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Let him have a fixed determination not to allow himself to be beaten, for, if the devil sees that he has firmly resolved to lose his life and his peace and everything that he can offer him rather than to return to the first room, he will very soon cease troubling him.

Yes, it is true, God can make you a contemplative -- through His goodness and mercy; but, in my opinion, one should always take the lowest place, for this is what the Lord told us to do and taught us in deed. Prepare yourself so that God may lead you along this path if He so desires. When He doesn't, you can practice humility, which is to consider yourself lucky to serve the servants of the Lord and praise His Majesty because He brought you among them.

The greatest of all is that he has shown me my littleness and how, of myself, I am incapable of anything good.

To live hidden in Christ it is necessary to die to self.

A supernatural soul does not stop to deal with secondary causes, but solely with God. And how life thus becomes simplified! ... then the soul is truly great, truly free, for its will is ‘enclosed’ in that of God.

Silence is precious; by keeping silence and knowing how to listen to God, the soul grows in wisdom and God teaches it what it cannot learn from men.

Humility does not disturb or disquiet or agitate, however great it may be; it comes with peace, delight, and calm. . . . The pain of genuine humility doesn't agitate or afflict the soul; rather, this humility expands it and enables it to serve God more.

But when souls are worn out from many years of meditation and of having sought this Bridegroom, and most weary of worldly things, they sit under the shadow of Truth, they do not seek their comfort or calm or rest anywhere except where they understand they can truly have it. They place themselves under the protection of the Lord; they desire no other.

It is greatly to be lamented that, when God has granted them strength to break other and stouter cords-- namely, affections for sins and vanities -- they should fail to attain to such blessing because they have not shaken off some childish thing which God had bidden them conquer for love of Him, and which is nothing more than a thread or a hair.

God takes care of the affairs of those who truly love Him without their having to be anxious about them.

Be fervent therefore in your spiritual progress, for you shall shortly receive the reward of your labours; and then grief and fear shall no more come near you.

Perhaps all the graces that I have received in abundance have come to me through the prayers of some little soul whom I shall know only in heaven!