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The greater number of mankind employ their time badly; many others are perfectly embarrassed by their time, and do not know how to employ it, or rather, how to lose it; their sole object is to fritter it away, to pass it agreeably to themselves, or at least without feeling themselves wearied and bored.
Do they ever succeed in this? No. Experience teaches us that those people who are most greedy for pleasure are soon satiated with it, and that disgust, weariness, and idleness soon render them unbearable, even to themselves. But unfortunately, when they have acquired this experience, it is very rarely that they profit by it: the bad habits are formed; it would cost too much to adopt good ones: they continue to live as they have lived, although they no longer flatter themselves with the hope of the happiness they once confidently expected. Woe to those who abuse and misuse their time! One day they will regret to have acted so, but then their regrets will be in vain.
Let us now propose for Christians and interior souls some salutary and useful reflections.
What is time, with regard to myself? It is my present and actual existence. Past time, or my past existence, is no longer anything, as far as I am concerned; I can neither recall it, nor change anything in it. The time to come, or my future existence, has not yet arrived, and perhaps never will arrive. It does not depend upon me; I cannot count upon it; and the most powerful monarch in the world cannot make sure of one single instant of life. No one is ignorant of these two simple truths, but very few draw from them the conclusions they ought to draw.
It is true and certain that I have only belonging to me the present moment, which cannot be divided, which nothing can fix, not even thought, and which is passing away with a rapidity which nothing can equal.
This present moment, or this actual existence, from whom do I hold it? From God. It is He Who called me from nothing into being, twenty, thirty, forty years ago, more or less: it is He Who has preserved my existence from one instant to another, and Who is preserving it at this present moment. Will He preserve it for me in the moment which shall immediately follow this one? I do not know; and nothing in the world can give me the assurance of it.
Why has time been given to me? That by it I may merit a happy eternity. I shall live for ever: faith teaches me this: my reason even assures me of another life: the desire of immortality is implanted in the depths of my heart; and this desire, which God Himself has planted there, can never be frustrated of its object. I am, then, born for eternity; but this eternity will be happy or wretched; and that is according to the use I make of time. If I sincerely repent of the bad use of time I have made in the past, if I am beginning to make a good use of it, if I persevere in this good use until the moment comes when time shall cease for me, then I shall be eternally happy. If I have made a bad use of time in the past, if I am still doing so, if I continue to do so, and death surprises me in this state, I shall be eternally miserable.
My fate for all eternity depends, then, upon the use I make of time; and since neither the past nor the future are in my own power, it is quite true to say that my eternity depends always upon the present moment. Now, at this present moment, what is my state? Should I like to die just as I am now? Should I dare to run the risk of my eternity just as I am now? If I should not, am I not a fool to remain in the state in which I am, to count upon the future, when I am not sure of the moment which shall follow this one, when perhaps between me and eternity there is only one instant of time?
All the events of life, except sin, can contribute to my happy eternity. It is sin alone which can make me lose it. And what is sin? It is the result of a moment's determination. As soon as the deliberate intention of mortal sin is formed by my will, whether the exterior act follows or not, if I die in that state I am lost for ever, and without resource; and I have no assurance that I shall not die as soon as this deliberate intention to sin is formed in my heart. What folly, then, to consent to that which can ruin me for ever, at the very moment I give the consent of my will, even before I have passed to the exterior act of sin!
All the other evils which may happen to us in time are only evils belonging to time itself, and they are evils which may be converted into blessings for all eternity, if we will accept them all as a Christian should, and make a holy use of them. We need not fear them so much, and we need not torment ourselves so much to avoid them or to remedy them. Sin alone is the evil which lasts for all eternity; it is an evil which we can never be sure of remedying when once we have committed it; it is an evil which can only be cured by repentance, but by a repentance which perhaps may never be in our power, and which certainly will not be, unless God Himself, by granting us more time, gives us, through His infinite goodness alone, the grace of conversion.
From these deep and serious reflections it is easy for me to conclude what sort of employment I ought to make of time: 1st, Never to do anything which may expose me to the danger of forfeiting my happy eternity; 2nd, To make of each moment the use which God wishes me to make of it, that by it I may merit that happy eternity; 3rd, Never to put off to a moment which perhaps may never come to me what I can and ought to do at the present moment; 4th, Never to give to any frivolous amusement, still less to any dangerous amusement, to any useless occupation, or to simple idleness, the time whose moments are so precious; 5th, and finally, To be convinced that a life which may finish at any moment, and which has only been given to me that by it I may merit eternal happiness, ought to be a very serious life, a life divided between the duties I owe to God, to my state, and to society; a life in which I do not seek for any other rest and recreation than what God Himself allows and authorises, so that this very rest and innocent enjoyment may be another means towards gaining that blessed eternity. What a reform there would be in the world, and what a difference, if every one would be guided by these solid truths, upon which depend our greatest and only real interest! These rules are for the generality of Christians.
But with regard to interior souls there is more than this. They must never look upon time as a thing they may dispose of as they will; they must never think they are masters of one single instant. Since they have given themselves entirely to God, their liberty and the use they ought to make of it belong solely to Him, at every instant of their lives. It is for Him to inspire them from one moment to another as to what they have to do, for Him to regulate all their interior dispositions, their exterior acts, and even their innocent amusements. He has become the Master of all that, by the gift they have made Him of themselves. They would take back that gift if they were to make one step, if they were to speak one word, of themselves, without consulting Him.
There is no longer any constraint for them in this; on the contrary, God treats them as His own children; and as long as He knows that their hearts are His alone, He allows them to enjoy a sweet liberty which mere servants know not of.
The only use which these souls should make of time is to be attentive each moment to what God asks of them, and faithful to accomplish it. With the exception of this attention and this fidelity, which soon become a habit with them, they are free from all other care whatsoever: and God, Who is the sole Master of their time, disposes of it Himself just as He pleases. There is no longer any necessity for them to trouble themselves about what employment God wishes them to undertake; there is no need for them to form plans for the future; God will provide for that; He will not suffer them to be idle for a moment; He will arrange everything; He will direct everything; and even if He gives them no exterior occupation, He will keep them interiorly occupied with Himself. Even if a spiritual life had no other advantage than this, that it keeps us in perfect repose as to the employment of our time, and gives us a calm assurance that all our moments are employed according to the Will of God, that alone is an inestimable advantage, which we can never buy too dearly.
The sole object of the interior soul is to glorify God, to love God; to glorify Him by all her actions, and by all her sufferings, which come to her through His choice, and in which she has nothing to do but patiently to submit; to love Him, not by formal acts or by effusions of sensible devotion, but by being effectually and continually devoted to Him, and by an entire resignation of her own will to His.
This, from one moment to another, and without any interruption, is the constant occupation of that favoured soul. Her exterior situation may change; she may pass from repose to action, from health to sickness; she may experience every sort of vicissitude from within and without. In this, as all others are, she is subject to the changes of time. But the depths of her heart are changeless as God Himself, and fixed in a constant peace, except that her union with God goes on increasing, and becomes closer and closer, as time goes on. In this respect time has almost ceased to exist for her; she is almost transported to eternity. Yes; from the moment that she gave herself entirely to God, so long as she does not take back that gift, so long as she remains in that state of simple dependence on God's Will, and never swerves from that dependence by any deliberate act, she participates in the depths of her being in the very being of God, because she is every moment just what He wishes her to be. She works and acts as a creature; but God works and acts with her as a Creator; and as this Divine action is continual, and as she is always submissive to it, she is, notwithstanding occasional miseries and weakness, already on this earth in a peace which is almost like that of the blessed in heaven; and the changes of time no longer affect her, more than they affect God, because they are incapable of altering the fixed disposition of her heart.
Happy are those who understand this; happier still are those who faithfully practice it!
- taken from Manual for Interior Souls, by Father Jean Nicolas Grou