Meditation on Psalm 31 ("Tristitia obsedit me")

Sadness has besieged me; with a great and strong army it has hemmed me in; it has seized my heart with shouting and arms; day and night it does not cease to fight against me. My friends are in its camp and have become my enemies. Whatever I see, whatever I hear, carries the banners of Sadness. The memory of my friends saddens me; the remembrance of my sons afflicts me; the thought of the cloister and the cell torments me; the meditation of my studies grieves me; the thought of my sins weighs me down. For as to those suffering from fever all sweet things seem bitter, so for me all things are turned into mourning and sadness. A great burden indeed upon the heart is this sadness; the poison of asps, a deadly pestilence, it murmurs against God, it does not cease to blaspheme, it urges me to despair. Wretched man that I am! who will deliver me from its sacrilegious hands? If all the things I see and hear follow its banners and fight strongly against me, who will be my protector? Who will help me? Where shall I go? How shall I escape? I know what I will do. I will turn to the invisible things and lead them out against the visible. And who will be the leader of so lofty and so terrible an army? Hope, which is of things invisible. Hope, I say, will come against Sadness and will overcome it. Who will be able to stand against Hope? Hear what the prophet says: "You, Lord, are my hope; you have made your refuge most high." Who will stand against the Lord? who will be able to storm his refuge, which is most high? I will call her, then. She will surely come, and will not put me to shame. Behold, she has already come; she has brought joys, she has taught me to fight, and she said to me, "Cry out, do not cease." And I say, "What shall I cry?" "Say," she said, "with confidence and with your whole heart: IN YOU, Lord, have I hoped; let me never be put to shame; in your righteousness deliver me."

O wonderful power of Hope, whose face Sadness could not endure! Now consolation has come. Let Sadness now shout and clamour with its army. Let the world press upon me, let enemies rise up: I fear nothing, for in you, Lord, have I hoped, for you are my hope, for you have made your refuge most high. I have already entered it; Hope led me in. I did not enter rashly; she will excuse me before you. "Behold," says Hope, "O man, the most high refuge of God; open your eyes and see. God alone is; he alone is the infinite ocean of being. Other things are as if they were not; for all things depend on him, and if he did not sustain them they would suddenly return to nothing, because they were made from nothing. Consider the power of him who in the beginning created heaven and earth. Does he not himself work all things in all? Who can move a hand without him? who can think anything of himself? Weigh the wisdom of him who governs all things in tranquillity, who sees all things, and to whose eyes all things are naked and open. This is he who alone knows how and is able to free you, alone to console you, alone to save you. Do not trust in the sons of men, in whom there is no salvation. The heart of men is in his hand; wherever he wills he will turn it. This is he who is able and knows how to help you. Or perhaps you suspect his will? Weigh his goodness. Consider his love. Is he not the lover of men, who for men became man and for sinners was crucified? He is truly your father, who created you, who redeemed you, who has always done you good. Can a father forsake his son? Cast yourself upon him, and he will receive you and save you. Search the Scriptures and you will find how earnestly such great kindness urges you to hope in him."

"Why this? Surely because he wills to save. For what does he say through the prophet? 'Because he has hoped in me, I will deliver him.' See, he wills to deliver him for no other reason than that he hoped in him. And what did the prophets, what did the apostles, what did the Lord of the apostles himself preach, but that men should hope in the Lord? Offer, then, O men, the sacrifice of righteousness, and hope in the Lord, and he himself will deliver you and rescue you from all tribulation." O great power of hope! Truly it is poured out: for grace is poured out on your lips. O your refuge, Lord, truly most high, which the evil of sadness cannot approach! These things I have known and understood; therefore in you, Lord, have I hoped. For although the weight of my sins presses heavily on me, yet I do not know how to despair, because your goodness so kindly calls me to hope. Therefore I shall not be put to shame for ever. I may indeed be put to shame in time, but not for ever. For the hope that led me into your most high refuge did not teach me to hope for temporal things but for eternal. For hope is of things invisible; and the things that are seen are temporal, but those that are not seen are eternal. Hearing, then, the words of Hope, who came to snatch me from the hands of Sadness, in you, Lord, have I hoped, desiring above all to be freed from sins, and by your mercy and grace to come to the eternal things that are not seen. This is my first desire; for my sins are my greatest tribulation. For from this every other tribulation proceeds. Take away my sins, Lord, and I am free from all tribulation. For tribulation and anguish proceed from the fountain of the heart, since all sadness comes from love. If I love a son and he dies, I am in tribulation, because I have lost what I loved. If I do not love a servant and he dies, I am not saddened, because I have lost what I did not love.

Take away my sins, then, Lord, by your grace. What remains but that I love you with my whole heart and despise all temporal things as vain? If, then, I have you through faith, from whom I also hope for what eye has not seen nor ear heard nor has entered into the heart of man, what can trouble me? Whatever I lose apart from God, I have lost what I do not love. In you, then, Lord, have I hoped, as my hope taught me to hope; therefore I shall not be put to shame for ever, because you will give me eternal things. But whoever hopes not in you but in his own vanity will be put to shame for ever, because he will go down to eternal shame. I may indeed be put to shame in time, both by you and by men, but I shall not be put to shame for ever. By you, when I ask to be freed from temporal distress and perhaps you do not hear me: then indeed I shall be put to shame in time, but I shall not be put to shame for ever; for it is not expedient for me, since power is made perfect in weakness. By men I am put to shame in time, and they prevail against me, when they persecute me; but this too is permitted by you, that I may not be put to shame for ever. If, then, before you a thousand years are as yesterday that is past, I will gladly bear temporal shames, that I may not be put to shame for ever. I will hope in the Lord, as my hope has taught me to hope, and I shall soon be freed from all tribulation. By what merits shall I be freed? Not by mine, Lord; but in your righteousness deliver me. In your righteousness, I say, not mine. For I seek mercy; I do not offer my own righteousness. But if by your grace you make me righteous, then I have your righteousness. For your grace in us is your righteousness. The Pharisees trusted in works of righteousness; they trusted, indeed, in their own righteousness, and therefore they did not submit to the righteousness of God, because by the works of the law no flesh will be justified before God.

But the righteousness of God has appeared through the grace of Jesus Christ, even without the works of the law. The philosophers gloried in their own righteousness, and therefore they did not find your righteousness, because they did not enter by the door. They were thieves and robbers, who had come not to save but to destroy and to slaughter the sheep. Your grace, then, is your righteousness, Lord. And it would no longer be grace if it were given for merits. Therefore not in my righteousness, but in your righteousness, deliver me from my sins; or rather, deliver me in your righteousness, that is, in your Son, who alone among men was found righteous. For what is your Son but Righteousness itself, in which all are justified? In your righteousness, then, justify me and deliver me from my sins, that I may also be delivered from the other tribulations that I suffer because of them, so that, the cause removed, the effect may be removed too. Behold, Lord, I have asked you and I am comforted; hope taught me so; I have rejoiced, because in you, Lord, have I hoped; therefore I shall not be put to shame for ever. Sadness has come back; it has returned with great array, armed on every side with swords and lances; it advances with great force; it has already encircled our city. The shouting of its horsemen terrified me. Standing outside, it commanded silence and spoke from afar: "Oh," it said, "behold the man who hoped in the Lord, who said, 'I shall not be put to shame for ever,' who followed comforting Hope." And when it saw me blush at these words, coming near it said, "Where are the promises of your hope? where the consolation? where the deliverance? what good have your tears done you? what have your prayers brought you from heaven? You cried out; no one answered you. You wept, and who was moved with pity for you? You called upon your God, and he was silent.

"You asked him and besought him, and there was no voice nor hearing. You implored all the saints, and none of them regarded you. See what the words of Hope have brought you! You have laboured, and found nothing in your hands. Or do you think that God looks at these lower things? He walks about the hinges of heaven and does not consider our affairs." So it spoke, blaspheming, and when I shuddered at its words, it came near and spoke in my ear, saying, "Do you think the things that faith preaches are true? Do you want to see that they are the inventions of men? Know it from this at least: if God had become man and been crucified for men, so great a kindness could not fail to console a man worn out with the greatest grief, crying and weeping to him. If, as they say, infinite goodness made him come down from heaven to undergo the cross, how is it that he does not now come down to wretched men to console them? This is certainly easier, and the same kindness should come to help. Why do the angels and the blessed, if they are so kind, not come to console you? How many men, do you think, would come to you if they could, and with words and deeds, as far as they were able, would gladden you, and even free you from all distress? Why do the blessed not do this, who are believed to be far better than men? Believe me, all things are governed by chance; nothing exists but what is seen. Your spirit will vanish like smoke. Who ever came back from the dead and told anything of what is said to happen to souls after death? These are old wives' tales. Rise up, then, and flee to the help of men, so that, released from this prison, you may live in such a way that you do not labour for ever, deceived in vain by this hope of yours." When it had said this, so great a shout was heard in its camp, such a din of arms and clamour of the crowds, that I could scarcely stand; and if my beloved Hope had not given me help, Sadness would have led me bound in chains to its own country.

So Hope came, shining with a kind of divine splendour, and smiling said, "Come now, soldier of Christ, what heart, what courage have you in this fight?" Hearing this, I blushed at once. And she said, "Do not fear; no evil will take you; you will by no means perish; see, I am with you to deliver you. Do you not know that it is written, 'The fool has said in his heart, There is no God'? This Sadness has spoken like one of the foolish women. Can you be persuaded that there is no God, that he has no providence over all things? Can you doubt the faith, you who have strengthened it with so many arguments and reasons? I wonder that you have been so cast down by its words. Tell me, I beg you: have you begun in your heart to doubt the faith?" "As the Lord lives and as my soul lives, O my sweetest mother, I have not felt the least prick of unbelief. For by the grace of Christ I believe the things of faith to be true no less than the things I see with bodily eyes. But sadness was pressing me so hard that I was being drawn toward despair rather than unbelief." "Son, know that this is a great gift of God. For faith is a gift, not of works, lest anyone should boast. Rise up, then, and do not fear, but rather know from this that the Lord has not forsaken you; and though he does not hear quickly, there is no need to despair; if he delays, wait for him: for he will surely come and will not tarry. The farmer waits patiently for the fruit in its season. Nature does not at once bring in the form when it generates something; but first it prepares the matter, and disposes it little by little until it makes it fit to receive the form. Know, however, that the Lord always hears those who pray devoutly and humbly; for they never go away from him empty.

"Nor will I strive to prove this by reasons, since you have felt it in yourself. Tell me, who lifted your heart from the earth to God? who brought you to prayer? who gave you sorrow for sins and tears? who gave you hope? who left you cheerful in prayer and after it? who confirmed you daily in your holy purpose? Was it not the Lord, who works all things in all? If, then, he constantly bestows these gifts on you, why does that worst of women say, 'Where are your prayers? where your tears?' and the other words of blasphemy? Do you not know that the heavenly Jerusalem is distinct from this earthly one? Do you not know that it is neither fitting nor necessary nor useful for God, or his angels and saints, to come down visibly to men and speak with them familiarly? It is not fitting, because of the distance of merits. For what fellowship has light with darkness? do wayfarers and those who have attained agree well together? Different cities have different citizens. To some, indeed, because of their excellent holiness, since they are already near the homeland, it has been given to see angels and speak with them; but a special privilege does not touch everyone. Nor is it necessary, for since the blessed govern, enlighten, and console us invisibly, there is no need to use visible appearances; although the Lord is so good that he never omits even visible appearances when there is need. For what could he do for our salvation that he has not done? Nor is it useful, for too much familiarity breeds contempt. For to the Jews great and many miracles were of no profit. Rare things are precious. Let invisible visitation, then, suffice you. For the Lord knows what you need. Has he not consoled you himself?

"I know what you have felt in your heart. Rise up, then, and return to prayer. Cry out, ask, seek, persevere; for even if he will not give because you are his friend, yet because of your importunity he will give all that is needed." Comforted by these words, I rose, and prostrate before God I continued my prayer, saying: INCLINE your ear to me; make haste to rescue me. Lord my God, I return to you. Hope has sent me; I do not come by my own presumption. Your goodness invites me; your mercy draws me. O what condescension! I am plainly glad; nor is any other consolation left me. Happy indeed is this necessity that compels me to come to God, that forces me to speak with him, that urges me to pray. I will speak, then, to my God, though I am dust and ashes. Incline your ear to me. What are you saying, my soul? Has God ears? Is he a body? Far from it. For since spirit is far better than body, who but a madman would assert that God is a body? But stammering as we can, Lord, we echo your high things. We know you through creatures; we speak to you and of you through their likenesses. What, then, Lord, is your ear? Is it perhaps your knowledge? For by our ears we understand what is said to us. But you have known from eternity all that men speak and think. Can we, then, take your ear to be your knowledge? Your ear surely suggests to me something that is not contained in the name of your simple knowledge. For to some you incline your ear, but from others you turn it away. Yet your knowledge always remains the same. What, then, is your ear but your knowledge of approval and disapproval? You incline your ear and hear the words of the righteous, because they please you and you approve them.

You turn your ear away from the words of the wicked, who will not depart from wickedness, because they do not please you and you disapprove them. What, then, is it to incline your ear to those who speak to you, but to approve their prayers, to look on them with a face of kindness, to enlighten and kindle them, so that they pray to you and beseech you with confidence and the fervour of love, because you wish to give them what they ask with humble devotion? For if a king shows a cheerful face to a poor man who wishes to speak with him, turns his eyes to him, and shows himself attentive to his words, will not the poor man be glad? Will not the face and the attention of the king give him eloquence? Will it not supply him with words and fluency? So, Lord, we understand that you incline your ear to our prayers when you grant us to be fervent in spirit in prayer. I ask you, then, Lord, incline your ear to me; approve my prayer; enlighten me; kindle me; teach me what I ought to ask; lift up my heart on high, that at last you may hear my supplication. Make haste to rescue me. Shorten the days, hasten the time. So incline your ear to me that I may soon deserve to be heard. For to you, who inhabit eternity, all time is short. For eternity comprehends all at once and immeasurably exceeds the whole of time. But to me any day is long. For time is the number of motion; whoever does not perceive motion does not perceive time either; but whoever perceives motion also perceives time. And he perceives motion most who counts its parts. I, then, because I count the days and hours, perceive time most of all; and therefore, as to you a thousand years are as yesterday that is past, so to me one day is as a thousand years to come. Make haste, then, Lord, to rescue me from my sins and my adversities.

For death is hurrying on and awaits me in every place. Make haste, Lord, lest perhaps, overtaken by it, I have no room for repentance. Rescue me, Lord, from the hand of the evil one; free me from the chains of sin; snatch me from the snare of death; lead me out of the depth of hell; save me from the oppression and hard servitude of Sadness, that my soul may rise and rejoice in you and bless you all the days of its life. Thanks be to you, Lord, through Jesus my Saviour, for according to the multitude of my sorrows in my heart, your consolations have gladdened my soul. I, then, will always hope in you, and will add to all your praise. But you, Lord, incline your ear to me; make haste to rescue me. Alas, wretched me! Behold, Sadness again, equipped with terrible arms! The banner of justice goes before it. An innumerable army follows at its feet; each one has a lance in his hand; I see the instruments of death all around. Woe is me, for I am lost. With a horrible voice it cries, "O wretch, that Hope of yours has deceived you; see, you have laboured in vain. For you said, 'Incline your ear to me; make haste to rescue me.' Has God inclined his ear to you? has your prayer been heard? Where is the deliverance? where the consolation? Has he made haste to rescue you? You are still in chains; nothing has changed for you. If you believe the faith is true, why do you embrace hope alone? Do you not know that God is just? are you ignorant of his justice? He did not spare his angels, he did not pity them, nor will he pity them: for one sin alone they were condemned for ever. Adam sinned, and the justice of God punished the whole race with death. Do you think God does not love justice as he loves mercy? Children dying in original sin will never see the face of God.

"For the justice of God is so severe that, for a sin they did not commit but contracted, they are punished with eternal punishment. And in hell there is no redemption. Do you not know that God does not spare the offender? Did he not in the time of Noah destroy almost the whole human race? Did he not consume Sodom and the other cities joined to it with fire, and did divine justice not have compassion even on infants and the innocent? How often he punished the Jews when they sinned! Did he not utterly overthrow Jerusalem by the hand of Nebuchadnezzar? He did not spare even his own Temple. This was done also by Titus, prince of the Romans, when the Jews were struck with so cruel a punishment that no one can hear of it without dread. But see how hard divine justice is. The sons are punished for the fathers even to this day. See, the Jews are slaves everywhere on earth; and dying in their blindness they are tormented with eternal punishments. Do you think that God's mercy is greater than his justice? In God himself, indeed, neither is greater or less, for whatever is in God is his substance. But let us consider the works of justice and of mercy. Surely the works of justice exceed the works of mercy. God himself is witness, who says, 'Many are called, but few are chosen.' Consider, I beg you, how many unbelievers are damned, how many bad Christians, how few live well, and you will easily understand that the vessels of justice are far more numerous than those of mercy. For the elect of God are vessels of mercy, but the reprobate vessels of justice. Do not let Mary Magdalene make you hope, nor the thief, nor Peter, nor Paul. For Mary was one, the thief one, Peter one, Paul likewise one. Do you think you are to be numbered among the few, you who have committed so many and such great sins, who have been a scandal in the church, who have offended heaven and earth? See, your eye has wept, your heart has implored mercy, and you have not yet obtained mercy.

"So many prayers of those who loved you have not been heard. Why is this? Surely because you are counted among the vessels of justice. That hope of yours has made you labour in vain. Follow my counsel. Heaven spurns you, earth has not received you. Who could endure this great shame? It is better for you to die than to live. Choose death, and if no one inflicts it, lay hands on yourself." This it pressed upon me with wondrous importunity, and its whole army redoubled it with loud voices, saying, "Death alone is your refuge, death alone is your refuge." Hearing this I was terrified, and at once I fell on my face, wailing and saying, "Lord, help me; Lord, do not forsake me. My Hope, come; my Hope, come." Behold, suddenly Hope came down from heaven, shining, and touched my side and raised me, and set me on my feet, and said, "How long will you be a little child? How long will you want to be a raw recruit? So often you have been in battle and walked in the midst of the shadow of death, and you have not yet learned to fight? Do not be troubled by the great justice of God; take courage, faint-hearted one. Let those fear who are not converted to the Lord, who walk in their own ways, who follow vanities, who have not known the way of peace. Let the wicked tremble, who sin and say, 'What have I done?', who do not return to their heart, who are called and refuse to come, who do not know God and will not understand so as to do well. Let these fear. What does the Apostle say? 'It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.' Such men God's justice indeed punishes; men of this kind belong to it. But let sinners who come to themselves, rise, and run to the Father of mercies, saying, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you, but be merciful to me a sinner,' trust in the Lord, for he who drew them will without doubt receive them and justify them.

"Let this Sadness bring forward (if it can) any sinner, however great, who turned to the Lord and was not received and justified by him. For although it is written of Esau, 'He found no place for repentance, though he sought it with tears,' this does not stand against our position, because Esau did not weep for sins committed but for temporal goods lost, which he could not recover. Nor should you think that justice so regards the wicked that it is wholly separated from mercy, or that mercy so regards the righteous that it is cut off from justice. For all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth. For he shows mercy even to sinners, when for the good they do in time he repays them with temporal gifts, and after this life does not punish them as much as they deserve. And he pursues his elect with his justice, when he afflicts them in time for their faults, so that they may not be assigned to eternal punishments. You, then, wait patiently for the Lord meanwhile; for you have sinned; do penance. Let the remission of guilt through his grace be enough for you. My son, do not neglect the discipline of the Lord, nor grow weary when you are rebuked by him. For whom God loves he chastises, and he scourges every son whom he receives. Persevere, then, in discipline; God offers himself to you as to a son. And though the elect are few compared with the reprobate, yet those who are saved are innumerable. Nor is there only one Mary Magdalene, nor only one thief, one Peter, one Paul; for innumerable people have followed in their footsteps, doing penance and received by the Lord, adorned with many and great gifts of grace. Nor is mercy less in its works than justice; for mercy grants such great goods to the righteous that its works immeasurably exceed the works of justice. Do you not know that the earth is full of the mercy of the Lord?

"What creature can boast that it has anything and did not receive it from mercy? And if you have gravely offended God, his mercy is greater than all the sins of the world. Do not be troubled because of the number and gravity of your sins. Has not mercy already run to meet you? Has it not kissed you? See, you fell and were not dashed to pieces. Why? Are you not a fragile vessel, which when it falls must be shattered unless someone puts his hand under it? Why, then, falling, were you not shattered? Who put his hand under you? Who, I say, but the Lord? This is a great sign of your election; for when the elect man falls he will not be dashed down, because the Lord will put his hand under him. Does not the Apostle write, 'For those who love God all things work together for good,' and all things are from God, so that even sin itself works together for good for them? Does not that fall work together for good for them, since by it they are made more humble and more careful? Does not the Lord receive the one who falls, who is received by humility? You loved the Lord for many years; you laboured for love of him. Then you lifted up your heart and walked in the vanity of your mind; the Lord withdrew his hand, and you fell, and went down into the depth of the sea. Nevertheless the Lord's condescension at once put his hand under you, and you were not dashed to pieces. Say, then, 'I was pushed and overturned so that I might fall, and the Lord received me.' Not so the wicked; not so those whom God has rejected. When they fall they will not rise again, but either they excuse their sins out of a harmful shame, or they get a harlot's brow, and now they neither fear God nor respect man. Rise, then, and be of strong heart; take courage and be strong; wait for the Lord and act manfully; let your heart take courage, and wait for the Lord.

"You have proved how your own strength is nothing. Humble yourself, then, now under the mighty hand of God, and be more careful from now on. You have need of patience. Pray without ceasing, and the Lord will hear you at the right time. Rise, then, and drive all sadness from you. Embrace the feet of the Lord, and he will save and deliver you." When she had said this she was caught up into heaven, leaving me strengthened and wonderfully consoled; and following her at once with my whole heart I stood before God, and, falling at the feet of my Saviour, I said with confidence: BE to me a God, a protector, and a house of refuge, to save me; for you are God, greatest and mightiest of all; you are the Redeemer and Saviour of all; you are the protector of your faithful. To you I flee with confidence. Hope has led me in, hope, whom in your kindness you love supremely, whom you have always commended to us; I was not afraid to come before your face with her. I confess I am unworthy, but she drew me. I was afraid to enter because of my many crimes, but she gave me confidence. See, she stands before you; let her bear witness. I will speak to my Lord, though I am flesh and a sinner. Hope taught me, and told me to open my mouth with confidence. "The Lord is sweet," she said; "he will not repel you, he will not be angry; he will gladly hear you; whatever you ask he will give." I believed her; therefore I have spoken. But considering your majesty I was greatly humbled, and I said in my alarm, "Every man is a liar." I will not trust in man for ever, but in you alone, for you alone are faithful in all your words, but every man is a liar. What shall I render to you, Lord, for all that you have rendered to me? I will take the cup of salvation, for from now on I will live not for myself but for you; for love of you I will do good and bear all evils; I will not do this by my own strength, but I will call on the name of the Lord.

I will pay my vows before all your people: precious in the sight of God is the death of his saints. Be to me a God, a protector; defend me from my enemies. My enemies are my sins, which provoke your justice against me. I shall not be able to stand against them unless you protect me. Let your mercy be my shield, Lord; and crown me with the shield of your good will. I have nothing to offer to justice by which I can temper its fury. Everything I carry with me accuses me. I will offer you, then, Lord; do not be indignant, Lord my God; but rather be to me a God, a protector; protect me under your wings, shade me with your shoulders, and under your feathers I will hope. What will justice do to me if you keep me under your protection? It will fall silent, Lord, and will carry the sword of its fury back to its place. It will become gentle, seeing the kindness of your incarnation, beholding the wounds of your passion, seeing the blood of your love. It will depart from me and say, "Rejoice, son; you have found me; eat in peace; in peace sleep and rest." Be to me, then, Lord, a God, a protector, and a house of refuge, so that in the time of rains and storms, in the time of temptations, I may flee to you, for in you alone is my salvation; be to me a house of refuge; open to me your side, pierced by the lance, that I may enter the breast of such great kindness, in which I may be safe from faintness of spirit and from the storm; hide me in your tabernacle; in the day of evils protect me in the hidden place of your tabernacle. Let your ineffable kindness be the house of my refuge, to save me. For I cannot fail to be safe in the house of your refuge: for you have made your refuge most high; this place is fortified; no enemy is feared there; would that I might always remain in it!

Whoever dwells in it cannot be wounded. In every temptation, then, in every tribulation, in short in every need of whatever kind, open to me, Lord, the house of your refuge. Spread out the bosom of your kindness; let the heart of your mercy lie open, to save me. The tempter will not come there, the slanderer will not go up there, the most wicked accuser of the brothers will not reach it; I shall be safe, for already I seem to myself almost safe. Thanks be to you, Lord Jesus, for you have sent your Hope to me, who raised me from the dust and lifted me from the dunghill, and set me before you, that you may be to me a God, a protector, and a house of refuge, to save me. MY SOUL IS TROUBLED. See, Sadness is here; it comes with the banner of justice; it does not withdraw from yesterday's battle, but it is armed with other weapons; for during this night it stole my weapons and girded its soldiers with my swords. Unarmed, then, and weak, what shall I do? See how insolently it shouts, with what force it attacks me, how confident it is of victory! "Where," it says, "is your protector? where the house of refuge, where salvation? Do you still remain in your vain confidence? Those consolations of yours come from imagination; you picture God to yourself as favourable, your protector and your house of refuge, and you think you have climbed into heaven. You are surely deluded by your fantasy and consoled by vain hope. Do you think you have been caught up to the third heaven? These are dreams. Remember, I beg you, how grave a sin ingratitude is. Does it not dry up the fountain of mercy? Remember that the Lord wept over the city of Jerusalem and foretold the evils to come upon it, saying, 'For the days will come upon you when your enemies will surround you with a rampart, and surround you, and hem you in, and dash you to the ground, you and your children within you; and they will not leave in you one stone upon another.'

"And he did not keep silent about the cause of such great evils, but added it, saying, 'Because you did not know the time of your visitation.' See, ingratitude deserves not only to be deprived of a benefit but also to be gravely punished. Does this not apply to the soul? Is not the soul often signified in the Scriptures by Jerusalem? When it will not know the visitation of the Lord, it is surrounded by demons and various temptations, by which, hemmed in, it falls, is dashed to earthly things, and no virtue or good work is left in it that is not destroyed. For it is deprived of all grace, nor will it be restored afterwards, because it did not know the time of its visitation. You surely, you, I say, are this city, adorned by God with many and great benefits, and you did not know them but were ungrateful. He created you in his own image. He caused you to be born in the midst of the church, not among unbelievers. He placed you in a flourishing city; he sanctified you with the water of baptism; he nourished you in a religious house. But you ran after your own thoughts, walked in the vanity of your mind, came into the depth of sins. The Lord called you, and you did not answer him. He often warned you, and you neglected his counsel. How often he enlightened you, how often he turned you to your heart, how often he woke you from sleep; he invited you, and you made excuses; he drew you, and you resisted him. At last ineffable and boundless kindness prevailed: you sinned, and he visited you. You fell, and he raised you. You were ignorant, and he taught you. You were blind, and he enlightened you. From the noise of the world, from the storm of the sea, he led you to the rest and haven of religious life; he gave you the habit of holy living; he willed you to be his priest; he brought you to the schools of his wisdom. Yet you were always ungrateful and did God's work negligently.

"Though you knew that it is written, 'Cursed is he who does the work of God negligently,' not even so did divine kindness leave you; but it always kindly led you on to better things, and, what is greatest, it adorned you with the knowledge of the Scriptures, put the word of preaching in your mouth, and set you as one of the great men in the midst of the people. But you taught others and neglected yourself; you healed others and did not save yourself; you lifted up your heart in your beauty, and therefore you lost your wisdom in your beauty. You have become nothing, and you will be nothing for ever. Do you not know that the servant who knows his master's will and does not do it will be beaten with many stripes? Do you not know that God resists the proud? How you have fallen, Lucifer, who rose in the morning, who wounded the nations, who said in your heart, 'I will ascend into heaven.' But you will be brought down to hell, to the depth of the pit. Under you the moth will be spread, and worms will be your covering. Do you think you will now find mercy, you who have caused so many to stumble, who, called and warned by God so many times, would not answer? Where would God's justice be? where the fairness of his judgment? Mercy does not always follow the sinner; it sets itself limits. Is it not written, 'I called and you refused; I stretched out my hands and there was no one who regarded; you despised all my counsel and neglected my rebukes; I also will laugh at your destruction and mock when what you feared comes upon you'? See, mercy does not always grant pardon to the sinner. Do you not see that the steps of mercy have reached their end in you, who, honoured by God with so many benefits, have fallen into the depth of the sea, who, adorned with so many graces, have been a scandal to the world through your pride and vainglory?"

"So do not let the vain hope you follow deceive you; live from now on as you please; do not be tormented with hellish punishments in this life and in the other. Choose to dwell with those who spend their days in good things and in a moment go down to hell; and let no shame hold you back; put on a harlot's brow; let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die. Your wound is desperate and has become incurable." When it had said this, the whole army howled with terrible voices and repeated its words, saying, "Your wound is desperate and has become incurable." But I, remembering the admonitions of my mother, though somewhat cast down in spirit, raised myself as well as I could, and stood on my feet, lifting my eyes to heaven, from where I awaited help. And behold, Hope, with a cheerful face, adorned with divine splendours, came down from on high and said, "Who is this that wraps up sentences in unskilful words, that has set limits to mercy, that wants to put an end to the infinite, that thinks it can carry the waters of the sea in its hands? Have you not heard the Lord saying, 'On whatever day the sinner groans, I will not remember all his iniquities'? Who is the man who does not sin? who can say, 'My heart is clean'? For the Lord's Prayer applies to all, in which all men are compelled to say, 'Forgive us our debts.' The Lord taught the Apostles to pray in this way: will this prayer then not apply to other men? Did not the Apostles receive the firstfruits of the Spirit? And why did the Lord teach them to pray so, if they had no sin? and if they had, who can boast that he is not a sinner? Hear the beloved disciple of the Lord: 'If we say,' he says, 'that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.'

"The Apostle James says, 'In many things we all offend.' All, then, have sinned, and the holy men of God continually need the mercy of God; for it is written, 'The righteous man falls seven times a day and will rise again.' Mercy, then, has no limits; but as often as the sinner groans, mercy will be at hand. Nor does it matter whether we speak of great or small sins. You have fallen; rise, and mercy will receive you. You have collapsed; cry out, and mercy will come to you. You have fallen again, collapsed again; turn to the Lord, and the heart of his kindness will lie open to you. You have fallen, collapsed, a third and a fourth time; lament, and mercy will not forsake you. As often as you sin, so often rise, and mercy will have no end. Why do you reproach him with the benefits he received, O worst of women, Sadness? Did not David, the greatest prophet, receive great and many benefits, he of whom the Lord said, 'I have found a man after my own heart,' and yet he sinned, and gravely, both in adultery and in the murder of a just and innocent man, and still the Lord did not put an end to his mercy toward him? Why do you bring up the sin of pride? Did not David himself lift up his heart and have the people of Israel counted? For he gloried in his own strength like a great and powerful king, and yet he was not rejected for this. Why? Because he did not hide his sin; he did not proclaim it like Sodom; but he said, 'I will confess my unrighteousness against myself to the Lord.' Mercy, then, has not set limits to itself; but the reprobate set limits for themselves, so that it does not pass over to them; for it goes as far as their borders, but they drive it back. Hence it is written, 'Your destruction is from yourself, O Israel; your help is only from me.' 'Open your mouth,' says mercy, 'and I will fill it; spread out your lap, and I will give you good measure, pressed down and running over.'

"Persist in prayers and weeping, for he who began to love you and to draw you to his love by benefits and graces will not fail, but rather will complete his work. What natural cause begins a work only to stop in the middle of the way? The power of the seed does not cease until the fruit is brought to perfection. What bird leaves its young before they can fend for themselves? Why do they do this? What profit comes to them from it? None at all, only labour. Love, then, compels natural causes to bring their effects to perfection; goodness drives them, which they desire to pour out; for the good is diffusive of itself. If creatures do this, what will the Creator do? For he is love, he is infinite goodness. Will he not complete his work? Hear the Lord Jesus: 'My will,' he says, 'is to do the will of him who sent me, to accomplish his work.' He, then, who began to love you, to draw you by his benefits and graces, to cleanse you from sins, will without doubt complete his work; for these are preparations for eternal life. Why, then, falling now, were you not dashed to pieces? Was it not because the Lord put his hand under you? And why did he put his hand under you? why did he turn your heart to himself? Why did he call you to repentance? Why did he console you? Was it not to cleanse you, and make you worthy of his grace, and lead you to eternal life? These are not illusions or imaginings of yours, but divine inspirations. But suppose they are imaginings. Are they not good? Do they not come from the virtue of faith? Since, then, every good is from God, these imaginings are certainly divine illuminations. Exult, then, in these words." At these words my heart was so strengthened that for joy I began to sing, saying, "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the protector of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" And falling at the feet of the Lord with tears I said, "Lord, though camps be set against me, my heart shall not fear. FOR YOU are my strength and my refuge, and for your name's sake you will lead me and nourish me."