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That gaze of the soul at its Bridegroom inflames it with love. You can always look at Him. That sight of Jesus will bring you peace, if you are disturbed or exalted. It will fortify you, if you are cast down; it will bring you recollection, if you are dissipated.

Those who now desire to question God or receive some vision or revelation are guilty not only of foolish behavior but of also offending Him by not fixing their eyes entirely on Christ and by living with the desire for some other novelty.

When we have prayed to the Blessed Virgin and she has not given us what we asked for, we should let her do what she pleases, without insisting on our request; and after that let us not worry any more about it.

If trials are not suffered for God, they are worth nothing; if they are suffered for Him, His Majesty adapts them to our strength. Thus, if we are so afraid of them it is because we are fainthearted.

How your life would be transformed if you were frequently with Jesus as with a friend! Do you perchance think that Jesus will not receive you as such? If you think such a thing, you would demonstrate that you do not know Him. He is all tenderness, all love for His sinful creatures.

The remembrance of my faults humbles me, and helps me never to rely upon my own strength, which is mere weakness. More than all, it speaks to me of mercy and of love. When a soul with childlike trust casts her faults into Love's all-devouring furnace, how can they escape being utterly consumed?

God is more pleased by one work, however small, done secretly, without desire that it be known, than a thousand done with desire that men know of them. The person who works for God with purest love not only cares nothing about whether men see him, but does not even seek that God Himself know of them.

Then gradually, he becomes very small and humble; he grows patient and indulgent toward the splinter in strange eyes because the beam in his own is brought into being; and, finally, he also learns to be patient with himself in the inexorable light of the divine Presence and to surrender himself to the divine mercy which can take care of all that ridicules our energy.

To secure a hearing there is no need to recite set prayers composed for the occasion. . . .I have not the courage to search through books for beautiful prayers; they are so numerous, that it would only make my head ache, and besides, each one is more lovely than the other. Unable either to say them all or to choose between them, I do as a child would do who cannot read-I say just what I want to say to God, quite simply and He never fails to understand.

Since Jesus wants to sleep why will I hinder Him? I am only too happy that He doesn’t bother with me, for He is showing me that I am not a stranger when treating me this way, for I assure you, He is going to no trouble about carrying on a conversation with me!

Our Beloved does not need our brilliant deeds nor our beautiful thoughts. If He wanted sublime concepts, has He not the angels, who surpass in knowledge the greatest geniuses of the world?

In savoring a finite joy
the very most one can expect
is to enfeeble and destroy
our taste, leaving the palate wrecked;
for all the sweetness there may be
I’ll never throw away my soul…