the marvels of divine grace : meditations based on the 'glories of … · 2011. 11. 25. ·...

ST. MICHAEL S COLLEGETORONTO, CANADA

LIBRARY

PRESENTED BY

Rt. Rev. William A. Egan

) (jnj^,"^

j

THE MARVELS OF DIVINEGRACE

Jttlul t)tat.

HENRY G. S. BOWDEN,CENSOR DEPUTATUS.

imprimatur.

EDM. CAN. SURMONT,VICARIUS GENERALIS.

WESTMONASTERII,

Die 1 6 Augustii, 1917.

THE MARVELS OFDIVINE GRACE

MEDITATIONS BASED ON THEGLORIES OF DIVINE GRACE"

(ORIGINAL TREATISE BY FR. NIEREMBERG, S.J.,ENTITLED, "DEL APRECIO Y ESTIMA DE LA

DIVINA GRACIA")

BY

ALICE LADY LOVAT

WITH PREFACEBY THE

RIGHT REV. ABBOT HUNTER-BLAIR, O.S.B.

R. & T. WASHBOURNE, LTD.PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON

AND AT MANCHESTER, BIRMINGHAM, AND GLASGOW

1917 A II rights reserved

MAY 1 5 1953

GPREFACE

^ RACE is a supernatural and spiritualgift gratuitously bestowed by God,and by Him alone, through the

merits of our Redeemer, to guide us tolife everlasting. It is supernatural, becauseit is high above nature, and can come onlyfrom God, enabling us to perform actions

deserving of a heavenly reward. It is

spiritual, because it is inward and invisible.It is bestowed by God alone, inasmuch as"

every best gift and every perfect gift isfrom above, coming down from the Fatherof Lights." And it is given to its throughthe merits of our Redeemer, because He isthe One Mediator between God and man.What does grace do for us ? It elevates

us, from the moment of our baptism,above the natural order on to a planeimmeasurably higher. It lifts us abovenature, even nature the highest and mostsublime, so that it is literally true to saythat the lowest of God s children, in whosesoul His grace resides, is incalculablyabove Angels, Archangels, Cherubim andSeraphim, when considered in their nature

PREFACE

alone, and apart from the grace which hasbeen given to them. Grace makes uschildren of God, brothers of His Divine

Son, living temples of His Holy Spirit*and in very truth (as St. Peter says)"

partakers of the Divine Nature." It

endows us with the keenest spiritualinsight, and makes us in a special way thebeloved friends of God, on whom He lookswith peculiar tenderness, and whom Hewatches over with constant and lovingsolicitude.

"

If men but knew ! " If grace, andthe effects of grace, are what has been

feebly described above, how could anyspiritually minded Christian, meditatingor writing on

"

the things that belong toour

peace," help steeping his mind or his

pen in the marvels of this astonishing giftof God, which is the very keystone of theChristian life ? Yet what are the facts ?One takes up at random a modern

"

Manualof Christian Doctrine," which purports to

expound in many pages perhaps inseveral volumes the complete science ofthe supernatural life : and what does onefind about Divine Grace, its nature, its

effects, its absolute necessity to the soulof man ? Nothing, or very little. It allseems to be taken for granted. Are thereno Pelagians or semi-Pelagians, no Mani-

chaeans, among us to-day ? Their verynames are unknown to the averagetwentieth-century Christian : they are

vi

PREFACE

relegated to the pages of dry-as-dustChurch histories, and not a hint is everdropped that their deadening and soul*destroying heresies are alive still, with a

vitality as persistent as it is poisonous.Are courses of sermons on grace everpreached in English pulpits ? One fearsthat it is a topic too abstract for the

congregations of to-day ; and yet can therebe a subject more practical, more essential,more uplifting, more consoling, moreinspiring, than the marvels of this greatestgift of God to man ?

It is because one is apt to suspect andnot without evidence that this great andvital doctrine is not presented to thefaithful in these days with the prominenceand the persistence which are its due, thatsuch a treatise as that to which thesewords are an introduction is particularlywell timed, and especially welcome.Father John Eusebius Nieremberg, theauthor of the

"

Del aprecio y estima de laDivina Gratia," was the son of a Tyrolesefather and a Bavarian mother

; but hewas born in Madrid, and his upbringingand religious training was in the countryand in the age which produced St. John ofthe Cross, Luis da Ponte, John of Avila,Suarez, Salmeron, Vasquez, and Luis deGranada. One may trace in his writings,of which this is perhaps the most renowned, that combination of solid Teutoniclearning and ardent Spanish faith and

vii

PREFACE

eloquence which distinguish so manyeminent spiritual writers and thinkers ofthe seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.Father Nieremberg was a man of austerevirtue, saintly life, and glowing piety ;and these characteristics shine out con

spicuously in this beautiful treatise. It is

in the section dealing with the effects andfruits of Divine Grace that we see withwhat splendidly tenacious faith he has

grasped the astonishing intimacy whichthe infusion of grace establishes betweenman and his Creator. Some pious writersof our time seem almost to shrink fromthe logical consequences of St. Peter s

triumphant assertion that by grace weare made actual partakers of the DivineNature

"

divinae naturae consortes."

They call it"

amazing" and " wonder

ful"

(as indeed it is), and give the im

pression that such a statement must be,if not explained away, yet very carefullyexplained and duly qualified before it canbe accepted or understood. Our seven

teenth-century Jesuit has no hesitationsof this kind. He takes St. Peter s wordsas axiomatic they are indeed a sort oftext to this part of his treatise and jubilantly exults in their fullest meaning and

significance, basing on them exhortationsand arguments as cogent and convincingas they are eloquent. No one, surely,can read these pages without a stirring ofthe heart, and an uplifting of the soul in

viii

PREFACE

gratitude to God for this wonderful andcrowning gift of His ineffable goodness.The compiler of this English edition of

the"

Aprecio"

has produced a veryattractive volume, which will undoubtedlybe of real service to souls who are inearnest over the work of their perfection.Some of the native charm and fragranceof a Spanish ascetical treatise may possiblyhave evaporated in this English adaptation of the original work. But its solidmerits, based as they are on sound learning and a profound knowledge of thingssupernatural, have safely survived theprocess of translation. Lady Lovat hasclone her work well, and her book is agenuine and welcome contribution to theliterature of the spiritual life.

^ OSWALD, O.S.B., Abb.

Octave of the Ascension,

1917-

IX

"And which of you if he ask his father forbread will he give him a stone, or a fish will he

for a fish give him a serpent ?"

"

If you then, being evil, know how to give

good gifts to your children, how much more

will your Father from heaven give the good

Spirit to them that ask him?" LUKEX!. 11, 13." But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy,

peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longa

nimity, mildness, faith, modesty, continency,

chastity." GAL. v. 22, 23.

XI

CONTENTSCHAP. PAGE

I. ON THE NATURE OF GRACE 3

II. ON THE SUBLIME UNION WITH

GOD TO WHICH WE ARE IN

TRODUCED THROUGH DIVINE

GRACE - 45

III. ON THE EFFECT AND FRUITS OF

DIVINE GRACE 87

IV. ON SOME PREROGATIVES OF

DIVINE GRACE - - 121

Xlll

ON THE NATURE OF GRACE

The

Marvels of Divine Grace

CHAPTER I


THEgrace of God is a ray of Divine

beauty infused from heaven into the

soul of man, and penetrating its

innermost nature with such brilliancyand power that the soul delights

the eyeof God, is most tenderly loved by Him, is

adopted as His child, and is elevatedabove

natural limits from earth to heaven. Bygrace the soul is received

into the bosom

of the Eternal Father, and at the side of

His Son, participates in His nature,His

life and glory, and inherits the realmsof

His eternal happiness.The Angel of the Schools

1 teaches that

the whole world and all it contains is of

less value before God than the grace of a

single man, and St. Augustine maintains

that the whole of heaven, together with

1 Thorn., i, 9, 113, a. 9, ad 2.

3 A

THE MARVELS OF DIVINE GRACE

all Angels, cannot compare with it.1 How

infinitely superior in value, therefore, is

grace to all the riches and pleasures of theworld ! And yet how often do men, morerash and foolish than Esau, lose aninheritance immeasurably greater thanhis for the sake of a momentary enjoyment !

" Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this:and ye gates thereof be very desolate."

2

We disregard grace because we permitourselves to be too deeply impressed byour senses with the transitory things of

this life, and have but a superficial know

ledge of true and heavenly things. Ifwe did but approach the inexhaustiblefountain of Divine grace, we should learnto esteem and admire it, and accordingly,as St. John Chrysostom says, we should

carefully and zealously guard it. Let us,then, with the Divine assistance, begin"

the praise of the glory of His grace"

(Eph. i. 6).

ii

THEleast prerogative of grace is that

it is infinitely above all natural

things." Heaven and earth shall pass

away, according to the assurance of our

Saviour," says St. Augustine,"

but thesalvation and justice of the elect will

remain; for the former contain only the

works of God, the latter the image of1Aug., i ad Bonif., c. 6.

2Jer. ii. 12.

4


God."1

St. Thomas, again, teaches2 that

it is a greater work to bring a sinner backto grace than to create heaven and earth.For the objects of the latter work aretemporary; the former work is so muchgreater because it leads to the participation in the immutable Divine Nature. Increation God erects for Himself a dwellingonly ; in giving man a rational nature Heplaces His servants and His creatures inthis dwelling, but when He gives man Hisgrace He receives Him into His bosom,makes him His child, and communicatesto him His own eternal life.

Again, grace is a gift which no creatednature can possess of itself, or even layclaim to; for it belongs alone, properlyspeaking, to the highest nature of GodHimself. Thus, the greater number oftheologians maintain that God cannotproduce a created being that would fromits nature already possess grace; theyeven say that, if we should suppose sucha creature, it would not differ from GodHimself. The Church accordingly teachesthat neither man nor any other creaturebears in his nature even the least germ ofgrace; and St. Augustine remarks thatnature is related to grace in the same wayas inanimate matter is to living organisms.Lifeless matter cannot itself give life, butmust receive it from another living being.

JAug., tr. 72 in Joannem.

2 Thorn., 2, q. 113, a. 9 in corp.5


In like manner the rational creature has

not of itself any grace, and cannot acquireit by its own labour and merit. God alone

can, from pure love, give this grace by

opening the abyss of His omnipotence,and pouring out His Divine power uponHis creature. Grace is as a heavenly lightwhich diffuses itself from the depths of

the Divinity on the rational creature.

The sun pours down its light on the earth,and our nature, like the earth, receives

the rays of the Divine Sun and becomes

glorified and illuminated by them. Now,as God, whom we possess by grace, not

only contains within Himself the perfection of all things, but is infinitely more

perfect than all things put together,so

grace is more precious than all created

things. To despise these great giftswhich are offered to us by God with suchtender love would be to draw down uponourselves the punishment of the men inthe Gospel, who, having been invited to

the king s banquet, made frivolous excusesto stay away, and brought down his justire upon them. Even if we do not go tothe length of forfeiting all God s favourand His graces by mortal sin, still, what

folly it would be if we abstained from the

opportunities He gives us of increasingtheir precious store ! Even if we do notoffend God by omitting to assist at Masson week-days, or by neglecting an opportunity of prayer, or a work of mercy, or of

6


self-abnegation or mortification, neverthe

less, we suffer an immense loss if wedo not increase this heavenly capital bythese means, because the least degree of

grace is worth more than all the riches ofthe world. We are not required to shedour blood in this labour. One sign issufficient, one earnest resolution, one piouswish

;the holy Name by which we express

our love for Him or invoke His assistance.Who would not gladly invoke Jesus athousand times a day if he could therebyobtain as many coffers of gold ? And yetwhat is gold untold in comparison to the

spiritual treasures which God is preparedto bestow on us by means as simple and

easy as these ?

iii

ST.AUGUSTINE, commenting upon

our Lord s promises to His disciples,that they should do yet greater thingsthan He had done, says this might beexplained by the fact that St. Peter hadhealed the sick by his shadow passing overthem, which we do not read of as happening to our Saviour.

"

But it is moreprobable," he continues,

"

that we are tounderstand here the work of justification,in which we can co-operate for ourselvesand others. For although we do notproduce grace in ourselves, yet we can,with the Divine assistance, prepare ourselves for it and make ourselves worthy

7


of it; may encourage and induce others to

do the same, and thus we shall performgreater works than Christ did throughHis miracles." 1 For His miracles werefor the most part worked on the body andon visible things, but by grace He workson the soul, He elevates it above its nature,implants in it the germ of a supernaturallife, and reproduces, so to speak, Himselfin it by impressing upon it the image ofHis own nature. Accordingly the workof grace is the greatest wonder of God somnipotence. It is greater than thecreation of the world out of nothing, andcan only be compared with the unspeakable act of God the Father in which Heproduced from all eternity His co-equalSon, and in time united with Him a humannature. As supernatural and sublime asis the generation of Christ, so is the in

fusion of grace into our souls, whereby,as St. Leo says, we participate in the

generation of Christ.

In working miracles the Saints do but

co-operate with God, who acts throughand by means of them. But in grace wedo more; for God wills that we shouldwith His assistance prepare our souls for

it, receive it from His hand, preserve,cultivate, and increase it.How wonderful is this favour which

God grants us of taking one soul to Himself as His spouse, that by the power

1 Tr. 72 in Joannem.


received from Him she may produce inherself the image of God and become Hischild ! Equally wonderful is the powerwhich God has granted His Church tocommunicate His grace to her children byher teaching and her sacraments. Nogreater work can be given to man toaccomplish than to labour to acquire andincrease grace in himself and in his fellow-men.Oh if men could only realize the great

ness of the act that is performed when bysincere contrition for their past sins theyabandon their past and begin a new life:"If God has made you man," St.Augustine says,

"

and you, with God shelp, make yourself a just man, yourwork is better than that of God." 1

When our souls are in a state of grace,every degree of grace that we acquireraises us higher above our nature andunites us more closely to God. If wecould reflect how every good work weperform has the power of increasing our

grace, and thus adding to our eternal

happiness, we should let no moment passwithout loving God, adoring Him, and

uniting our acts and intentions with His ;we should even rejoice with the Apostlesthat we are accounted worthy to sufferfor the Name of Jesus.The infusion and communication of

grace is a miracle of the highest order;1 Serm. 15, de verbis Apos,

9


why does it not excite our wonder andadmiration ? Only because it is invisibleto our corporal sight, and does not occur,like other miracles, rarely and exceptionally, but universally and according tofixed laws.

iv

THE gloryof heaven, in which the

blessed see and enjoy God, is nothingelse but the fruition of the grace given tous here below.

Grace is the fountain springing up unto

everlasting life ; it is the root of which theblossom and fruit is beatitude.

" The

wages of sin is death, but the grace ofGod life everlasting," says the Apostle.The Saints have continually been trans

ported out of themselves at the contemplation of the reward which awaited them.St. Isidore wept over the necessity to eat,because he was compelled like animals totake bodily food, whilst he was destinedfor the banquet of the Blessed in heaven.But great as the privilege is of participating with the Saints in glory hereafter,there is yet a greater one. For by graceman participates in the uncreated DivineNature. To speak in more precise terms :man in the state of grace is so superior toall created things because he is so near toGod. He partakes of the prerogatives ofGod as a body partakes of the light andheat of fire in proportion to its proximity

10


to the fire. The Fathers and Doctors ofthe Church are unanimous in ascribingthis meaning to the words of St. Peter,that,

"

by the most great and preciouspromises God hath made us by JesusChrist, we may be made partakers of theDivine Nature." From this we are tounderstand that the prerogatives whichare above all created nature, and are dueto the Divine Nature, are, as far as

possible, communicated to our nature.The Saints cannot find words to express

the magnificence of this gift. St. Denis

says:"

Sanctity, or sanctifying grace, isa Divine gift, an inexpressible copy of thehighest Divinity and the highest goodness,by means of which we enter a Divinerank through a heavenly generation."

1

Many of the holy Fathers teach with St.Thomas that by grace we are in a mannerdeified, and they apply to this mysterythe words of our Saviour:

"

I have saidyou are gods, and all of you sons of themost High."

"

By the union with the Son and theHoly Ghost," says St. Cyril of Alexandria," we all, who have believed and have beenlikened unto God, are partakers of theDivine Nature; not only in name, but inreality, because we have been glorifiedwith a beauty surpassing all createdbeauty. For Christ is informed in usin an indescribable manner, not as one

1 Eccl. hier., c. 2. 2 Centur. cecon., i. 76.II


creature in another, but as God increated nature Christ transforms us, the

creature, by the Holy Ghost into Hisimage, and elevates us to an uncreated

dignity."1

" What is essential and substantial inGod," says St. Thomas,

"

exists in the

soul, which partakes by grace in theDivine love, as a quality superadded toits nature."

2 Elsewhere the AngelicalDoctor, in agreement with St. Basil,

compares the soul to iron, which is initself cold, black and hard, and without

beauty, but when laid in a furnace becomes penetrated by its heat, and, withoutlosing its own nature appears brilliant incolour, flexible, and red-hot. God, weknow, dwells in inaccessible light. He is,to use our human words, a furnace ofDivine love. God thus, in descending tothe creature He has made, or receivinghim into His bosom, can without destroying the nature of man penetrate it withHis Divine light and heat, so that itsnatural lowliness and defects disappear,and it is seemingly absorbed altogetherin God.

THEOLOGIANSsay that a certain

participation in the Divine perfections is found in all things that God hascreated. All things more or less resemble

1 De Trin., i. 4. 2 i, 2, q. no, art. 2, ad 2,12


God in their existence, in their life, intheir force, or activity; so that, as theApostles teach, the invisible glory of Godmay be seen and considered in createdthings. But they differ much in theirsimilarity. In material things we seebut the print of His footsteps. They mayreveal themselves as the work of His hands,but they do not represent His nature.Our souls, and all pure spirits such as theAngels are by their very nature made tothe likeness of the Divine Nature; for likeGod they are spiritual, rational, andpossessed of free will. Yet their natureis finite, they are created out of nothing,and if not upheld by their Creator wouldfall back into nothingness.The participation in the Divine Nature,

therefore, which we enjoy by means ofgrace consists in this, that our natureassumes a condition peculiar to the DivineNature, and becomes so similar to theDeity that, according to the Fathers ofthe Church, it is in a sense deified. Wedo not speak, therefore, of a dissolutionof our substance in the Divine Substanceor of a personal union with it, such asexisted in our Divine Saviour, but onlyof a glorification of our substance into theimage of the Divine Nature. The truthlies in this that we are made by thepower and grace of God something whichGod alone is by nature. We are made toHis likeness in a supernatural manner,


and our soul receives a reflex of that glorywhich belongs to God alone.To understand better this likeness to

God, let us examine in order the prerogatives which distinguish the Divinity from

created natures.Let us first consider the eternal existence

of God.God only exists by Himself eternal,

immutable, and dependent on no one.

Creatures are of themselves nothing ; theyexist only because God has created themand maintains them in existence.

"

I amwho am," saith the Lord. And

"

all

nations are before Him as if they had nobeing at all, and counted to Him asnothing and vanity."

1 All creatures, even

the immortal spirits, would in virtue oftheir nature fall back into nothingness if

not sustained by the will of God and His

good pleasure.Grace therefore, according to St. Paul,

is a new creation, and the foundation of anew indestructible kingdom, by means ofwhich we are received into the bosom ofthe Eternal God by the side of the EternalWord, by whose power the Father hathcreated all things and who is co-eternalwith Him. 2 Thus, we are called to dwellin the tabernacle of God s eternity, at thefountain of all being and of all life. Hereour eternal existence is as secure as that

of God Himself ; here we need fear neither1 Isa. xi. 17.

2 Eph. ii. 10; Heb. xii. 28,


death nor destruction. Were heaven andearth to pass away, the stars to fall fromthe heavens and the powers of heaven tobe moved, we should not be affected,because we rest, far above creatures, in thebosom of the Creator. Hence the Bookof Wisdom says:

"

The just shall live forevermore, and their reward is with theLord; therefore shall they receive akingdom of glory, and a crown of beautyat the hand of the Lord, for with Hisright hand He will cover them, and withHis holy arm He will defend them." 1Our first parents, following the example

of the fallen Angels, willed "to be asGod." Yea, God Himself wills that webe as He; yet not without Him, not outside Him, nor opposed to Him; He willsnot that we should make ourselves asother gods to adore ourselves or beadored. He wills that we be as He, butin His bosom, at His heart. He wills itthrough Himself, and in union with Himas His own Divine Son, who is notanother God, but one God with the Father.What therefore is the folly and crime ofthe sinner, who rejects the infinite goodness and mercy of God and sets up hisjudgment and will in opposition to Him !

1 Wisd. v. 16, 17.


VI

IWILL be as the Most High/ was theaspiration of Lucifer when he looked

upon the glory and beauty with whichhis Creator had adorned him, and becausehe wished to possess this glory independ

ently of God he was condemned. But wecannot give God greater praise and renderthanks more pleasing to Him than byconfessing that by His grace He will makeus similar to Himself. Our Lord tells us :" Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is

perfect;"and though these words are

doubtless to be understood primarily of

moral perfection, they may also beinterpreted to mean that we shall partakeof the other perfections of God. Accord

ingly, the poor man destitute, forsaken,despised by all though he sees himself tobe has no reason to envy the rich mansurrounded by friends. For if he is in astate of grace he has the Son of God forhis friend, the Paraclete abides in him,

and he is a sharer in the riches of theEternal Father; for Christ has said:

" The

kingdom of God is within you."But you will answer:

"

All these gloriesare hidden from me, and of what use is atreasure to me if I do not enjoy it ?"True, it is kept from us during our mortal

life; for, as St. John says: "We are nowthe sons of God, but it hath not yet

16


appeared what we shall be when we shallsee God as He is." As long as the sightof God is withheld from us we cannot seethe image of His Divine Nature in us.Grace is, so to speak, the dawn of the lightof the Divine Sun, which, when it risesupon us in the everlasting day, will penetrate us with its glory and its heat. Untilthen we must, in the words of the Apostle,walk by faith and not by sight, trustingin God s unfailing promises. For

"

byfaith," says St. Peter,

" we are kept untosalvation, ready to be revealed in the lasttime at the appearing of Jesus Christ."

1

And by Him we have the lively hope of"

an inheritance incorruptible and un-defiled, and that cannot fade, reserved inheaven for us." In grace we have thepledge ay, the root of our futureglorification in soul and body. If youstill sigh in the servitude of the flesh, if

you feel depressed by suffering and trials,sigh with the Apostle for your true homewhere the mercies of God will be revealedto you.

vii

MAN,inasmuch as he is a reasonable

being, bears some resemblance to, but the distance between his nature

and that of God is no less than infinite.God therefore can only be seen at animmeasurable distance. " Every one

1 i Pet. i. 5. 2 T pet j 417


beholdeth Him afar off." Creatures onlysee as it were, the hem of His garment,the reflex of His glory in His great

and

glorious creation;He Himself, the in

visible King of Ages, whom no man hath

seen nor can see, inhabiteth light inacces

sible,"1

says the Apostle.Even the

Cherubim cover their faces and sink

prostrate before Him,in the deepest

reverence. God Himself alone can byHis nature behold His being; only

the"

only begotten Son who is in thebosom

of the Father," and is of the same nature

with Him, beholds Him face to face; onlythe Holy Spirit, who is in God, penetratesand fathoms His innermost nature. To

behold God, we must either be God or

participate in the DivineNature. Thus,

the spiritual sightof man must become

in a sense Divine, and his soul partake of

the Divine Nature, if he will see God face

to face; and this the Holy Spirit effectsin

us when by grace He makes us partakeol

the Divine Nature. For what else is the

meaning of these words:"

Beholding the

glory of the Lord with open face,we are

transformed into the same image from

glory to glory, as by the Spirit(rf the

Lord "? 2 St. John teaches likewise:We

shall be like to God, because we shall see

Him as He is." 3 Our Lord also at the

Last Supper addressed HisFather thus:

i i Tim. vi. 16.2 2 Cor. iii. 2.

3 i John iii. 2.

18

ON THE NATURE OF GRACE"

Father, the glory Thou hast given Me,which I had with Thee before the worldwas, I have given to them."

1 In heavenwe shall, moreover, know God as Heknows Himself, and as He knows us." Then I shall know," exclaims the Apostle,"

even as I am known." 2 But it isimpossible, as a holy doctor of the Churchurges, that we should have a knowledgewhich is peculiar to the Divine Nature ifwe were not really made to participate init; for the vision of God could not becommunicated to us unless we weredeified.

3

Truly we are forced to exclaimwith St. Peter: "God has called us intoHis marvellous

light."

Providence has implanted in our heartsa great thirst for knowledge and truth,but this knowledge and this truth can onlybe found in Him that is by revelation,or the teaching of His Church. He Himself introduces us into His admirable

light."

In Thy light we shall see light,"says the Psalmist. Only in His ownlight, and not in our light, can we see God.

If, then, we experience, in common withevery child of Adam, an inexpressibledesire for the perception of truth and theenjoyment of the beautiful, why do wenot seek to satisfy it at its Source ? Thatis, in God. The light of grace will introduce us to the light of God. In heaven

1 John xvii. 22. 2 i Cor. xiii. 12.3Dionys. Areop., Vulg de eccl. hier., c. i. 83

19 B


He will manifest to us His own beauty,in the enjoyment of which He, with theSon and the Holy Ghost, is happy forever and ever : that beauty which unitesin itself all the possible and imaginablebeauties of His works with all theirwonderful diversity; that beauty whichthe Angels behold and can never tire of,and one ray of which is enough to intoxicate all created beings with joy unspeakable.

"

My face hath sought Thee," we shouldsay with the Psalmist : Thy face, O Lord,will I still seek." If we love Him, in ourmeasure and degree, as He loves us, thenwe shall know Him as we are known.

"

I cannot express, O my God," saysSt. Anselm,

" how happy Thy elect willbe; certainly they will rejoice according tothe measure of their love, and they willlove after the measure of their knowledge.But how great will be their knowledge,and how great their love ! Certainly noeye has seen, nor ear heard, nor has itentered in this life into the heart of man,how much they will know, and love Theein the world to come. I beseech Thee, OGod, that I may know Thee, love Thee,rejoice in Thee; and, if I cannot do so

perfectly in this life, that I may at leastprogress from day to day until I arrive atthis perfection. Let my knowledge ofThee progress here, and be perfect there ;let my love increase here, and become

30


perfect there, that my joy may be greatin hope here, and perfect in possessionthere. O Lord, Thou biddest andcounsellest us to ask through Thy Son,and dost promise that our joy will be full.I beseech Thee, then, O true and faithfulGod, grant that our joy may be complete.May in the meantime my soul consider it,my tongue speak of it, my heart love it.May my spirit hunger for it, my fleshthirst for it, my whole being desire it,until I enter into the joy of the Lord,who as the Triune God be blessed forever."

1 Amen.

viii

AMIDSTall the glories which sur

round God in heaven, there is onewhich attracts the enraptured praise of the

seraphim more than any other, and thatis His sanctity:

"

Holy, holy, holy, LordGod of Sabaoth," is their unceasing cry.Accordingly, we shall be perfect partakersof the Divine Nature only when, by the

grace of the Holy Spirit, we participate inits sanctity ; and the Fathers of the Church

identify this partaking of the DivineNature with being holy as God is holy.They compare the sanctity of God with agreat and potent fire which penetratesour imperfect nature, transforms andcleanses it from all dross and stain, sothat our goodness becomes like to the

1 Anselm, in Proslog., sub finem.

21


Divine." Even the princes and powers

of heaven/ says St. Basil,"

are not bynature holy. The iron lying in thefurnace does not lose the nature of iron,vet by its contact with the fire it becomes

fiery itself and penetrated by the fire, sothat it assumes its heat and brilliancy.So the souls of Angels and of men have bytheir vision with God, the essentiallyHoly One, this sanctity implanted intotheir being, with this difference only : thatthe Holy Ghost is by nature holiness,whilst their holiness is a participation of

His sanctity."1

This term, therefore, of sanctifying

grace is one of deep significance. It not

only implies that by grace we obtainforgiveness of sin, but still more that oursoul is made an image of the Divinegoodness and sanctity. It further signifiesthat grace is irreconcilable with sin, andcannot exist in the same soul with it. Ifwe commit a mortal sin, our naturalfaculties and the light of reason are not

thereby destroyed; but grace and its

accompanying virtues instantly departfrom our souls; for grace, being of Divinenature and origin, can co-exist with sinas little as God Himself. When grace,accordingly, has terminated in the lightof glory, and has perfectly united oursouls with God, and made them like toHim, then we shall lose even the ability

1 Basil, Contra Eunom., b. iii.22


to commit sin, by its inherent Divinevirtue; we shall be as incapable of committing sin as God Himself.

IX

T3 Y grace, as we have seen, manX3 receives a participation of the DivineNature; he is thus endowed with a newnature, and lays aside his former one.This St. Paul describes as a transformation.You are," he says,

"

transformed intothe image of God, from glory to glory ";

L

for by it we are created anew, and receivea new being of which our natures did notcontain so much as a germ before. St.Cyril of Alexandria speaks of this recreation in the following terms:

"

If wehave once taken leave of the life of thesenses, is it not evident by this surrenderof our former selves and union with the

Holy Spirit that we are changed into aheavenly image, and transformed, to acertain extent, into another nature ? Wecan then, with justice, be called, not menonly, but children of God, having becomeparticipants in the Divine Nature.

"-

What has been said of a transformationof one nature does not mean that ournatural substance is destroyed, or absorbedin the Divine Substance, which would bea grave error. Yet it would not be suffi-

1 2 Cor. iii. 18.2 In Joannem, i., ii., c. 12, ad 27.

23


cient to say that grace makes us newmen in the sense in which a change ofdisposition or the acquirement of newhabits makes us new men.The change wrought by grace comes

from God, not from the will or power of thecreature. It is a miracle of the Divine

Omnipotence which lifts us into a highersphere, far above human limitations, andso transforms us that we are not onlychanged men, but we also appear as beingsof a Divine nature or kind.The Fathers of the Church again make

use of the illustration of the iron which istransformed by heat without changingits substance

;and this is one which lends

itself, perhaps, more than any other to

explain the change which takes place inour souls by means of Divine grace. Asthe defects and imperfections of iron areburnt up and destroyed when it is plungedinto a furnace, and yet its substanceremains the same, in a similar manner, St.

Cyril teaches, we do not put off the substance of our nature, but only its lowliness and defects.

Elsewhere he compares it to a vesture,and says:

"

Those who are called by thefaith of Christ to the sonship of God havedeposed the lowliness of their own nature,and, glorified by the grace of God andadorned with it as with a precious garment,are raised to a supernatural dignity."

1

1 In Joannem, i. i. 14.24


We lose nothing by sanctifying grace thatwe have hitherto possessed; rather do wereceive what was hitherto wanting to us;according to the word of St. Paul,

" Wewould not be unclothed, but clothed upon ;that that which is mortal may be swallowedup by life."

1 The garment of grace isnot only superadded to the soul, as raimentis to the body; it likewise invests and

penetrates the soul in the same way as theglow of fire penetrates the iron which issubmitted to its heat.

By nature a man is a servant of God;by grace he is made His child. Heascends a step in the ladder of beings, is

placed in a new relation to God, to hisfellow-men, and to corporal things, andenters a new sphere of life, one which isheavenly rather than earthly. Man inhis natural state is composed of twonatures a corporal and a spiritual.Again, there are in him two men, an outward and inward man, to whom theApostle gives the name of

"

a mortal andan immortal man." 2 Since we cannotserve both natures at the same time, wemust subject the corporal to the spiritual.But as the flesh should serve the spirit, soshould our spirit serve God and His grace ;for as the spirit is superior to the flesh, sois grace superior to the spirit. If the

spirit subjects itself to the flesh, it isdrawn down to the level of the flesh and

1 2 Cor. v. 4.2 2 Cor. iv. 16.

25


becomes carnal itself; but if it gives itselfup to grace, and is penetrated and movedby it, it becomes in a measure Divine." Who loves earth," says St. Augustine,"

is of earth; who loves the world is of theworld; who loves God, what shall I say,brethren ? Not I, but the word of Godwill tell you. Who loves God becomesGod : I have said ye are gods and sonsof the Most High.

" 1

In the same measure in which we cooperate with grace, and tend towards theAuthor of grace, the Father of light, weare filled with His light and glory andpartake of His nature. Lest, however,we should forget, as Lucifer and our firstparents forgot, that of ourselves we arenothing, and that we owe all we possessto the goodness of God, He has given us apowerful reminder in the

"

sting of ourflesh," for our chastisement, our confusion,and our wholesome humiliation. Buteven this knowledge of our weakness andthe lowliness of our origin should not robus of the sense of our heavenly dignity.For with the Apostle we may say:

"

I

glory in my infirmities, that the power ofChrist may dwell in me. For whichcause I please myself in my infirmities... for when I am weak then am Ipowerful."

2

1 John x. 34. 2 2 Cor. xii. 9, 10.


RACE enables the soul to raise itselfVjrfar above its natural limitations, tobehold God in His infinite nature, topossess and enjoy Him. How could it dothis if it did not contain something of theinfinite power of God ?

All created natures have a circumscribed and distinctly definite limit beyondwhich they cannot rise or increase, without changing their nature. Grace aloneknows no such restrictions

;it is bound by

no limits. Being a ray of the Divinenature glorifying our soul, it has itsmeasure and end only in the infinity ofGod. It may increase daily and hourly,and incessantly grow richer, greater, andnobler

;it never transgresses its appointed

limits, because it has none; it alwaysremains grace, and is always a participation of the Divine Nature; yet it alwaysbecomes more and more what it is destinedto be. St. Thomas says that

"

nothingis able to set limits to supernatural love

[and the same may be said of grace],since it has its origin in the infinite powerof God, and is itself nothing else but aparticipation in the sanctity of God."

1

Certainly, the vessel which receives it isnarrow and limited, but grace extendsthe capacity of our nature, and every

1 Thorn. 2, 2, qu. 24, a. 7.27


measure of grace received qualifies it fora still greater measure; every degree of

grace is a step leading to the next degree,so that the farther one progresses the

higher is our ascent.

Every degree of grace is in itself infinitelyvaluable, more precious than all created

things in heaven and earth, a treasure forwhich we should, with the Apostle,

"

countall things lost that we may gain Christ

"

and His grace. Every supernatural action

performed in the state of grace, everymoment utilized and made to bear fruit,merits another increase of grace fromGod

;and it rests only with man to double

this grace again in a short time, and the

greater this increase of grace the greateralso the merit of our works.

Grace gives an immense scope to ouraims and desires, and yet leaves them thefreest possible play. We have only todesire it in order to obtain it, and only tolove its donor to receive it. By thisardent desire for grace, and of the love ofour heavenly Father, we acquire all goodgifts, and that according to the measureof our love and desire. Why do we notmanifest a holy eagerness to possess our

selves of these treasures, and like St. Paul,forgetting the things that are behind,"

stretch forth to those that are before,to the prize of the supernal vocation of

God in Christ Jesus "P1 Oh that we were

1 Phil. iii. 13, 14.

28

ON THE NATURE OF GRACE"

as eager to lay up treasures in heaven aswe are to add to our possessions herebelow ! The desire to acquire money isa source of endless disquietude, but a

holy thirst for Divine grace leads us to aneternal rest in God, who will satisfy usthe more in proportion to the greater loveand desire we have had for Him on earth.Grace, moreover, permits us to enjoy our

possessions on the way to that end, becauseat every step we make in our upwardascent we experience more and more howsweet is the Lord to those who serveHim and are of a right heart.

XIr

I "^HE two great mysteries of the

J[ Christian faith the Incarnation ofthe Word and the Divine maternity ofMary reveal the greatness of thetreasures of grace in a still stronger light,for in a very real sense it may be fitlycompared with them.

" Which is the more adorable mystery,"says St. Peter Chrysologus,

"

that Godgave Himself to the earth, or that Hegives you to heaven ? That He Himselfenters into such intimate union with ourflesh, or that He introduces us to companionship with the Godhead ? That Heis born like us to servitude, or that Hegenerates us as His free-born children ?That He adopts our poverty, or that He

29


makes us His heirs and the co-heirs ofHis only begotten Son ? Certainly, it ismore astounding and worthy of praisethat earth should be transferred to heaven,man should be transformed by the Deity,and the rank condition of slavery receivethe rights of dominion."

1

Again, thesame writer says:

"

So great is the Divinecondescension towards us that the creatureknows not which to admire more, thatGod has descended to our servitude, orthat He has transported us to the Divinedignity."

2

Therefore the Church makes the priestsay daily in the Mass,

" O God, let uspartake of His Divinity, who has deignedto partake of our humanity;" and this

equalization, this balance between thehumiliation of God and the elevation ofman by grace, has so deep a reason thatthe holy Fathers teach that the Son ofGod was made man on account of grace,to elevate us by grace.

" God was mademan that man might be made God," saysSt. Augustine;

"

the Son of God was madethe son of man that the children of manmight be made children of God."

3 Andthis doctrine is contained in the words ofthe Apostle:

" God sent His Son made ofa woman . . . that we might receive theadoption of sons."

4 St. Fulgentius givesa beautiful explanation of this passage:

1 Homil. 67. 2 Ibid., 72.3Aug., Siren., 13.

4 Gal. iv. 4.

30

ON THE NATURE OF GRACE" God was born of man that man mightbe born of God. The first birth of Christas the Son of God was of God, the secondof man. Our first birth is of man, oursecond of God. And because God to beborn of woman adopted the reality of theflesh, He has given us at our regenerationin Baptism the spirit of sonship. WhatChrist was not by nature at His firstbirth, that He was made at His secondbirth by grace, that we might also be madeby the grace of the second birth what wewere not by nature of the first. God,however, has brought us grace when Hewas born of man; we, on the other hand,receive grace gratuitously, that by thegift of the Incarnate God we mightpartake of the Divine Nature."

1If, then,

the condescension of God in His Incarnation appears to us inconceivably greatas great as is the infinite distance between God and the creature must notthe elevation of man to God, which is itscause and reason, likewise astound usalmost in the same measure and degree ?The humanity of Christ may be con

sidered not only in its personal unionwith the Son of God, but also in regard tothe qualities which it received on accountof its Divine dignity; and here again thegreatness of grace is made manifest.God in all His wisdom and power couldgive the human soul of His Son no more

1Ep. 17, sive lib. ad Petr., cap. 7, nn. 14, 15.

31


worthy condition than that whichour

soul receives by grace; for it is the sub

limest that can be found in a creature.

One distinction only is there between the

soul of Christ and our own. The soul of

the Son of God has every claim and rightto grace, merits it instead

of receiving it

as a gratuitous gift; it likewisereceives

grace directly and in exceedingabund

ance, and can in no wise lose it. Our soul

receives grace as a gratuitous gift through

Christ, in a limited measure, and mayeasily lose it by sin.

Again, the Divine dignitywhich the

humanity of Christ receives throughthe

personal union with the EternalWord is

reflected upon all the members of humankind. As that humanity was made the

true Body of Christ, so all regeneratedmankind was made the mystical Body of

Christ. Christ is indeed the Head, and

we are His members. Inasmuch as weare one with Him, we enjoy already, apartfrom grace, a certain supernatural dignity ;

and as He had a right to grace, so we ac

quire a right to it through Him. By Himmankind appropriates grace, and possessesit as something which is due to it on

account of its Head. Christ is the

heavenly Vine permeated by the fulness

of Divine life, and we are the branchesinto which this life is diffused.

" O Christian soul," St. Leo exclaims,"

acknowledge your dignity; know that as

32


a Christian you surpass the Angels notonly in nature, but also in grace ! Forthe Angels are kindred to God by one tieonly, because they partake of this DivineNature; you, however, in a twofoldmanner, because God has also adoptedyour nature. If these pure and holyspirits were capable of envy, they wouldenvy us because God hath taken uponHimself the nature, not of Angels or Arch-

angels, but of the seed of Abraham." 1"

Very foolish," says the venerablemonk Job,

"

are they who would ratherbe Angels than men." For although theAngels are not subject to tribulations anddeath, yet they have not the Son of Godfor their Brother, nor have they thesupreme consolation and honour of uniting, and sharing even by this means, theirlabours and sorrows with Him.By Holy Baptism we are incorporated

into the mystical Body of Christ; and intoken of this union, and as a pledge of it,we receive the sacramental character bywhich we are made Christ s and He becomes ours. Moreover, we are, as it were,Christ Himself Totus Christus," asSt. Augustine calls us, inasmuch as we,the Body, and Christ the Head, form awhole. The character is indelible in oursoul, and gives us, as long as we live, aright to the grace of God; for the Body ofChrist must also be filled by Christ s life

1 Heb. ii. 16.-

33


of glory. But this right belongs to us

only as long as we fear Him and keep Hiscommandments,

"

for this is all man."

Xll

TN the mystery of the Incarnation, a1^human nature only is elevated to a

Divine dignity. The Divine maternity,however, is a supernatural dignity whichwas communicated to a human person :it is therefore more easily compared withthe dignity granted to us by grace. Thefirst truth we have to keep in mind is thatin Mary grace cannot be separated fromher Divine maternity. This is the signification of the dogma of the ImmaculateConception namely, that it cannot be

supposed that the Mother of God was evenfor one moment despoiled of His grace." God is inseparably united with her,"is an axiom laid down by the holy Bishopand Martyr Methodius in the third century.Because she communicated her humannature to the Son of God, she has a rightas none other has ever had to the participation in His Divine Nature by grace.As Mother she forms one person, as itwere, with her Son. His rights are her

rights, His gifts hers, His sanctity her

sanctity. She is the woman seen by St.John in his revelations

"

clothed with the

sun, and the moon under her feet." 11-Apoc. xii. i.

34


The grace, therefore, that filled her soulhas this prerogative above that of all other

creatures, that it is especially due to heras the grace of her Divine Son is due toHim. As it is said of her Son that He isfull of grace and truth, so she is called bythe Angel, not only blessed with grace,but full of grace. As Christ is the onlybegotten Son of the Father, so is MaryHis first-born daughter. . But apart fromthis august union, and considering thematernal dignity of Mary alone, we maysafely assert that grace is a greater gift,and confers a higher dignity than that holyoffice itself. As Mother of God accordingto the flesh, Mary ranks high above all

creatures; but she would rather be a

daughter of God by grace than the Motherof God by nature : for she well knows that,notwithstanding the incomparable filiallove which Jesus bears for her, He wouldnevertheless love another soul more if thissoul were richer in grace.

It was this great truth which Christ intimated to His disciples when they cameto tell Him His Mother awaited Him:" Who is My mother, and who are Mybrethren ? And, stretching forth Hishands towards His disciples, He said:Behold My mother and My brethren.For whosoever shall do the will of MyFather who is in heaven, he is My mother,and sister, and brother." 1 And again

1 Matt. xii. 48-50.

35 c


when, in answer to the woman who criedout,

"

Blessed is the womb that bore thee,and the breasts that gave thee suck !"He said,

"

Yea, rather, blessed are theywho hear the word of God and keep it."

1

By these words our Lord intends us tounderstand that His Mother was blessedand worthy of Him for that reason: because she performed the will of His Fatherin the most perfect manner, and that ifanother could have exceeded her in this

respect He would honour her more thanHe did His own ever-blessed Mother.As Mother of our Saviour in the flesh,

she gave birth to Him according to theflesh; but by receiving the Word of Godinto her soul she conceived and broughtforth her Son spiritually; she was clothedwith the splendour of His Divine Nature,and thus entered into a heavenly relation

ship with Him. Thus, St. Augustinesays:

" The maternity would have profitedthe Virgin nothing if she had not borneChrist still more happily in the spirit thanshe bore Him in the flesh." By grace weare made to resemble in a marvellousmanner the Mother of God ; for we imitatein ourselves the maternity of Mary by thereception of grace. The same HolySpirit that descended into the bosom of

Mary to confer on her a holy fertilitydescends also into our soul to generate ina spiritual manner the Son of God. As

1 Luke xi. 27, 28.

36


the Blessed Virgin, by lending a willingear to the Angel and fulfilling the will of

God, was made the Mother of the Son inthe flesh, and in the spirit, so must we

give birth spiritually to the Son of God byfaithfully receiving the Word of God andcorresponding to His grace and His commands. Penetrated with the greatnessof God s mercies to us, should we not, then,join in Mary s great hymn of thanksgiving:

"

My soul doth magnify the Lord,and my spirit rejoiceth in God mySaviour; for He that is mighty hath donegreat things for me."

Mary is not our Mother according toour human nature, as this we receivedfrom Eve, and not from Mary. She isour Mother in so far as we are the brethrenof her Divine Son, and are the livingmembers of His Body. She is our Motheraccording to grace, by which we have received a new heavenly nature, and partakeof the nature of her Son ; and therefore asGod alone can be our Father by grace, soour Mother by grace can be no other thanthe Mother of God.How highly should we value this privi

lege, and how careful should we be lestby the loss of grace we go over from her toher enemy, and the enemy of her adorableSon!

37


Xlll

ONEthing yet remains to be said to

prove the unspeakable value of gracein the sight of God ; and that is the infinitevalue of the price God Himself paid forit. What could He have done more thanHe has done to procure it for us ? For in

purchasing grace for mankind He has notspared His only begotten Son.Even the human life of the Son of God

is a Divine life, on account of the infinite

dignity of His person, and can only besacrificed for the sake of another Divinelife. Neither heaven nor earth, with allthe splendour and countless number of

beings they contain, was worthy to be

bought and saved by the life of the Sonof God, or even by a tear or a drop of Hisblood. And yet theologians say that theSon of God would not have become manand died in vain, should He have acquiredgrace for one soul only. By sacrificingHis life for us, the Son of God would haveus understand that by so doing He haspurchased for us the life of children of

God, and that the grace that adorns oursoul possesses a value as infinitely greatas that of His own precious blood. Forif His corporal life is of infinite dignity,because it belongs to a Divine Person, thelife of grace is of equal value, because it

makes us partakers of the Divine Nature.

38


Man by the sins of his first parents lostthe grace which God in His infinite lovehad originally bestowed upon him. Inorder to recover it for him, God, withequal or even greater love, Himself becameman, to restore to mankind the dignitythey had forfeited and to bring them backto His paternal bosom. Behold, the Sonof man descends from the highest heavensand is made flesh, suffers the torments ofthe Passion, and dies on the Cross; and allthis He undergoes for love of us, and toacquire that grace which the world esteems so lightly. Nor did He believe Hepurchased it too dearly even at such aprice. If, then, the Son of God, who inHis unspeakable wisdom estimates allthings according to their true value,would purchase grace so dearly for us,how grieved we should be to lose it !Or, rather, should we not look upon sucha loss as the greatest misfortune whichcould possibly befall us ?

It did not satisfy Christ merely to takeupon Himself our nature and die for us;for thirty-three years He laboured andsuffered for us. All His actions had aninfinite value; accordingly, by one dropof His precious blood, one action of His,He might have merited grace again for us.But, to make us fully aware of the infinitevalue of grace, He would show that evena God-man could not do and suffer toomuch for it. Therefore He suffered alJ

39


that man could suffer: He fasted fortydays ; He endured His agony in the Garden,the scourging at the pillar, the torments of

the Cross, in order to raise us to the throne

of grace and fill us with Divine life. Inthe light of our Saviour s toils and anguish,should we not understand that all sacrifices we are called upon to make for thesake of grace are nothing compared to itsinfinite value ? If we had to suffer allthat Christ suffered, and to endure thetorments of hell, we could not merit theleast degree of grace. What limit shouldthere be, accordingly, to our gratitude to

Him for having earned for us what wecould not possibly have earned for our

selves, and what is of such priceless valueto us ?Nor is this all that Christ has done for

us to propagate the blessings of Divine

grace. At the Last Supper He instituteda sacrifice and sacrament which contains

nothing less than His own precious Bodyand Blood, which are the wellsprings ofall grace. Not satisfied with being bornfor us in the stable of Bethlehem, Hecomes again daily in ten thousand churchesall over the world, at the word of the

priest, to give Himself to all who ask toreceive Him. His love induces Him toexpose Himself to the insults of the irreli

gious who receive Him sacrilegiously, andthe neglect of the indifferent and luke

warm; and thus He again proves that40


there is no sacrifice He is not willing tomake to increase Divine grace in the soulsof the children of men. The words ofthe Apostle put these great truths beforeus in the most forcible terms:

" Know younot that you are not your own ? for youare bought at a great price. Glorify andbear God in your body."

1

To conclude, grace is held in such highregard by God that He would rather thatevery evil should fall upon man, and thatthe world should be thrown into confusion,than permit the loss of grace. Thus,have we not all heard, or read in history,of fearful epidemics, of wars and earth

quakes which have destroyed flourishingcommunities and converted smiling landsinto deserts ? Of persecutions wagedagainst the just in which the sinner

appears to triumph ? All these evils, forwhich many men blame Divine Providence,are permitted by God because temporalmisfortunes are as nothing to Him compared to the loss of grace, which thesetrials are intended to convey to man, orwhich is preserved to him by means ofthem. Grace is the pearl of great price,and, like the man in the parable, weshould willingly part with all we possess,and even submit to every earthly trialwhich can befall us, rather than partwith it.

1 Cor. vi. 20.

ON THE SUBLIME UNION WITHGOD TO WHICH WE AREINTRODUCED THROUGH DIVINE GRACE

CHAPTER II

ON THE SUBLIME UNION WITH GODTO WHICH WE ARE INTRODUCED

THROUGH DIVINE GRACE

INthe preceding chapter we have seen

how sanctifying grace makes us partakers of the Divine Nature. We

shall now consider the intimate unionwhich is thereby effected between thesoul and God.

In the words of Scripture and theFathers of the Church, the Holy Spirit is

generally designated as that Person withwhom we are specially united by grace.For the Holy Spirit, as the Third Personof the Blessed Trinity, stands, as it were,on the boundary of the Blessed Trinity;therefore the union of God with the creature is primarily attributed to Him. Heis also the personal representative of the

Divine Love from which He proceeds.Since therefore the union of God with thecreature is effected by His love, and ourunion with God in this life consists principally in our love for Him, it is evident

45


why it is the Holy Spirit who representsin this respect the Blessed Trinity.The Holy Ghost, accordingly, comes to

us with grace, He gives us Himself ingrace, and He really and essentially dwellsin us in an unspeakably intimate manner

by grace.The Holy Spirit it is who, in the words

of the Apostle,1 transforms us by His

power into the image of God. In this Hedoes not act like the sun, which lights upthe earth with its rays from a distance,because as God He must be present where-ever He acts. He illuminates our soullike a light that is placed within a crystalglobe. Or, to use another figure, He isthe seal by which God impresses upon oursoul the image of His holiness and DivineNature. In giving us His grace the HolySpirit gives us Himself, as St. Paul says:The charity of God is poured forth into

our hearts by the Holy Ghost, who isgiven to us."

2

"

By sanctifying grace," we learn fromSt. Thomas,

"

the rational creature isthus perfected, that it may not only usewith liberty the created good, but that it

may also enjoy the uncreated good; andtherefore the invisible sending of the HolyGhost takes place in the gift of sanctifyinggrace at the same time that the DivinePerson is given us."

3

1 2 Cor. iii. 18. 2 Rom. v. 3.3 I. p. g, q. 33, art. 2.

ON THE SUBLIME UNION WITH GOD

By grace, therefore, we are not onlyqualified to know, love, and enjoy Godfrom afar mediately, by the beauty andgoodness of His creatures, but to possessHim immediately in His substance. Astheologians for the most part teach, with

regard to the beatific vision, that itcannot be imagined without a true and

exceedingly intimate presence of God inour soul, so we must likewise hold thatwe cannot love God in this life with asupernatural love unless He is intimatelyunited to us and present in our soul.

In a twofold manner, then, and from atwofold cause, we are truly and reallyunited to the Holy Spirit by grace.First, as the Author of grace, He comes tous with grace, and unites Himself with us,and again grace conducts us to Him andunites us with Him. The Holy Spirit,and the Divinity itself, is present, also,in all natural things; but in creatures Heis present as their Creator only, withoutwhom they cannot exist, but in the soulspossessed of grace He is present as theirSanctifier. He gives Himself to them anddiscloses to them the depths of His ownBeing. He is in them in the same wayas God the Father is in His only begottenSon.

Although the Holy Ghost dwells in thewhole created nature as in a vast temple,as the Scriptures say of Him,

" The Spiritof the Lord hath filled the whole world,"

47


yet He dwells in a special manner in thesoul adorned by grace. Suarez says:

"

If

God should cease to be present in othercreatures, He would not cease to be inthe souls that are in a state of grace, anymore than He would thereby separateHimself from the humanity of Christwhich is united with Him in one person.Therefore, if all creation is His temple,the soul is His altar; if that is His house,this is His innermost chamber. . . .

Shall I say even more ? In the soul whichis in a state of grace the Holy Spirit isas intimately present as the soul is presentin the heart, of which it is the principleof life and action." 1

The Holy Spirit does not come to us asa passing guest. Our Saviour prayed forus to the Father that He might send usthe Paraclete, the Spirit of Truth, to abide

with us for ever. Never will He leaveus unless we ourselves expel Him from ourhearts. If Zaccheus called himself blessedbecause he received for a short time the

Son of God under his roof, how much moreshould we rejoice at the intimate presenceof the Holy Spirit of God, who comes totake possession of our souls to abide there

for ever !

The Holy Ghost brings with Him agreat treasure, which is Himself; and Heis the pledge of an eternal one. ForSt. Paul says: "He is the pledge of our

1 Suarez, de Tri., lib. 12, p. 5.

48

ON THE SUBLIME UNION WITH GOD.

inheritance."1 As this inheritance is none

other than God Himself, the pledge for itcan be no other than God. For only aDivine pledge can secure us a Divine in

heritance, and give us a foretaste of the

enjoyment of God. Oh, how insensibleare we of the value of this treasure, andof the living hope this pledge gives us !The Spirit of Divine charity can only be

perceived and enjoyed in the measure inwhich we receive His love. The more welove Him, the nearer He approaches usand we experience His heavenly sweetness,the stronger will our desire grow to possessone day, not only the pledge, but thewhole treasure of God. But if we do notcultivate this love in us, then we ourselves are at fault if we do not experiencethe presence of the Holy Spirit in our soul,and we even run the risk of losing it.The Holy Ghost comes to us for our own

good and our happiness, but at the sametime He comes as our Lord and God totake possession of our soul.

" Know younot," says the Apostle,

"

that yourmembers are the temple of the HolyGhost, who is in you, whom you havefrom God, and you are not your own ?"

2

What a crime it would be to desecrate Hisdwelling-place ! "If any man violatethe temple of God," again we read,

" himshall God destroy. For the temple of Godis holy, which you are."

1 Eph. i. 14. 2 i Cor. vi. 19.

49


The members of our body are membersof Christ, by whom we have received theHoly Spirit ; thus they are His instrumentsand dedicated to His service and glory.Therefore the Apostle tells us:

"

This isthe will of God, your sanctification.

1

And again:"

Let not sin reign in yourmortal body, so as to obey the luststhereof. Neither yield your members asinstruments of iniquity unto sin, but

present yourselves to God ... as instruments of justice unto God."

1

The Son of God became incarnate onceonly, for man s redemption, and the Angelsof God, and man, have never ceased marvelling at His mercy and condescension.He dwelt also in one country only, andamongst one people. The Holy Spirit,however, who is equal to the Father andthe Son, comes to each one of us, entersour soul, makes it His dwelling-place:should we not, therefore, do our utmostto welcome this Divine Guest by mani

festing our love and gratitude to Him ?Our Saviour gave the Holy Spirit twice

to His Apostles: immediately after His

Resurrection, and on Pentecost Day; andSt. Augustine reasons from this that,

being the Spirit of Love, the Holy Ghostwas to confer on them thereby a doublelove -for God and their neighbour. 3

Oh, how few realize that their neighbours1 i Thess. iv. 3. 2 Rom. vi. 12, 13.3August., de Tri., lib. 15, cap. 26.

5


are temples of the Holy Ghost, and loveand reverence them as such ! Were we asenlightened as the Saints, we shouldkneel before the sick and helpless, and

willingly render them the most humiliatingservices, perceiving that we are renderingthem to Him who dwells in them. For itis by love for our neighbour that we makeour own souls pleasing to God.

" He thatloveth not his brother whom he seeth,how can he love God whom he seethnot ?" L

ii

E beloved disciple says,"

In thiswe know that we abide in God, and

e is in us, because He hath given us HisSpirit

"

;

2 the Three Persons of the Blessed

Trinity being inseparably united witheach other on account of the unity ofTheir essence ; when one is present the twoothers must also be present. Thus, OurLord says: "If anyone love Me, he will

keep My word; and My Father will lovehim, and We will come to Him and makeOur abode with him ? 3

St. Augustine explains in what sense wemay in the Paternoster address the words" who art in heaven " to God the Father,and says that the word

"

heaven "

signifies the just on earth and the Angelsabove, in whom, as in a magnificent royal

1 John iv. 20.2 i John iv. 13.

., John xiv. 23.51 D


palace, God the Father dwells with theSon and the Holy Ghost. God alwaysfollows directly His grace; accordingly,whoever receives it receives into his soul

the Triune God, an incomparably greaterfavour than Abraham received when Hevisited him in his tent under the guise ofthree strangers. Must we not exclaimwith holy Job:

" What is man that Thoushouldst magnify him ? or why dost Thouset Thy heart upon him P"

1

Who can describe how loving the intercourse is between the devout soul and

God; how He reveals His innermostnature to her, makes known His holymysteries to such a soul, and infuses intoher a peace which transcends all under

standing ?If the Blessed Trinity is present within

us, this presence cannot be without fruit.

God is a living God, and the Holy Spiritis the breath of Divine life. He must,then, dwell in us as the soul of our soul,and inspire it with a new life.Our soul has, certainly, its own life, but

this life is scarcely a shadow of the Divine

life; it is so weak and limited that thesoul endowed with it alone is rather to becalled dead than alive when comparedwith God. Therefore by conferring the

Holy Spirit upon us God may be said tobreathe with exceeding goodness andkindness His Divine life into our life; He

1 Job vii. 17.

52


thus converts its natural life into a Divineand supernatural one. He may be saidto plant a germ within us, which Heirrigates with that living water of whichHe spoke to the Samaritan woman, whenHe told her it would become in her afountain of water springing up into lifeeverlasting.

Life in itself is so precious that everyliving being, be it ever so humble, is worthfar more than all, even the greatest andmost beautiful things which are inanimate. The natural life of the soul isexceedingly precious, more so than thelife of all other things on earth. But thesphere of this activity is very limited,as the soul by its natural powers candirectly comprehend and enjoy onlynatural things. Grace amplifies and elevates this sphere immeasurably; it qualifies the soul to know God immediately inHis glory, and to recerve within itselfthe highest good, and enjoy it as GodHimself enjoys it. Grace gives the soula life infinitely superior to all natural life,a Divine life full of unspeakable power andhappiness.Oh that we esteemed this heavenly life

of the soul at least as much as the shortand miserable life of the body, which isin reality a lingering death, ^and whichevery passing hour brings nearer its dissolution ! Whereas our soul by thegrace of the Holy Ghost contains the

53


germs of an eternal life; for, as St. Paul

says, "Though our outward man is cor

rupted, the inward man is renewed dayby day,"

1 and this because" He that

raised up Jesus Christ from the dead shall

quicken also your mortal bodies, because

of His Spirit that dwelleth in you."2

Ill

"

\ T 7 HOSOEVER are led by the Spirit\V of God, they are the sons of God,"

says St. Paul; and, again,he tells us:

"

Because you are sons, God hath sent the

Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying :

Abba, Father."3 " For the Spirit Him

self giveth testimony to our spirit, that weare sons of God. And if sons, heirs also ;heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs with

Christ."4 Can anything show so clearly

the glory of grace as the fact that it makesus children of God ? Or could anythingexcite more our love of God than His

adoption of us as His children ? Behold

what manner of charity the Father hathbestowed upon us, that we shouldbe called, and should be the sons of

God."5

The words" Our Father who art in

heaven"

should be a revelation of the

i 2 Cor. iv. 16. 2 Rom. viii. n.3 Gal. iv. 6.

4 Rom. viii. 16, 17.5 i John iii. i.

54


goodness of God to us; but we repeatthese words so mechanically that it is asif they had no meaning for us. St. PeterChrysologus in his instructions to hiscatechumens tells them to pause andtremble at the thought of the mightycondescension of God, that whereas theywere sinners and slaves, subject to frailtyand every vice, He bade them call HimFather. He quotes the great prophetwho,

"

having found the Lord had becomehis Father, cried out : I have consideredThy works, and have trembled. Notbecause he contemplated the world and.the harmony of its various elements, butbecause he beheld the work of Divinetenderness in himself, therefore he wasseized with wondering admiration andfear."

1

By nature we are not, strictly speaking, children of God, but only His servantsand bondsmen, the least and humblest ofall. Like the Angels but in our naturefar below them we are creatures, and thework of His hands. With all our likenessto Him on the part of our rational soul,which is His image, we are not God skindred; we are not begotten by Him,neither have we received His DivineNature. Only the Eternal and UncreatedWord is in a strict sense the Son of God.He alone is begotten of the Father, andproceeds from Him as Light of Light, God

1 Peter Chrysol., Horn. 68.

55


of God, Himself One God with the Fatherfrom all eternity. How can this creature,then, presume to call its Creator, the Kingof heaven and earth, Father ? How canmortal man approach with confidence Himbefore whom the seraphim prostrate in

deepest reverence and veil their faces?

To this there is the all-sufficient answer:

What is impossible with men is possibleto God; what we cannot claim as a rightis gratuitously granted us by our infinitely

loving and merciful God.The Son of Gocl undertook this great

work of acquiring the life of children of

God for us by the shedding of His blood.He was made flesh in order to

"

give to as

many as received Him the power to bemade the sons of God." He was madeour Brother in the flesh to make us Hisbrethren in His Divine glory. Hemlocksupon it as an honour, not to be the

"

only

begotten,"but

"

the first-born amongst

many brethren." Therefore, too, He isthe first to call His Father ours, as well

as His:"

I ascend to my Father and to

your Father." At the Last SupperHis

prayer for us is that we may be all onein Him, as He is one with the Father.What return can we make for so muchlove ? St. Peter Chrysologus makes this

beautiful answer:" Return to God, by

whom you are so well loved ; devote yourself entirely to His honour, who for yoursake exposed Himself to the greatest

dis-

56


honour, and acknowledge Him as Father,whom you know and feel by His love foryou to be your Parent."

iv

GOD,in bestowing His grace upon us,

r imparts at the same time a goodnessand supernatural beauty whereby wereceive the fruit of this favour, and remain

worthy of it. He, thus, not only lovesus in and through His Son, as His children,but He really impresses upon us the imageof His Son, and makes us resemble Him,that we may be truly His children.

"

Forwhom He foreknew He also predestinatedto be made conformable to the image ofHis Son, that He might be the first-bornamongst many brethren." 1 He wills thatwe put on His only begotten Son, that wereceive the impress of His features uponus, and that we be clothed with His Divinelife; and this He accomplishes when Hereceives us into His paternal bosom, and

by the Holy Ghost gives birth to us in thewaters of regeneration.

That which is born of the flesh isflesh,"

2 said our Saviour to Nicodemus;it must be born again of water and the

Holy Ghost in order to become spiritualand be raised to a spiritual life. Accord

ingly, St. James says: "The Father of

Lights, from whom comes every best and1 Rom. viii. 29. 2 John iii. 6.

57


perfect gift . . . hath of His own will be

gotten us by the word of truth."1 We

have a nature infinitely different fromthe Divine; and, as St. Athanasius tells

us, we are first created and afterwards

generated of God, whilst the Son receivesHis being solely by this generation andhas the same substance as the Father.Nevertheless, our relation as children of

God to our heavenly Father is incomparably more intimate than that of adoptedchildren to their parent. For we are

generated and born of Him in a similarmanner to His own Son, since we receivethe communication of His Divine natureand life, and are filled and animated byHis Spirit. St. Peter therefore teaches:"

Blessed be the God and Father of ourLord Jesus Christ, who according to Hisgreat mercy hath regenerated us unto a

lively hope . . . unto an inheritance in

corruptible, that cannot fade, reserved inheaven for

you."

2 Those whom Godadopts He makes new men; He formsthem after His own image and that ofHis Son; He seals them with His ownHoly Spirit as the seal of their dignityand the pledge of their inheritance.

"

Great is the mystery of this grace,"says St. Leo,

" and this gift which exceeds all gifts namely, that God shouldcall man son, and man should call GodFather. By these names we feel, and

1Jas.-i. 17, 18.

2 i Pet. i. 3, 4.

58


learn, what sentiments should correspondwith such sublimity. For if among men itredounds to their glory that the splendourof ancestry should be reflected by its posterity, is it not far more glorious thatthose born of God should exhibit the imageof their Father ? As the Lord Himself

says: Let your light so shine before men,that seeing your good works they mayglorify your Father who is in heaven/

"*

Again, the Son of God reminds us ofour sublime destiny in the words:

" Be youperfect, as also your heavenly Father is

perfect." Because we are children of God,we must not be satisfied by leading a lifeof natural goodness; but, conscious of our

high dignity, we must seek to imitate ourgood and merciful God Himself. Accordingly, St. Augustine, drawing a parallelbetween Alexander the Great and ourselves, remarks that if the delusion he

possessed, that he was a descendant of the

gods, led him to perform great and heroicactions, how much more should we, whoby God s grace belong in truth to aheavenly and divine race, direct all ourfaculties to be like God, to seek Him, andlabour and suffer in His service !

If we are really children of God, thenHe will indeed be with us, and,

"

if Godbe for us, who is against us ? Who shallseparate us from the love of Christ ?Shall tribulation, or distress, or famine, or

1 Serm. 6, de nativ. Dom.

59


nakedness, or danger, or persecution, orthe sword ? But in all these things weovercome because of Him that hath lovedus."i

We must consider ourselves as pilgrimsupon earth, journeying towards our

heavenly country; and our life thereforeshould be comformable to the one towhich we are destined. Far from attaching our hearts to the things of this world,and seeking our happiness in it, we shouldrather sigh and lament that our

"

sojourning is prolonged," and that we are not inour true home.

Let us also, as St. Leo bids us,"

put offthe old Adam with his works, and, beingmade partakers of the generation of Christ,let us renounce the works of the flesh.

Recognize your dignity, and as participantof the Divine Nature beware of returningto your former lowliness. . . . By thesacrament of Baptism you have been madea temple of the Holy Ghost ; take care notto drive away so great a Guest by evilworks

;for the price of your purchase is

the blood of Christ, and He will judge youin justice who has redeemed you inmercy."

2

1 Rom. viii. 31, 37.2 Serm. i, de nativ. Dom., in fine.

60


V

OD, who has given Himself to usas a Father, who has adopted us as

His children, who has made us the heirs ofHis possessions, distinguished us with His

Name, honoured us with His glory andHis kingdom, wills also that we ask ofHim our daily bread. But what bread isthis ? The heavenly Father can demandof His children to ask only a heavenlyBread, and this Bread is the Son of God,who says of Himself: I am the LivingBread, which laid upon the altars is dailyoffered to the faithful as a heavenlyfood."

1 The first duty of a parent is thenourishment of his children; but whatmortal mind can comprehend the liberalityof Thy love towards Thy children, OGod ? Oh love that no mother could haveimagined ! Oh more than paternal heartof my God ! Truly we can say with Thyprophet: "We have been nursed at thebreast of Kings." But it was naturallybecoming that, God being greater thanman, the food prepared for His childrenshould correspond with the greatness oftheir heavenly Father. Therefore Godwould place no limits to His love; Hewould pour out all the treasures of His

omnipotence, and give His children themost precious of these treasures for their

1 Peter Chrysol., Horn. 67.61


eternal banquet, which is Himself. Forwhat is the good thing, and what is Hisbeautiful thing, but

"

the corn of thechosen ones, and the wine which makethvirgins "?

But if this nourishment is so precious,we may judge from it the value of the lifeof grace which is maintained by it, andthe greatness of that dignity that meritsit. If our body receives the Blood ofChrist, is not that a sign that our soul, too,in regeneration is filled through grace with aDivine life and possesses a Divine nobility ? .If our body is united to the substance ofthe Body of Christ, is not this a pledgethat by grace we have been made partakersof the Divine Nature ? Oh, if we had alively faith; how highly we should esteemthe life of grace which is worthy of suchfood ! and withwhat loving desire we shouldapproach this heavenly banquet, whichmakes us partakers of the Divine Natureand fills us with Divine life. But ouradmiration for this nourishment of thechildren of God, and for grace which isthe object of it, will increase when weconsider in what manner it is prepared forus. The entire substance of bread andthe entire substance of wine are changedafter consecration into the Body andBlood of the Son of God. Is this not a

sign that our nature, in receiving this foodand drink, is by grace entirely transformed ? As the natural bread is by a

62


miracle made a heavenly Bread, so gracecoming to us in this sacrament convertsour earthly nature into a heavenly one,and without destroying its substancemakes it participate in the Divine Nature.It is true that this change is not visibleto our senses; but neither does Transub-stantiation affect the outward form of thebread and wine. Exteriorly the childrenof God are as other men, subject to thesame trials and diseases; but, as theApostle says,

"

the outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewedday by day"; they are transformed bythe Spirit of God, until hereafter theirmortal life is changed into a glorious andimmortal one.The Body and Blood of His Son is, yet,

not the greatest food which the heavenlyFather gives to His children. In the HolySacrament the Son of God gives Himselfdirectly in His humanity, because we areyet too immature, too small, to be able to

comprehend Him in His Divinity. HereHe gives Himself, as it were, as the milk,there as the Bread of Eternal Life.

"

Foras the mother," says St. Augustine,

"

prepares in her maternal breast, as milk, thebread which the infant cannot eat yet atthe table of its father, so that the infant

receiving it may become stronger and growbigger; so the Word of God, who, withHis Father in heaven, is the Bread of theelect, has descended to us on earth, and

63


made Himself small, that He may be takenas milk by the new-born children of HisFather. The Holy Sacrament of theAltar, therefore, though truly Divine, is

only a foretaste of, and a preparation for,that food with which God the Father willnourish us in heaven. There we shall

enjoy the Son of God in His glory; therewe shall be strengthened by the power ofHis Divine Nature; there we shall benourished by the light of His glory, andshall drink in the flood of His love and

delight."*

St. Francis of Sales has explained this

sublime mystery very beautifully." Thou

alone, O God," he exclaims,"

canst enable

us to see and feel the happiness and joy ofthe human understanding, when, re

ceiving in itself, not the image, but the

real presence and essence of the essentialtruth and Divine Majesty, it will see itselfunited for eternity to its End and Object.We shall then be nourished by the substance of God Himself entering our souls

through the medium of our understanding." The tender love of God towards us is

almost incredible; for as an affectionatemother makes use of no foreign means tocommunicate her substance to her child,but feeds him in it and by it; so our

heavenly Parent does not confine Himself

to conveying an abstract idea of His

Divinity to our understanding, but by an1 In Ps. xxx. ; cf. in Ps. cxix.

64


excess of love He represents Himself tothe mind without the assistance of anyimage, that it may be thereby seen andunderstood in itself and by itself; thatthereby this Divinity and Eternal Essenceshould become at once the object con

templated by the understanding, and themedium by which it is contemplated.We shall then fully enjoy the accomplishment of these promises of God: Behold,I will bring upon her as it were a river ofpeace . . . you shall be carried at thebreasts, and upon the knees they shallcaress you. As one whom the mothercaresses I will comfort you. This is the

boundless, the eternal happiness to whichwe aspire, and of which we have receivedthe promise and pledge in the HolyEucharist, the perpetual banquet of Divine

grace. . . . There is, however, one difference: for the first favour, though real, ishidden under

the marvels of divine grace : meditations based on the 'glories of … · 2011. 11. 25. ·...

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