The Interior Castle:
“The Lord doesn’t look so much as the greatness of our works as at the love with which they are done.”
The First Dwelling Places:
“…the soul of the just person is nothing else but a paradise where the Lord says He finds His delight.” p. 283
“…and in the center and middle is the main dwelling place where the very secret exchanges between God and the soul take place.” p. 284
“Anyone who has the habit of speaking before God’s majesty as though he were speaking to a slave, without being careful to see how he is speaking, but saying whatever comes to his head and whatever he has learned from saying at other times, in my opinion is not praying.” p. 286
“There is nothing, while we are living, that deserves this name “evil,” except mortal sin, for such sin carries in its wake everlasting evils. This, daughters, is what we must go about in fear of and what we must ask God in our prayers to protect us against. For if He doesn’t guard the city, our labor will be in vain since we are vanity itself.” p. 289
“…let it believe me and fly sometimes to ponder the grandeur and majesty of its God. Here it will discover its lowliness better than by thinking of itself, and be freer from the vermin that enter the first rooms, those of self-knowledge…it is by the mercy of God that a person practices self-knowledge.” p. 291
*“While we are on this earth nothing is more important to us than humility. So I repeat that it is good, indeed very good, to try to enter first into the room where self-knowledge is dealt with rather than fly off to other rooms.” p. 292
*”In my opinion we shall never completely know ourselves if we don’t strive to know God. By gazing at His grandeur, we get in touch with our own lowliness; by looking at His purity, we shall see our own filth; by pondering His humility, we shall see how far we are from being humble.” p. 292
“Let us understand, my daughters, that true perfection consists in love of God and neighbor; the more perfectly we keep these two commandments the more perfect we will be.” p. 295
The Second Dwelling Places:
“The intellect tells the soul of its certainty that outside this castle neither security nor peace will be found, that it should avoid going about to strange houses since its own is so filled with blessings to be enjoyed if it wants.” p. 299
*”…but be determined to fight with all the devils and realize that there are no better weapons than those of the cross.” p. 300
*”The whole aim of any person who is beginning prayer – and don’t forget this, because it’s very important – should be that he work and prepare himself with determination and every possible effort to bring his will into conformity with God’s will. Be certain that, as I shall say later, the greatest perfection attainable along the spiritual path lies in this conformity.” p. 301
*”Don’t think that in what concerns perfection there is some mystery or things unknown or still to be understood, for in perfect conformity to God’s will lies all our good.” p. 301
“Thus, if you should at times fall don’t become discouraged and stop striving to advance. For even from this fall God will draw out good, as does the seller of an antidote who drinks some poison in order to test whether his antidote is effective.” p. 302
*”Well now, it is foolish to think that we will enter heaven without entering into ourselves, coming to know ourselves, reflecting on our misery and what we owe God, and begging Him often for mercy.” p. 303
The Third Dwelling Places:
*”For He must give the reward in conformity with the love we have for Him. And this love, daughters, must not be fabricated in our imaginations but proved by deeds. And don’t think He needs our works; He needs the determination of our wills.” p. 308
“For God often desires that His chosen ones feel their wretchedness, and He withdraws His favor a little…This distress, I think, is a great mercy from God; and although it is a defect, it is very beneficial for humility.” p. 310
*”And believe me the whole affair doesn’t lie in whether or not we wear the religious habit but in striving to practice the virtues, in surrendering our will to God in everything, in bringing our life into accordance with what His Majesty ordains for it, and in desiring that His will not ours be done.” p. 311
“Humility is the ointment for our wounds because if we indeed have humility, even though there may be a time of delay, the surgeon, who is our Lord, will come to heal us.” p. 311
“If souls are humble they will be moved to give thanks.” p. 313
“For perfection as well as its reward does not consist in spiritual delights but in greater love and in deeds done with greater justice and truth.” p. 313
“And even if they are not members of a religious order, it would be a great thing for them to have-as do many persons-someone whom they could consult so as not to do their own will in anything. Doing our own will is usually what harms us. And they shouldn’t seek another of their own making, as they say-one who is so circumspect about everything; but seek out someone who is very free from illusion about the things of the world. For in order to know ourselves, it helps a great deal to speak with someone who already knows the world for what it is.” p. 314
“Let us look at our own faults and leave aside those of others.” p. 315
The Fourth Dwelling Places:
“For the Lord gives when He desires, as He desires, and to whom He desires.” p. 317
“It is for these reasons sometimes that these tears flow and desires come, and they are furthered by human nature and one’s temperament; but finally, as I have said, they end in God regardless of their nature. They are to be esteemed if there is the humility to understand that one is no better because of experiencing them, for it cannot be known whether they are all effects of love. When they are, the gift is God’s.” p. 319
“…the important thing is not to think much but to love much; and so do that which best stirs you to love…desiring with strong determination to please God in everything.” p. 319
“For such persons don’t reflect that there is an interior world here within us. Just as we cannot stop the movement of the heavens, but they proceed in rapid motion, so neither can we stop our mind; and then the faculties of the soul go with it, and we think we are lost and have wasted the time spent before God. But the soul is perhaps completely joined with Him in the dwelling places very close to the center while the mind is on the outskirts of the castle suffering from a thousand wild and poisonous beasts, and meriting by this suffering. As a result we should not be disturbed; nor should we abandon prayer, which is what the devil wants us to do. For the most part all the trials and disturbances come from out not understanding ourselves.” p. 320
*”…humility! Humility! By this means the Lord allows Himself to be conquered with regard to anything we want from Him. The first sign for seeing whether or not you have humility is that you do not think you deserve these favors and spiritual delights from the Lord or that you will receive them in your lifetime.” p. 326
“No matter how much we meditate or how much we try to squeeze something out and have tears, this water doesn’t come in such a way. It is given only to whom God wills to give it and often when the soul is least thinking of it.” p. 326
“He desires in His wonderful mercy to bring them back to Him. Like a good shepherd, with a whistle so gentle that even they themselves almost fail to hear it.” p. 328
*”Leave the soul in God’s hands, let Him do whatever He wants with it, with the greatest disinterest about your own benefit as is possible and the greatest resignation to the will of God.” p. 330
*”The fourth is that what is most essential and pleasing to God is that we be mindful of His honor and glory and forget ourselves and our own profit and comfort and delight. P. 330
“When His Majesty desires the intellect to stop, He occupies it in another way and gives it a light so far above what we can attain that it remains absorbed.” p. 330
“Since God gave us our faculties that we might work with them and in this work they find their reward, there is no reason to charm them; we should let them perform their task until God appoints them to another greater one.” p. 330
“And without any effort or noise the soul should strive to cut down the rambling of the intellect.” p. 331
*”The will has such deep rest in its God that the clamor of the intellect is a terrible bother to it. There is no need to pay any attention this this clamor, for doing so would make the will lose much of what it enjoys. But one should leave the intellect go and surrender oneself into the arms of love, for His Majesty will teach the soul what it must do at that point. Almost everything lies in finding oneself unworthy of so great a good and in being occupied with giving thanks. p. 331
The Fifth Dwelling Places:
“But however great the effort we make to do so, we cannot enter. His Majesty must place us there and enter Himself into the center of our soul. And that He may show His marvels more clearly He doesn’t want our will to have any part to play, for it has been entirely surrendered to Him.” p. 340
*”But He wants to enter the center of the soul without going through any door, as He entered the place where His disciples were when He said, pax vobis; or as He left the tomb without lifting away the stone.” p. 341
“For we will not have finished doing all that we can in this work when, to do the little we do, which is nothing, God will unite Himself, with His greatness, and give it such high value that the Lord Himself will become the reward of this work. Thus, since it was He who paid the highest price, His Majesty wants to join our little labors with the great ones He suffered so that all the work may become one.” p. 343
“Therefore, courage, my daughters! Let’s be quick to do this work and weave this little cocoon by getting rid of our self-love and self-will, our attachment to any earthly thing, and by performing deeds of penance, prayer, mortification, obedience, and of all the other things you know.” p. 343
“Everything wearies [the soul], for it has learned through experience that creatures cannot give it true rest.” p. 344
“All you want is our will and that there be no impediment in the wax.” p. 346
* “No, my great love and the desire I have that souls be saved are incomparably more important than these sufferings; and the very greatest sorrows that I have suffered and do suffer, after being in the world, are not enough to be considered anything at all in comparison with this love and desire to save souls.” p. 347
* “This is true, for I have often reflected on the matter. I know the torment a certain soul of my acquaintance suffers and has suffered at seeing our Lord offended. The pain is so unbearable that she desires to die much more than to suffer it. If a soul with so little charity when compared to Christ’s – for its charity could then be considered nonexistent – felt this torment to be so unbearable, what must have been the feeling of our Lord Jesus Christ? And what kind of life must He have suffered since all things were present to Him and He was always witnessing the serious offenses committed against His Father? I believe without a doubt that these sufferings were much greater that were those of His most sacred Passion. At the time of His Passion He already saw an end to these trials and with this awareness as well as the happiness of seeing a remedy for us in His death and of showing us the love He had for His Father in suffering so much for Him, His sorrows were tempered. These sorrows are also tempered here below by those who with the strength that comes from love perform great penances, for they almost don’t feel them; rather they would want to do more and more – and everything they do seems little to them. Well, what must it have been for His Majesty to find Himself with so excellent an occasion for showing His Father how completely obedient He was to Him, and with love for His neighbor? Oh, great delight, to suffer in doing the will of God! But I consider it so difficult to see the many offenses committed so continually against His Majesty and the many souls going to hell that I believe only one day of that pain would have been sufficient to end many lives; how much more one life, if He had been no more than man.” p. 347
* “True union can very well be reached, with God’s help, if we make the effort to obtain it by keeping our wills fixed only on that which is God’s will.” p. 349
* “The most certain sign, in my opinion, as to whether or not we are observing these two laws [love of God and neighbor] is whether we observe well the love of neighbor. We cannot know whether or not we love God, although there are strong indications for recognizing that we do love Him; but we can know whether we love our neighbor. And be certain that the more advanced you see you are in love for your neighbor the more advanced you will be in the love of God, for the love His Majesty has for us is so great that to repay us for our love of neighbor He will in a thousand ways increase the love we have for Him. I cannot doubt this.” p. 351
“It is in the imagination that the devil produces his wiles and deceits.” p. 352
“And beg our Lord to give you this perfect love of neighbor.” p. 353
“Look at what our Spouse’s love for us cost Him; in order to free us from death, He died that most painful death of the cross.” p. 353
“But when I see, as I have said, that Judas was in the company of the Apostles and conversing with God Himself and listening to His words, I understand that there is no security in these things.” p. 356
“But the devil comes along with some skillful deception and, under the color of good, confuses it with regard to little things and induces it to get taken up with some of them that he makes it think are good. Then little by little he darkens the intellect, cools the will’s ardor, and makes self-love grow until in one way or another he withdraws the soul from the will of God and brings it to his own.” p. 357
* “Don’t think that a soul that comes so close to God is allowed to lose Him so quickly, that the devil has an easy task. His Majesty would regret the loss of this soul so much that He gives it in many ways a thousand interior warnings, so that the harm will not be hidden from it.” p. 347
* “Love is never idle.” p. 357
* “If there were no danger of losing or offending Him, it would be easy to endure life until the end of the world so as to labor for so great a God and Lord and Spouse.” p. 358
The Sixth Dwelling Places:
“Oh, God help me, what interior and exterior trials the soul suffers before entering the seventh dwelling place!” p. 359
“Praise is just another trial greater than those mentioned! Since the soul sees clearly that if it has anything good this is given by God and is by no means its own – for just previously it saw itself to be very poor and surrounded by great sins – praise is an intolerable burden to it, at least in the beginning.” p. 361
*“Blame does not intimidate the soul but strengthens it. Experience has already taught it the wonderful gain that comes through this path. It feels that those who persecute it do not offend God; rather that His Majesty permits persecution for the benefit of the soul. And since it clearly experiences the benefits of persecution, it acquires a special and very tender love for its persecutors. It seems to it that they are greater friends and more advantageous than those who speak well of it.” p. 363
* “I say ‘if the pains are severe,’ because they then afflict the soul interiorly and exteriorly in such a way that it doesn’t know what to do with itself. It would willingly accept at once any martyrdom rather than these sharp pains; although they do not last long in this extreme form. After fall, God gives no more than what can be endured; and His Majesty gives patience first. But other great sufferings and illnesses of many kinds are the usual thing.” p. 362
“But I would always choose the path of suffering, if only to imitate our Lord Jesus Christ if there were no other gain; especially, since there are always so many other benefits.” p. 362
“The soul’s understanding is so darkened that it becomes incapable of seeing the truth and believes whatever the imagination represents to it (for the imagination is then its master) or whatever foolish things the devil wants to represent. The Lord, it seems, gives the devil license so that the soul might be tried and even be made to think it is rejected by God.” p. 364
“Our great God wants us to know our own misery and that He is king; and this is very important for what lies ahead.” p. 365
* One thing I advise you: do not think, even if the locutions are from God, that you are better because of them, for He spoke frequently with the Pharisees. All the good comes from how one benefits by these words; and pay no more attention to those that are not in close conformity with Scripture than you would to those heard from the devil himself. Even if they come from your weak imagination, it’s necessary to treat them as if they were temptations in matters of faith, and thus resist them always. They will then go away because they will have little effect on you.” p. 372
* “One thing very certain is that when the spirit is from God the soul esteems itself less, the greater the favor granted, and it has more awareness of its sins and is more forgetful of its own gain, and its will and memory are employed more in seeking only the honor of God, nor does it think about its own profit, and it walks with greater fear lest its will deviate in anything, and with greater certitude that it never deserved any of those favors but deserved hell.” p. 377
* “…for the love of God, Sisters, let us benefit by these faults so as to know our misery, and they will give us clearer vision as did the mud to the blind man cured by our Spouse. Thus, seeing ourselves so imperfect, let us increase our supplications that His Majesty may draw good out of our miseries so that we might be pleasing to Him.” p. 383
* “The soul would desire to have a thousand lives so as to employ them all for God and that everything here on earth would be a tongue to help it praise Him.” p. 384
“…how pleased our Lord is that we know ourselves and strive to reflect again and again on our poverty and misery and on how we possess nothing that we have not received.” p. 388
“Knowledge of the grandeur of God, because the more we see in this grandeur the greater our understanding; self-knowledge and humility upon seeing that something so low in comparison with the Creator of so many grandeurs dared to offend Him (and neither does the soul dare look up at Him); the third, little esteem of earthly things save for those that can be used for the service of so great a God.” p.390
“But the Spouse who gives them has the power to give the grace not to lose them.” p. 390
“As a result of these wonderful favors the soul is left so full of longings to enjoy completely the One who grants them that it lives in a great though delightful torment. With the strongest yearnings to die, and thus usually with tears, it begs God to take it from this exile. Everything it sees wearies it.” p. 301
“You will indeed know when this fire is the source of tears, for they are then more conforming and bring peace not turbulence, and seldom cause harm.” p. 394
* Let’s not think that everything is accomplished through much weeping but set our hands to the task of hard work and virtue. These are what we much pay attention to; let the tears come when God sends them and without any effort on our part to induce them. These tears from God will irrigate this dry earth, and they are a great help in producing fruit. The less attention we pay them the more there are, for they are the water that falls from heaven.” p. 395
“…and let Him give us what He wants, whether water or dryness.” p. 395
“…happy are they whose good fortune it is to remain apart from the world.” p. 396
“…because suffering over one’s sins increases the more one receives from our God.” p. 397
“…for the soul doesn’t think about the suffering it will undergo on account of its sins but of how ungrateful it has been to One to whom it owes so much and who deserves so much to be served.” p. 397
“If they don’t want to stay long in purgatory, the reason comes from the fact of their not wanting to be away from God – as are those who are in purgatory – rather than from the sufferings undergone there.” p. 398
“Rather, it adds to the suffering to see so much goodness and realize that favors are granted to one who deserves nothing but hell.” p. 398
“To be always withdrawn from corporeal things and enkindled in love is the trait of angelic spirits not of those who live in mortal bodies.” p. 399
“Nor is it possible for the soul to forget that it has received so much from God, so many precious signs of love, for these are living sparks that will enkindle it more in its love for our Lord.” p. 402
* “The intellect represents them in such a way, and they are so stamped on the memory, that the mere sight of the Lord fallen to the ground in the garden with that frightful sweat is enough to last the intellect not only an hour but many days, while it looks with a simple gaze at who He is and how ungrateful we have been for so much suffering. Soon the will responds even though it may not do so with tender feelings, with the desire to serve somehow for such a great favor and to suffer something for One who suffered so much, and with other similar desires relating to what the memory and intellect are dwelling upon.” p. 402
“I believe I’ve explained that it is fitting for souls, however spiritual, to take care not to flee from corporal things to the extent that even the most sacred humanity causes harm.” p. 404
“This vision comes in another unexplainable, more delicate way. But it is so certain and leaves much certitude; even much more than the other visions do because in the visions that come through the senses one can be deceived, but not in the intellectual vision. For this latter brings great interior benefits and effects that couldn’t be present if the experience were caused by melancholy; nor would the devil produce so much good; nor would the soul go about with such peace and continual desires to please God, and with so much contempt for everything that does not bring it to Him.” p. 406
* “For even though we already know that God is present in all we do, our nature is such that we neglect to think of this. Here the truth cannot be forgotten, for the Lord awakens the soul to His presence beside it. And even the favors that were mentioned became much more common since the soul goes about almost continually with actual love for the One who it sees and understands is at its side.” p. 407
* “For since the favors are not granted to all, they should be highly esteemed; and one should strive to perform greater services since God in so many ways helps the soul to perform these services. Hence the soul doesn’t consider itself to be any greater because of this, and it thinks that it is the one who serves God the least among all who are in the world. This soul thinks that it is more obliged to Him than anyone, and any fault it commits pierces to the core of its being, and very rightly so.” p. 408
“The Lord leads each one as He sees is necessary.” p. 410
* “One should consider the virtues and who it is who serves our Lord with greater mortification, humility, and purity of conscience; this is the one who will be the holiest.” p. 410
“Even if the vision is not from God, it will do you no harm if you have humility and a good conscience. His Majesty knows how to draw good from evil, and the road along which the devil wanted to make you go astray will be to your greater gain.” p. 415
“The desire to be given what you have never deserved shows a lack of humility, and so I believe that whoever desires this path will not have much humility.” p. 416
“I believe that these favors will never be given to those who desire them, because before granting them God gives a deep self-knowledge. For how will he who has such desires understand in truth that he is being granted a very great favor at not being in hell? Second, such a person will very certainly be deceived or in great danger because the devil needs nothing more than to see a little door open before playing a thousand tricks on us. Third, the imagination itself, when there is a great desire, makes a person think that he sees what he desires and hears it, as with those who desiring something during the day and thinking a great deal about it happen to dream about it at night. Fourth, it would be extremely bold to want to choose a path while not knowing what suits me more. Such a matter should be left to the Lord who knows for me – for He leads me along the path that is fitting – so that in all things I might do His will. Fifth, do you think the trials suffered by those to whom the Lord grants these favors are few? No, they are extraordinary and of many kinds. How do you know you would be able to bear them? Sixth, by the very way you think you will gain, you will lose, as Saul did by being king.” p. 416
“…the safest way is to want only what God wants.” p. 417
“So there are many holy persons who have never received one of these favors; and others who receive them but are not holy.” p.417
“But their desire is to satisfy love, and it is love’s nature to serve with deeds in a thousand ways. If it could, love would want to discover ways of consuming the soul within itself. And if it were necessary to be always annihilated for the greater honor of God, love would do so very eagerly.” p. 418
“The devil gains much and is extremely pleased to see a soul afflicted and disquieted, for he knows that disturbance impedes it from being totally occupied in loving and praising God.” p. 418
“The greatest evil of the world is that God, our Creator, suffers so many evil things from His creatures within His very self and that we sometimes resent a word said in our absence and perhaps with no evil intention.” p. 419
* “…and let us love the one who offends us since this great God has not ceased to love us even though we have offended Him very much. Thus the Lord is right in wanting all to pardon the wrongs done to them.” p. 420
“Thus, we shall have little esteem for this world, which is a complete lie and falsehood, and as such will not endure.” p. 420
* “It is because God is supreme Truth; and to be humble is to walk in truth, for it is a very deep truth that of ourselves we have nothing good but only misery and nothingness. Whoever does not understand this walks in falsehood.” p. 420
“It feels a strange solitude because no creature in all the earth provides it company, nor do I believe would any heavenly creature, not being the One whom it loves; rather, everything torments it. But the soul sees that it is like a person hanging, who cannot support himself on any earthly thing; nor can it ascend to heaven. On fire with this thirst, it cannot get to the water; and the thirst is not on that is endurable but already at such a point that nothing will take it away.” p. 423
* “The soul is left with greater contempt for the world than before because it sees that nothing in the world was any help to it in that torment, and it is much more detached from creatures because it now sees that only the Creator can console and satisfy it.” p. 426
The Seventh Dwelling Places:
“Each one of us has a soul, but since we do not prize our souls as is deserved by creatures made in the image of God we do not understand the deep secrets that lie in them.” p. 427
“For just as in heaven so in the soul His Majesty must have a room where He dwells alone.” p. 428
“We can rightly take pity on them and reflect that at one time we were ourselves in this condition and that the Lord can also have mercy on them.” p. 429
** “Let us take special care, Sisters, to beg this mercy of Him and not be careless, for it is a most generous alms to pray for those who are in mortal sin. Suppose were to see a Christian with his hands fastened behind his back by a strong chain, bound to a post, and dying of hunger, not because of lack of food, for there are very choice dishes beside him, but because he cannot take hold of the food and eat, and even has great loathing for it; and suppose he sees that he is about to breathe his last and die, not just an earthly death but an eternal one. Would it be a terrible cruelty to stand looking at him and not feed him? Well, then, what if through your prayer the chains could be loosed? The answer is obvious. For the love of God I ask you always to remember in your prayers souls in mortal sin.” p. 429
“…it should be understood that in this state there is no more thought of the body than if the soul were not in it, but one’s thought is only of the spirit. In the spiritual marriage, there is still much less remembrance of the body because this secret union takes place in the very interior center of the soul.” p. 433
“For He has desired to be so joined with the creature that, just as those who are married cannot be separated, He doesn’t want to be separated from the soul.” p. 434
“Thus the soul could be joined in this heavenly union with the uncreated Spirit. For it is very certain that in emptying ourselves of all that is creature and detaching ourselves from it for the love of God, the same Lord will fill us with Himself.” p. 435
“The Lord puts the soul in this dwelling of His, which is the center of the soul itself.” p. 436
“The first effect is a forgetfulness of self, for truly the soul, seemingly, no longer is, as was said. Everything is such that this soul doesn’t know or recall that there will be heaven or life or honor for it, because it employs all it has in procuring the honor of God.” p. 438
“The second effect is that the soul has a great desire to suffer, but not the kind of desire that disturbs it as previously. For the desire left in these souls that the will of God be done in them reaches such an extreme that they think everything His Majesty does is good. If He desires the soul to suffer, well and good; if not, it doesn’t kill itself as it used to.” p. 439
** “These souls also have a deep interior joy when they are persecuted, with much more peace than that mentioned, and without any hostile feelings toward those who do, or desire to do, them evil. On the contrary, such a soul gains a particular love for its persecutors, in such a way that if it sees these latter in some trial it feels compassion and would take on any burden to free them from their trial, and eagerly recommend them to God and would rejoice to lose the favors His Majesty grants it if He would bestow these same gifts on those others so that they wouldn’t offend our Lord.” p. 439
* “Their glory lies in being able some way to help the Crucified, especially when they see He is so offended and that few there are who, detached from everything else, really look after His honor.” p. 439
“There are no interior trials or feelings of dryness, but the soul lives with a remembrance and tender love of our Lord.” p. 440
“For certainly that note or letter is His, written with intense love and in such a way that He wants you alone to understand it and what He asks of you in it. By no means should you fail to respond to His Majesty, even though you may be externally occupied or in conversation with some persons.” p. 441
“There are almost never any experiences of dryness or interior disturbance of the kind that were present at times in all the other dwelling places, but the soul is almost always in quiet. There is no fear that this sublime favor can be counterfeited by the devil…the faculties and senses have nothing to do with what goes on in this dwelling place. His Majesty reveals Himself to the soul and brings it to Himself in that place where, in my opinion, the devil will not dare enter, nor will the Lord allow him to enter. Nor does the Lord in all the favors He grants the soul here, as I have said, receive any assistance from the soul itself, except what it has already done in surrendering itself totally to God.” p. 441
“So in this temple of God, in this His dwelling place, He alone and the soul rejoice together in the deepest silence.” p. 442
* “The more favored they are by His Majesty the more they are afraid and fearful of themselves. And since through His grandeurs they have come to a greater knowledge of their own miseries, and their sins become more serious to them, they often go about like the publican not daring to raise their eyes. At other times they go about desiring to die so as to be safe; although, with the love they have, soon they again want to live in order to serve Him, as was said. And in everything concerning themselves they trust in His mercy.” p. 443
“…but our Lord does not want the soul to forget its being, so that, for one thing, it might always be humble; for another, that it might better understand the tremendous favors it receives, what it owes His Majesty, and that it might praise Him.” p. 444
“These souls are free from mortal sins, although not immune.” p. 444
“The one among you who feels safest should fear more.” p. 445
“To beseech Him that we not offend Him is the greatest security we can have.” p. 445
** “His Majesty couldn’t grant us a greater favor than to give us a life that would be an imitation of the life His beloved Son lived. Thus I hold for certain that these favors are meant to fortify our weakness, as I have said at times, that we may be able to imitate Him in His great sufferings. We have always seen that those who were closest to Christ our Lord were those with the greatest trials. Let us look at what His glorious Mother suffered and the glorious apostles. How do you think St. Paul could have suffered such very great trials?” p. 445
* For if it is with Him very much, as is right, it should think little about itself. All its concern is taken up with how to please Him more and how and where it will show Him the love it bears Him. This is the reason for prayer, my daughters, the purpose of this spiritual marriage: the birth always of good works, good works.” p. 446
“Since He sees that a soul is very faint-hearted He gives it a severe trial, truly against its will, and brings this soul out of the trial with profit. Afterward, since the soul understands this, the fear lessens and one can offer oneself more willingly to Him.” p. 446
“Let the soul bend its will if it wishes that prayer be beneficial to it.” p. 446
** “Fix your eyes on the Crucified and everything will become small for you. If His Majesty showed us His love by means of such works and frightful torments, how is it you want to please Him only with words? Do you know what it means to be truly spiritual? It means becoming the slaves of God. Marked with His brand, which is that of the cross, spiritual persons, because now they have given Him their liberty, can be sold by Him as slaves of everyone as He was.” p. 446
“…for this whole building, as I have said, has humility as its foundation. If humility is not genuinely present, for your own sake the Lord will not construct a high building lest that building fall to the ground.” p. 447
** “If you do not strive for the virtues and practice them, you will always be dwarfs. And, please God, it will be only a matter of not growing, for you already know that whoever does not increase decreases. I hold that love, where present, cannot possibly be content with remaining always the same.” p. 447
“…the soul wages more war from the center than it did when it was outside suffering with them, for then it didn’t understand the tremendous gain trials bring. Perhaps they were the means by which God brought it to the center, and the company it has gives it much greater strength than ever.” p. 447
* “I already told you elsewhere that sometimes the devil gives us great desires so that we will avoid setting ourselves to the task at hand, serving our Lord in possible things, and instead be content with having desired the impossible. Apart from the fact that by prayer you will be helping greatly, you need not be desiring to benefit the whole world but must concentrate on those who are in your company, and thus your deed will be greater since you are more obliged toward them.” p. 449
“Let us offer the Lord interiorly and exteriorly the sacrifice we can. His Majesty will join it with that which He offered on the cross to the Father for us. Thus even though our works are small they will have the value our love for Him would have merited had they been great.” p. 450
“He is very fond of humility. By considering that you do not deserve even to enter the third you will more quickly win the favor to reach the fifth. And you will be able to serve Him from there in such a way, continuing to walk through them often, that He will bring you into the very dwelling place He has for Himself.” p. 451