On the Three Words That Were Said to Saint Arsenius

These three words, which were spoken by a voice from heaven to Saint Arsenius, contain everything that it is necessary for us to do on our part to correspond with the designs of God for us. We must fly from all that could draw us away from God: we must keep ourselves in a silence both exterior and interior, that we may hear the voice of God: and we must calm all the agitations and anxieties of our mind and heart, that they may be fixed on God alone. All souls whom God destines for the interior life are not called, as Saint Arsenius was, to fly from the world, and to retire into complete solitude: but all are called upon to use this world as though they used it not, to detach from it their mind and heart, and to have with it only those relations which are indispensable; in short, in all their intercourse with the world, to avoid everything which could separate them from God.

Now this detachment goes much farther, and is much more difficult than appears at first sight. It is not sufficient to avoid everything which is actual sin, or which leads to actual sin; we must also avoid all which pleases our senses, curiosity, esteem of ourselves, the desire of being praised, approved, thought much of; all which is capable of distracting us, of drawing our soul towards external things, and taking her out of herself, and of that peaceful centre where God deigns to dwell. We cannot be too careful in this matter, because our exterior relations with the world are one of the principal sources of our faults, and the most ordinary cause of our slight progress in the spiritual life.

That which makes the great difficulty of this perfect detachment is the powerful inclination in our soul to pour itself out upon created things, to allow them to lead it astray, to seek in them its repose, and to attribute to them a reality and a solidity which they have not. This is the sad effect of original sin, even in the most innocent souls; much more in those who have had the misfortune to have actually offended God.

The next great difficulty comes from the love we have for ourselves, and the desire we have to be loved and esteemed by others. If we wish people to love us, we must love them, and love what they love. If we wish to be esteemed by them, we must esteem them; we must think, we must speak, we must act as they do. This is a law which the world imposes upon us, a law which self-love persuades us to be a duty, and to which are sacrificed often the laws of God, the maxims of the Gospel, and the light of reason and conscience.

If we associate with the world otherwise than through necessity and absolute charity, and even then fortifying ourselves interiorly against its seductions, it is quite impossible for us not to end by conforming to its judgments and opinions, and to its natural, human, and sensual ideas. We do this either to please others, or from human respect, or from being carried away, almost without our consent; it is quite impossible for us not to end by approving or at least excusing in others those things which God expressly condemns, because we are afraid of making ourselves ridiculous if we think differently from other people, and if we dare to oppose the pure maxims of the Gospel to the maxims received by the world.

What must we do then to practise this flight from the world which is so necessary and so recommended to us? We must look upon the world as the greatest enemy to the Christian faith, and as the most dangerous deceiver, because it always agrees but too well with the promptings of our own self-love.

We must retire from the world as much as possible, we must break with all useless ties which have no other object than amusement; we must speak but little in company, and not always say what we wish to say; but when we are obliged to speak, we must do so plainly, and without human respect, remembering those words of our Lord Jesus Christ: "Whoever shall be ashamed of Me before men, of him will I be ashamed before my Father in heaven."

We must keep silence, both exteriorly and interiorly. It is a great mistake to imagine that the practice of silence is only for those souls consecrated to God in the life of the cloister: it is necessary for every one who wishes to lead a really interior life; and it was not for religious alone that Jesus Christ said that at the day of judgment we must give an account of every idle word.

Great freedom of speech is the sure mark of a frivolous and dissipated soul. I defy any one to come away from a useless conversation, and to return easily to a state of recollection, or to pray or make a spiritual reading, with the peace and calm that are necessary for drawing any profit from such devout exercises.

But it is not enough to keep silence with others. We must keep silence with ourselves, we must not indulge our imagination, we must not be always thinking of what we have said or heard, we must not occupy ourselves with useless thoughts and reflections upon the past and the future. How can God make His voice heard by a soul so dissipated? And if she allows herself thus to roam over all sorts of objects, how can she recollect herself for prayer? It is not a little thing to be able to master our imagination, to control it, to fix it upon the present, upon what we are actually doing, and not to allow it to pause willingly before that crowd of thoughts which pass continually through our minds. I know that we cannot help having these kind of thoughts; but we can help letting our heart dwell on them, we can despise them, and take no notice of them. We can, when they come from some trouble, from some revolt of self-love, from some inordinate desire, make a sacrifice to God of that trouble, we can subdue that revolt, we can repress that desire. The exercise of interior mortification is an efficacious means, and more than that, it is the only means by which we can attain that perfect silence of the soul which disposes us for close communion with God.

Finally, we must fix in God the agitations and anxieties of our mind and heart. It is in vain that we seek for rest outside of God; we can only find it in God, and in God alone. It is not by agitating ourselves, by being very eager, and doing many external acts, that we succeed in resting in God; it is when we give up all agitation, all eagerness, all activity, and allow God to act upon us. God is always in activity, but always at rest. And the soul that is closely united to Him shares in His activity, and in His rest. That soul is always in action, even when she does not perceive it; but she acts always in the greatest peace. She does not fore-run the action of God, but she waits for Him to direct her; she moves under the Divine guidance, like the hand of a child who is learning to write moves under the guidance of his master's hand. If this child did not keep his hand supple and docile, if he wished to form the letters by himself, he would write badly. The child does undoubtedly act in writing, but his action is directed by the action of his master. The repose of the child does not consist in not moving his hand, but in not moving it of himself, and in simply following the guidance of the guiding hand.

So it is with the faithful soul under the immediate action of God: the soul is not idle for a single moment, as those imagine who have no idea whatever of what true rest in God means; God guides the rudder of that soul, and leads it as He will. It is quite true that the action of God on the soul, as well as the action of the soul herself, is sometimes imperceptible, but it is none the less real: only then it is even more direct, more close, more spiritual. Even in a natural state, how many interior movements are there of which we take no note, and which are nevertheless the motive-principle of our exterior actions? I look, I speak, I walk, I turn away my eyes, I keep silence, I stop, just because I will to do so; and, in a general way, I pay no attention to this constant exercise of my will. It is just the same, and still more so, in the supernatural state. We pray without thinking that we are praying; our heart is united to God, and we are not conscious of this union. Therefore, it must not be said that those whom God raises to the prayer of quiet are doing nothing, and losing their time: they are in reality acting there in a manner which is very real, although very secret, and, besides that, in a manner in which self-love can find nothing to nourish it, or to attract it, or to reassure it. And it is in this that the great advantage of this state of prayer consists; it is the very death and destruction of self-love; it is the soul losing itself entirely in God. As long as the soul thinks itself conscious of its state, as long as it knows where it is and how it stands it is not lost; it has still something to lean upon. When does the soul begin to be lost in God? It is when it feels nothing any more, when it no longer sees anything in itself, when it has even ceased to look within, or anywhere else, and when, ceasing to reason or reflect, it abandons itself entirely to the guidance of God. God will lead that soul by degrees in this way of loss, He will guide it by this prayer which has nothing sensible, until at last, finding no resource, either in itself or in any man, its trust is established in God alone, and, like Jesus Christ upon the cross, forsaken by all men, and apparently by His Father also, that soul can say, "'Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit:' I give myself to Thee, to do as Thou wilt with me, in time and in eternity."

It is to this great act of resignation, so glorious to God and so useful to the soul, that the prayer of quiet leads, when it is well understood and rightly practised. Of ourselves we cannot enter upon this way of prayer; of ourselves we cannot advance in it; but when God has raised us to it we must have the courage to follow it, and to persevere to the end. This grace is given to very few souls; and Saint Teresa complains that so many give up the prayer of quiet, and go no farther when their prayer ceases to be sensible and perceptible; that is to say, just when it begins to be most profitable to the soul, through the mortification of self-love.

Let us not be of the number of those cowardly and interested souls who only seek themselves in the service of God; let us seek Him for Himself alone, and most surely we shall find Him, and in Him the source of all good.

- taken from Manual for Interior Souls, by Father Jean Nicolas Grou