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In general, the reason why many souls have no love or inclination towards virtue is that they harbor affections and desires which are neither innocent nor directed wholly towards God.

God has no need of anyone to carry out His work of sanctification, but just as He allows a skillful gardener to raise rare and delicate plants, so does He wish to be aided in sanctifying souls.

I desire your progress, but it strikes me that enough has already been said and written for the attainment of everything you need. If anything is lacking it is not writing and speaking, but in silence and work.

I know, too, that our progress has nothing to do with the body, which is the thing that matters least. What the journey which I am referring to demands is great humility, and it is the lack of this, I think, if you see what I mean, which prevents us from making progress.

It is right that the soul, as far as it is able, should work to purify itself, that it may merit that God take it into His Divine care and heal it of those imperfections before which it is helpless.

He should not go seeking after new things which can only satisfy the desires in a superficial manner (and even here cannot satisfy fully) while leaving the spirit weak and empty, without deep inner virtue.

This is the measure of the holiness of the children of God: to be holy as God, to be holy with the holiness of God: and we do this by living close to Him in the depths of the bottomless abyss within.

It's an amusing thing that even though we still have a thousand impediments and imperfections and our virtues have hardly begun to grow -and please, God, they might have begun- we are yet not ashamed to seek spiritual delights in prayer or to complain about dryness.

If you were to understand how important this virtue (love of neighbor) is for us you wouldn't engage in any other study.

Those who do not receive these consolations may feel a despondency that is uncalled for, since perfection does not consist in consolation but in greater love; our reward will be in proportion to this, and to the justice and sincerity of our actions.

There are others who are vexed with themselves when they observe their own imperfectness, and display an impatience that is not humility; so impatient are they about this that they would fain be saints in a day.

Especially persons of prayer should always be attached to St. Joseph... Those who cannot find a master to teach them prayer should take this glorious saint for their master, and they will not go astray.