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What does it profit you to give God one thing if he asks of you another? Consider what it is God wants, and then do it. You will as a result satisfy your heart better than with something toward which you yourself are inclined.

Show us, then, O our good Master, some way in which we may live through this most dangerous warfare without frequent surprise. The best way that we can do this, daughters, is to use the love and fear given us by His Majesty. For love will make us quicken our steps, while fear will make us look where we are setting our feet so that we shall not fall on a road where there are so many obstacles. Along that road all living creatures must pass, and if we have these two things we shall certainly not be deceived.

True love accepts with perfect resignation, yes, even with joy, whatever comes it it from the hand of the Beloved, for 'perfect love casts out fear'.

What does it matter what we feel; He, He is the Unchanging One, He who never changes: He loves you today as He loved you yesterday and will love you tomorrow.

Never fail to keep your heart at peace and in tender love, ready to suffer as things present themselves.

Love is nourished only by sacrifices, and the more a soul refuses natural satisfactions, the stronger and more disinterested becomes her tenderness.

So Sisters, if you love Him, strive that what you say to the Lord may not amount to mere polite words; strive to suffer what His Majesty desires you to suffer.  For otherwise, when you give your will, it would be like showing a jewel to another, making a gesture to give it away, and asking that he take it; but when he extends his hand to accept it, you pull yours back and hold on tightly to the jewel.

Desire to be empty and poor for Christ's sake.  This state must be embraced with a perfect heart and you must really want it.  If your heart is truly engaged in these efforts you shall speedily attain to great joy and consolation.

Full of love you sink your gaze into mine,

And bend your ear to my quiet words,

And deeply fill my heart with peace.

Courage then, O soul most beautiful!  You now know that your Beloved dwells hidden within your own breast. Endeavor therefore to be truly hidden with Him.

All the being of creation, then, compared with the infinite Being of God, is nothing. And therefore the soul that sets its affection upon the being of creation is likewise nothing in the eyes of God, and less than nothing; for, as we have said, love makes equality and similitude, and even sets the lover below the object of his love.

You ask me for a method of attaining perfection. I know of Love and Love only! Our hearts are made for it alone. Sometimes I endeavor to find some other word for love; but in a land of exile words which have a beginning and an end are quite unable to render adequately the emotions of the soul, and so we must keep to the one simple word-Love.