Life of St Teresa of Jesus by Teresa of Avila (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📖

done in

this way, than by any scandal that might arise if the religious

showed in their actions, as they proclaim it in words, that the

world is to be held in contempt. Out of scandals such as this,

our Lord obtains great fruit. If some people took scandal,

others are filled with remorse: anyhow, we should have before us

some likeness of that which our Lord and His Apostles endured;

for we have need of it now more than ever.

17. And what an excellent likeness in the person of that blessed

friar, Peter of Alcantara, God has just taken from us! [16]

The world cannot bear such perfection now; it is said that men’s

health is grown feebler, and that we are not now in those former

times. But this holy man lived in our day; he had a spirit

strong as those of another age, and so he trampled on the world.

If men do not go about barefooted, nor undergo sharp penances, as

he did, there are many ways, as I have said before, [17] of

trampling on the world; and our Lord teaches them when He finds

the necessary courage. How great was the courage with which His

Majesty filled the Saint I am speaking of! He did penance—oh,

how sharp it was!—for seven-and-forty years, as all men know.

I should like to speak of it, for I know it to be all true.

18. He spoke of it to me and to another person, from whom he kept

few or no secrets. As for me, it was the affection he bore me

that led him to speak; for it was our Lord’s will that he should

undertake my defence, and encourage me, at a time when I was in

great straits, as I said before, and shall speak of again. [18]

He told me, I think, that for forty years he slept but an hour

and a half out of the twenty-four, and that the most laborious

penance he underwent, when he began, was this of overcoming

sleep. For that purpose, he was always either kneeling or

standing. When he slept, he sat down, his head resting against a

piece of wood driven into the wall. Lie down he could not, if he

wished it; for his cell, as every one knows, was only four feet

and a half in length. In all these years, he never covered his

head with his hood, even when the sun was hottest, or the rain

heaviest. He never covered his feet: the only garment he wore

was made of sackcloth, and that was as tight as it could be, with

nothing between it and his flesh; over this, he wore a cloak of

the same stuff. He told me that, in the severe cold, he used to

take off his cloak, and open the door and the window of his cell,

in order that when he put his cloak on again, after shutting the

door and the window, he might give some satisfaction to his body

in the pleasure it might have in the increased warmth.

His ordinary practice was to eat but once in three days. He said

to me, “Why are you astonished at it? it is very possible for any

one who is used to it.” One of his companions told me that he

would be occasionally eight days without eating: that must have

been when he was in prayer; for he was subject to trances, and to

the impetuosities of the love of God, of which I was once a

witness myself.

19. His poverty was extreme; and his mortification, from his

youth, was such,—so he told me,—that he was three years in one

of the houses of his Order without knowing how to distinguish one

friar from another, otherwise than by the voice; for he never

raised his eyes: and so, when he was obliged to go from one part

of the house to the other, he never knew the way, unless he

followed the friars. His journeys, also, were made in the same

way. For many years, he never saw a woman’s face. He told me

that it was nothing to him then whether he saw it or not: but he

was an aged man when I made his acquaintance; and his weakness

was so great, that he seemed like nothing else but the roots of

trees. With all his sanctity, he was very agreeable; though his

words were few, unless when he was asked questions; he was very

pleasant to speak to, for he had a most clear understanding.

20. Many other things I should like to say of him, if I were not

afraid, my father, that you will say, Why does she meddle here?

and it is in that fear I have written this. So I leave the

subject, only saying that his last end was like his

life—preaching to, and exhorting, his brethren. When he saw

that the end was comes he repeated the Psalm, [19] “Lætatus sum

in his quæ dicta sunt mihi;” and then, kneeling down, he died.

21. Since then, it has pleased our Lord that I should find more

help from him than during his life. He advises me in many

matters. I have often seen him in great glory. The first time

he appeared to me, he said: “O blessed penance, which has merited

so great a reward!” with other things. A year before his death,

he appeared to me being then far away. I knew he was about to

die, and so I sent him word to that effect, when he was some

leagues from here. When he died, he appeared to me, and said

that he was going to his rest. I did not believe it. I spoke of

it to some persons, and within eight days came the news that he

was dead—or, to speak more correctly, he had begun to live

for evermore. [20]

22. Behold here, then, how that life of sharp penance is

perfected in such great glory: and now he is a greater comfort to

me, I do believe, than he was on earth. Our Lord said to me on

one occasion, that persons could not ask Him anything in his

name, and He not hear them. I have recommended many things to

him that he was to ask of our Lord, and I have seen my petitions

granted. God be blessed for ever! Amen.

23. But how I have been talking in order to stir you up never to

esteem anything in this life!—as if you did not know this, or as

if you were not resolved to leave everything, and had already

done it! I see so much going wrong in the world, that though my

speaking of it is of no other use than to weary me by writing of

it, it is some relief to me that all I am saying makes against

myself. Our Lord forgive me all that I do amiss herein; and you

too, my father, for wearying you to no purpose. It seems as if I

would make you do penance for my sins herein.

1. Ch. xxv. § 20.

2. See ch. xxviii. § 5, and ch. xxix. § 1. The vision took

place, it seems, on the 29th June. See ch. xxix. § 6.

3. See ch. vii. § 12.

4. See Anton. a Spiritu Sancto, Direct. Mystic. tr. iii. disp. v.

§ 3.

5. See Inner Fortress, vi. 8, § 3.

6. § 17, infra.

7. See Relation, vii. § 26.

8. Inner Fortress, vi. 8, § 3.

9. Ch. xxv. § 1.

10. Cant. vi. 4: “Averte oculos tuos a me, quia ipsi me avolare

fecerunt.” St. John of the Cross, Mount Carmel,

bk. ii. ch. xxix. n. 6, Engl. trans.

11. Acts x. 34: “Non est personarum acceptor Deus.”

12. St. Luke xxiii. 28: “Filiæ Jerusalem, nolite flere super Me,

sed super vos ipsas flete.”

13. St. Matt. xxvii. 32: “Hunc angariaverunt ut tolleret

crucem Ejus.”

14. St. John x. 20: “Dæmonium habet et insanit: quid

Eum auditis?”

15. Sap. v. 4: “Nos insensati vitam illorum

æstimabamus insaniam.”

16. 18th Oct. 1562. As the Saint finished the first relation of

her life in June, 1562, this is one of the additions

subsequently made.

17. Ch. xiv. § 7.

18. Ch. xxvi. § 3, ch. xxxii. § 16.

19. Psalm cxxi. The words in the MS. are: “Letatun sun yn is que

dita sun miqui” (De la Fuente).

20. See ch. xxx. § 2.

Chapter XXVIII.

Visions of the Sacred Humanity, and of the Glorified Bodies.

Imaginary Visions. Great Fruits Thereof When They Come from God.

1. I now resume our subject. I spent some days, not many, with

that vision [1] continually before me. It did me so much good,

that I never ceased to pray. Even when I did cease, I contrived

that it should be in such a way as that I should not displease

Him whom I saw so clearly present, an eye-witness of my acts.

And though I was occasionally afraid, because so much was said to

me about delusions, that fear lasted not long, because our Lord

reassured me.

2. It pleased our Lord, one day that I was in prayer, to show me

His Hands, and His Hands only. The beauty of them was so great,

that no language can describe it. This put me in great fear; for

everything that is strange, in the beginning of any new grace

from God, makes me very much afraid. A few days later, I saw His

divine Face, and I was utterly entranced. I could not understand

why our Lord showed Himself in this way, seeing that, afterwards,

He granted me the grace of seeing His whole Person. Later on, I

understood that His Majesty was dealing with me according to the

weakness of my nature. May He be blessed for ever! A glory so

great was more than one so base and wicked could bear; and our

merciful Lord, knowing this, ordered it in this way.

3. You will think, my father, that it required no great courage

to look upon Hands and Face so beautiful. But so beautiful are

glorified bodies, that the glory which surrounds them renders

those who see that which is so supernatural and beautiful beside

themselves. It was so with me: I was in such great fear,

trouble, and perplexity at the sight. Afterwards there ensued a

sense of safety and certainty, together with other results, so

that all fear passed immediately away. [2]

4. On one of the feasts of St. Paul, [3] when I was at Mass,

there stood before me the most Sacred Humanity, [4] as painters

represent Him after the resurrection, in great beauty and

majesty, as I particularly described it to you, my father, when

you had insisted on it. It was painful enough to have to write

about it, for I could not describe it without doing great

violence to myself. But I described it as well as I could, and

there is no reason why I should now recur to it. One thing,

however, I have to say: if in heaven itself there were nothing

else to delight our eyes but the great beauty of glorified

bodies, that would be an excessive bliss, particularly the vision

of the Humanity of Jesus Christ our Lord. If here below, where

His Majesty shows Himself to us according to the measure which

our wretchedness can bear, it is so great, what must it be there,

where the fruition of it is complete!

5. This vision, though imaginary,