been redeemed from slavery, and made
free in order that he might govern his own sensuality, and obtain the end for
which he was created. Oh, miserable man, who delights to remain in the mud like
a brute, and does not learn this great benefit which he has received from Me! A
benefit so great, that the poor wretched creature full of such ignorance could
receive no greater."
How sin is more gravely
punished after the Passion of Christ than before; and how God promises to do
mercy to the world, and to the Holy Church, by means of the prayers and
sufferings of His servants.
"And I wish you to know, My daughter, that,
although I have re-created and restored to the life of grace, the human race,
through the Blood of My only-begotten Son, as I have said, men are not
grateful, but, going from bad to worse, and from guilt to guilt, even
persecuting Me with many injuries, taking so little account of the graces which
I have given them, and continue to give them, that, not only do they not
attribute what they have received to grace, but seem to themselves on occasion
to receive injuries from Me, as if I desired anything else than their
sanctification.
"I say to you that they will be more
hard-hearted, and worthy of more punishment, and will, indeed, be punished more
severely, now that they have received redemption in the Blood of My Son, than
they would have been before that redemption took place -- that is, before the
stain of Adam's sin had been taken away. It is right that he who receives more
should render more, and should be under great obligations to Him from whom he
receives more.
"Man, then, was closely bound to Me through
his being which I have given him, creating him in My own image and similitude;
for which reason, he was bound to render Me glory, but he deprived Me of it,
and wished to give it to himself. Thus he came to transgress My obedience
imposed on him, and became My enemy. And I, with My humility, destroyed his
pride, humiliating the divine nature, and taking your humanity, and, freeing
you from the service of the devil, I made you free. And, not only did I give
you liberty, but, if you examine, you will see that man has become God, and God
has become man, through the union of the divine with the human nature. This is
the debt which they have incurred -- that is to say, the treasure of the Blood,
by which they have been procreated to grace. See, therefore, how much more they
owe after the redemption than before. For they are now obliged to render Me
glory and praise by following in the steps of My Incarnate Word, My
only-begotten Son, for then they repay Me the debt of love both of Myself and
of their neighbor, with true and genuine virtue, as I have said to you above,
and if they do not do it, the greater their debt, the greater will be the
offense they fall into, and therefore, by divine justice, the greater their
suffering in eternal damnation.
"A false Christian is punished more than a
pagan, and the deathless fire of divine justice consumes him more, that is,
afflicts him more, and, in his affliction, he feels himself being consumed by
the worm of conscience, though, in truth, he is not consumed, because the
damned do not lose their being through any torment which they receive.
Wherefore I say to you, that they ask for death and cannot have it, for they
cannot lose their being; the existence of grace they lose, through their fault,
but not their natural existence. Therefore guilt is more gravely punished after
the Redemption of the Blood than before, because man received more; but sinners
neither seem to perceive this, nor to pay any attention to their own sins, and
so become My enemies, though I have reconciled them, by means of the Blood of
My Son. But there is a remedy with which I appease My wrath -- that is to say,
by means of My servants, if they are jealous to constrain Me by their desire.
You see, therefore, that you have bound Me with this bond which I have given
you, because I wished to do mercy to the world.
"Therefore I give My servants hunger and
desire for My honor, and the salvation of souls, so that, constrained by their
tears, I may mitigate the fury of My divine justice. Take, therefore, your
tears and your sweat, drawn from the fountain of My divine love, and, with
them, wash the face of My spouse.
"I promise you, that, by this means, her
beauty will be restored to her, not by the knife nor by cruelty, but
peacefully, by humble and continued prayer, by the sweat and the tears shed by
the fiery desire of My servants, and thus will I fulfill your desire if you, on
your part, endure much, casting the light of your patience into the darkness of
perverse man, not fearing the world's persecutions, for I will protect you, and
My Providence shall never fail you in the slightest need."
How the road to Heaven being
broken through the disobedience of Adam, God made of His Son a Bridge by which
man could pass.
"Wherefore I have told you that I have made a
Bridge of My Word, of My only-begotten Son, and this is the truth. I wish that
you, My children, should know that the road was broken by the sin and
disobedience of Adam, in such a way, that no one could arrive at Eternal Life.
Wherefore men did not render Me glory in the way in which they ought to have,
as they did not participate in that Good for which I had created them, and My
truth was not fulfilled. This truth is that I have created man to My own image
and similitude, in order that he might have Eternal Life, and might partake of
Me, and taste My supreme and eternal sweetness and goodness. But, after sin had
closed Heaven and bolted the doors of mercy, the soul of man produced thorns
and prickly brambles, and My creature found in himself rebellion against
himself.
"And the flesh immediately began to war
against the Spirit, and, losing the state of innocence, became a foul animal,
and all created things rebelled against man, whereas they would have been
obedient to him, had he remained in the state in which I had placed him. He, not
remaining therein, transgressed My obedience, and merited eternal death in soul
and body. And, as soon as he had sinned, a tempestuous flood arose, which ever
buffets him with its waves, bringing him weariness and trouble from himself,
the devil, and the world. Every one was drowned in the flood, because no one,
with his own justice alone, could arrive at Eternal Life. And so, wishing to
remedy your great evils, I have given you the Bridge of My Son, in order that,
passing across the flood, you may not be drowned, which flood is the
tempestuous sea of this dark life. See, therefore, under what obligations the
creature is to Me, and how ignorant he is, not to take the remedy which I have
offered, but to be willing to drown."
How God induces the soul to
look at the greatness of this Bridge, inasmuch as it reaches from earth to
Heaven.
"Open, my daughter, the eye of your intellect,
and you will see the accepted and the ignorant, the imperfect, and also the
perfect who follow Me in truth, so that you may grieve over the damnation of
the ignorant, and rejoice over the perfection of My beloved servants.
"You will see further how those bear
themselves who walk in the light, and those who walk in the darkness. I also
wish you to look at the Bridge of My only-begotten Son, and see the greatness
thereof, for it reaches from Heaven to earth, that is, that the earth of your
humanity is joined to the greatness of the Deity thereby. I say then that this
Bridge reaches from Heaven to earth, and constitutes the union which I have
made with man.
"This was necessary, in order to reform the
road which was broken, as I said to you, in order that man should pass through
the bitterness of the world, and arrive at life; but the Bridge could not be
made of earth sufficiently large to span the flood and give you Eternal Life,
because the earth of human nature was not sufficient to satisfy for guilt, to
remove the stain of Adam's sin. Which stain corrupted the whole human race and
gave out a stench, as I have said to you above. It was, therefore, necessary to
join human nature with the height of My nature, the Eternal Deity, so that it
might be sufficient to satisfy for the whole human race, so that human nature
should sustain the punishment, and that the Divine nature, united with the human,
should make acceptable the sacrifice of My only Son, offered to Me to take
death from you and to give you life.
"So the height of the Divinity, humbled to the
earth, and joined with your humanity, made the Bridge and reformed the road.
Why was this done? In order that man might come to his true happiness with the
angels. And observe, that it is not enough, in order that you should have life,
that My Son should have made you this Bridge, unless you walk thereon."
How this soul prays God to show
her those who cross by the aforesaid Bridge, and those who do not.
Then this soul exclaimed with ardent love, --
"Oh, inestimable Charity, sweet above all sweetness! Who would not be
inflamed by such great love? What heart can help breaking at such tenderness?
It seems, oh, Abyss of Charity, as if you were mad with love of Your creature,
as if You could not live without him, and yet You are our God who have no heed
of us, Your greatness does not increase through our good, for You are
unchangeable, and our evil causes You no harm, for You are the Supreme and
Eternal Goodness. What moves You to do us such mercy through pure love, and on
account of no debt that You owed us, or need that You had of us? We are rather
Your guilty and malignant debtors. Wherefore, if I understand aright, Oh,
Supreme and Eternal Truth, I am the thief and You have been punished for me.
For I see Your Word, Your Son, fastened and nailed to the Cross, of which You
have made me a Bridge, as You have shown me, Your miserable servant, for which
reason, my heart is bursting, and yet cannot burst, through the hunger and the
desire which it has conceived towards You. I remember, my Lord, that You were
willing to show me who are those who go by the Bridge and those who do not;
should it please Your goodness to manifest this to me, willingly would I see
and hear it."
How this Bridge has three
steps, which signify the three states of the soul; and how, being lifted on
high, yet it is not separated from the earth; and how these words are to be
understood: "If I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all things unto
Me."
Then the Eternal God, to enamor and excite that
soul still more for the salvation of souls, replied to her, and said:
"First, as I have shown you that for which you wished, and ask Me, I will
now explain to you the nature of this Bridge. I have told you, My daughter,
that the Bridge reaches from Heaven to earth; this is through the union which I
have made with man, whom I formed of the clay of the earth. Now learn that this
Bridge, My only-begotten Son, has three steps, of which two were made with the
wood of the most Holy Cross, and the third still retains the great bitterness
He tasted, when He was given gall and vinegar to drink. In these three steps
you will recognize three states of the soul, which I will explain to you below.
The feet of the soul, signifying her affection, are the first step, for the
feet carry the body as the affection carries the soul. Wherefore these pierced
Feet are steps by which you can arrive at His Side, Which manifests to you the
secret of His Heart, because the soul, rising on the steps of her affection,
commences to taste the love of His Heart, gazing into that open Heart of My
Son, with the eye of the intellect, and finds It consumed with ineffable love.
I say consumed, because He does not love you for His own profit, because you
can be of no profit to Him, He being one and the same thing with Me. Then the
soul is filled with love, seeing herself so much loved. Having passed the
second step, the soul reaches out to the third -- that is -- to the Mouth,
where she finds peace from the terrible war she has been waging with her sin.
On the first step, then, lifting her feet from the affections of the earth, the
soul strips herself of vice; on the second she fills herself with love and
virtue; and on the third she tastes peace. So the Bridge has three steps, in
order that, climbing past the first and the second, you may reach the last,
which is lifted on high, so that the water, running beneath, may not touch it;
for, in My Son, was no venom of sin. This Bridge is lifted on high, and yet, at
the same time, joined to the earth. Do you know when it was lifted on high?
When My Son was lifted up on the wood of the most Holy Cross, the Divine nature
remaining joined to the lowliness of the earth of your humanity.
"For this reason I said to you that, being
lifted on high, He was not lifted out of the earth, for the Divine nature is
united and kneaded into one thing with it. And there was no one who could go on
the Bridge until It had been lifted on high, wherefore He said, -- 'Si
exaltatus fuero a terra omnia traham ad me ipsum,' that is, 'If I am lifted on
high I will draw all things to Me.' My Goodness, seeing that in no other way
could you be drawn to Me, I sent Him in order that He should be lifted on high
on the wood of the Cross, making of it an anvil on which My Son, born of human
generation, should be re-made, in order to free you from death, and to restore
you to the life of grace; wherefore He drew everything to Himself by this
means, namely, by showing the ineffable love, with which I love you, the heart
of man being always attracted by love. Greater love, then, I could not show
you, than to lay down My life for you; perforce, then, My Son was treated in
this way by love, in order that ignorant man should be unable to resist being
drawn to Me.
"In very truth, then, My Son said, that, being
lifted on high, He would draw all things to Him. And this is to be understood
in two ways. Firstly, that, when the heart of man is drawn by the affection of
love, as I have said, it is drawn together with all the powers of his soul,
that is, with the Memory, the Intellect, and the Will; now, when these three
powers are harmoniously joined together in My Name, all the other operations which
the man performs, whether in deed or thought, are pleasing, and joined together
by the effect of love, because love is lifted on high, following the Sorrowful
Crucified One; so My Truth said well, 'If I am lifted on high,' &c.,
meaning, that if the heart and the powers of the soul are drawn to Him, all the
actions are also drawn to Him. Secondly, everything has been created for the
service of man, to serve the necessities of rational creatures, and the
rational creature has not been made for them, but for Me, in order to serve Me
with all his heart, and with all his affection. See, then, that man being
drawn, everything else is drawn with him, because everything else has been made
for him. It was therefore necessary that the Bridge should be lifted on high,
and have steps, in order that it might be climbed with greater facility."
