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He wants you to go out from yourself to leave all preoccupations, in order to retire into that solitude which He is choosing for Himself in the depths of your heart. He is always there, even when you do not feel Him. He is waiting for you, to establish with you ... an intimate union.

I have often said to you, and I repeat it again, forsake and resign yourself, and you shall enjoy a great inward peace.

It is a great favor from God when he darkens [the faculties of the soul] and impoverishes the soul in such a way that it cannot err with them. And if one does not err in this, what need is there in order to be right other than to walk along the level road of the law of God and of the Church and live only in dark and true faith and certain hope and complete charity, expecting all our blessings in heaven, living here below like pilgrims, the poor, the exiled, orphans, the thirsty, without a road and without anything, hoping for everything in heaven?

In heaven, there will be no looks of indifference, because all the saints owe so much to one another. No envious glances will be cast, because the happiness of each is the happiness of all.

I know I am being sustained and herein lies my tranquility and security- not the conscious security of the man who is on firm ground with his own strength, but the sweet and beautiful security of a child upheld by a strong arm- which in practice is a security not less reasonable. Could you call that child reasonable who would live in constant fear that its mother would let it fall?

Work, especially great work, is a burden and a pain, a suffering precisely because intense activity cannot fail to generate in us that disagreeable phenomenon that is called fatigue, which eventually degenerates into depression or prostration or some other form of real and actual suffering. This painful aspect of work renders it particularly adapted to share as an instrument in the work of our sanctification.

Are you so in need, my Lord and my Love, that You would want to receive such poor company as mine, for I see by Your expression that You have been consoled by me? If it's true, Lord that You want to want to endure everything for me, what is this that I suffer for You? Of what am I complaining?

My God, no one has sinned as I. And therefore do I rejoice and hope much, for the extent of Your mercy will be all the more clearly seen in me.

The divine light is here very appropriately called the approaches of Dawn, that is, twilight.  For as the twilight of the morn disperses the light of day, so the mind, tranquil and reposing in God, is raised up from the darkness of natural knowledge to the morning light of the supernatural knowledge of God.

...the preparation of the soul for this union, as we said, is not that it should understand or perceive or feel or imagine anything, concerning either God or aught else, but that it should have purity and love -- that is, perfect resignation and detachment from everything for God's sake alone; and, as there can be no perfect transformation if there be not perfect purity, and as the enlightenment, illumination and union of the soul with God will be according to the proportion of its purity, in greater or in less degree; yet the soul will not be perfect, as I say, if it be not wholly and perfectly bright and clean.

His Majesty gives strength to the one He sees has need of it.

Now be on your guard, daughters, against some types of humility given by the devil in which great disquiet is felt about the gravity of our sins. This disturbance can afflict in many ways even to the point of making one give up receiving Communion and practicing private prayer. These things are given up because the devil makes one feel unworthy.