We may have remarked, in several of these sketches of Father Grou, that he lays great stress upon the importance of making interior souls understand how very necessary it is for them to repress their natural activity, and to accustom themselves by degrees to be very simple before God in the practice of prayer, to repose sweetly in God, and to fix in Him all the agitation of their minds and hearts. "It is in vain," he says, " that we seek for rest outside of God; it is only and can only be found in God alone. It is not by agitating ourselves, or exciting ourselves, or making many acts, that we succeed in finding rest in God; it is by putting a stop to all agitation, to all over-eagerness, and all restless activity, that we may give free scope to the action of God: God is always acting, and always perfectly tranquil. The soul united to God shares equally in His action, and in His repose; she is always acting, even when she does not perceive it, but she acts then in the greatest peace; she does not outrun the action of God, but she waits until God pushes her forward; she moves under the Divine impulse, as the hand of a child, who is learning to write, moves tinder the impulse of his master's hand. . . The soul that is under the action of God is never for one moment idle, as those imagine who have no true idea of what rest in God really means. . ."
"Activity," he says again, "engenders multiplicity, and repose conduces to unity and simplicity, even to that simplicity of which Jesus Christ declares the necessity. Activity multiplies practices of piety; it embraces every kind of new devotion; it passes incessantly from one act to another; it agitates itself, it torments itself, it thinks it has never done enough. Repose concentrates us in God, and fixes us on one thing only to listen for the voice of God in prayer; and when we are not in prayer, to accomplish His Divine will in the moment that is passing, without troubling ourselves about the past or the future, in such a manner that the soul has never but one single object in view, and that she is never drawn away by exterior things, being less occupied with what she is actually doing, than with the will of God, which is its motive and its end."
This is the same doctrine as all the masters of the spiritual life teach, and especially one of the most celebrated of all, Saint Francis de Sales. "We place ourselves," he says, "in the presence of God for two special reasons; the first is, to render to God the honour and homage we owe Him, and this can be done without God speaking to us or our speaking to Him. This duty is done by acknowledging that He is our God, and that we are His vile creatures, and by remaining before Him, prostrate in spirit, waiting for His commands. How many courtiers there are who go a hundred times into the presence of the King, not to speak to Him, or to hear Him speak, but simply to be seen by Him, and to show, by this attention, that they are his faithful servants! And this simple end of presenting ourselves before God solely to show to Him our gratitude, and our goodwill, acknowledging that we are His faithful servants, is most excellent, most holy, and consequently of the greatest perfection.
"The second reason for our presenting ourselves before God is to speak to Him, and to hear Him speak to us by His inspirations and the interior movements of His grace. And one of these two benefits can never fail us in prayer. If we can speak to our Lord, let us speak, let us praise Him, let us listen to Him; if we cannot speak to Him because we are hoarse, let us stay nevertheless in His presence and do Him reverence: He will see us there; He will be pleased with our patience, and He will look with favour on our loving silence. Another time we may be quite amazed and overwhelmed when He takes us by the hand, and converses with us, and makes with us a hundred turns in the fragrant walks of His sweet garden of prayer; but even if He never does this, let us be content that it is our duty to be among His followers, and that it is a great favour and a greater honour that He allows us to be in His presence. In this manner, we shall not be in a hurry to speak to Him, since the other way of being near Him is not less useful for us, although it may be a little less agreeable to our taste. Whenever, then, you come near our Lord, speak to Him if you can. If you cannot, remain there, let Him see you, and do not trouble yourself about anything else."
It is nevertheless too true that many good and pious souls who give themselves to prayer regard their silence before God as a sort of idleness which is disrespectful to His Divine Majesty, and even go so far as to confound it with Quietism. This is why it has seemed useful to us to terminate this Manual by a little treatise of Bossuet, the most celebrated adversary of Quietism, which is very little known.
- taken from Manual for Interior Souls, by Father Jean Nicolas Grou