St. Alphonsus Liguori has stated that one of the clearest tokens
that a person is on the way to eternal happiness is an eagerness to
hear the word of God. The writer of these instructions has
uniformly found, during the experience of many years, that this
excellent disposition exists in a high degree of perfection among
the inmates of our convents. And yet very many of those devout
souls are so situated that for months they cannot hear any
religious instruction, at least not such discourses as apply the
sacred truths of revelation to the peculiar needs of their holy
vocation. It is to supply this want of oral addresses that these
pages are respectfully presented; they are chiefly intended to be
read in community, where a little effort of the imagination may
suffice to produce about the same impression as if they were
uttered by the lips of a priest of God. Let us consider this
excerpt: "First then the nature of holiness. We will take as our
instructor in this important matter our dear Lord Himself. He gave
this great lesson for all future ages on the night before His
sacred passion, when He discoursed for the last time in this life
with His Apostles. Let us imagine that we are seated with them
before the Divine teacher, treasuring up in our loving hearts every
word that falls from His sacred lips. He spoke as follows; St.
John, who was present, has recorded the very words: "I am the true
vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that
beareth not fruit, he will take away; and everyone that beareth
fruit, he will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide
in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself
unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in
me. I am the vine, you the branches: he that abideth in me, and I
in him, the same beareth much fruit; for without me you can do
nothing. If anyone abide not in me, he shall be cast forth as a
branch and shall wither, and they shall gather him up and cast him
into the fire, and he burneth. If you abide in me, and my words
abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done
unto you. In this is my Father glorified that you bring forth very
much fruit, and become my disciples" (XV, 18)." And this should
show that these instructions, although written for religious apply
to all Christians: "St. Teresa tells us clearly, in that remarkable
autobiography which she wrote by the order of her confessor, that
she was a very imperfect religious during nearly twenty years, and
that she was converted by prayer. To quote her own words: "I wish,"
she writes, "that I could obtain leave to declare the many times I
failed, during this period, in my obligations to God, because I was
not supported by the strong pillar of mental prayer. I passed
through this tempestuous sea almost twenty years, between these
fallings and risings, (though I rose very imperfectly, since I fell
again so quickly, ) and in this kind of life, which was so far
below perfection, I made almost no account of venial sins; and for
mortal ones, I feared them, it is true, but not so much as I ought
to have done, since I did not avoid the dangerous occasions. " And
the Saint adds: "The reason why I have given this account is. .
that it may be understood how great a blessing God bestows on that
soul which He disposes to practise mental prayer with a good will,
even though she were not SO well prepared for it as she should be.
But if she perseveres therein, whatever sins she may commit,
whatever temptations may be presented to her, or whatever falls she
may receive in a thousand different ways from the devil, I consider
it certain that our Lord will, in the end, bring her safe to the
port of salvation. ""
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