withdraw my heart from selfe-love and all affection to creatures But how shall I doe it O blessed Virgin if I receive not powerfull assistance for I am able to act nothing if I want efficacious grace which operates in and with me what God desires of me Now from whence may I have it but from and by you O Mother of grace and mercy since God hath put into your hands the price of my Salvation and since you hold in your armes the fountaine of all graces I repaire then to you O benigne Virgin and I give my selfe to you to the end by the power which you have in quality of my Saviours mother you may produce in my soule the effects of life and death my meaning is that you operate in such sort by your favour that I may really die to my vices and sinnes that I may detest and hate them and lead such a life as God expects of me and to which I obliged my selfe when by Baptisme I was incorporated and made a member of Iesus Christ your Sonne Point II. THe Son of God vouchsafed to unite pains sorrows afflictions and crosses to himselfe and his holy Mother with designe to render them from thenceforth pleasing sweet and worthy to be esteemed and desired on earth Begin to esteem them because they are deified in Jesus and honoured in his holy Mother And if you are unable to aske them of God at least resolve to be are them with humility and patience when they shall happen to you PRAYER YOu have ever been O holy Virgin the wel-beloved of the eternall Father You are amongst all the pure creatures the worthiest object of his love You are his spouse and the true Mother of Iesus as he is his Father and he gives you his Son with him hath put into your hands the treasures of Heaven and earth and all the riches of Divinitie For this reason you are the worthiest of all pure creatures and with my Iesus you are the happinesse of the whole world Neverthelesse O Mother of God I see you in the midst of mount Calvary and at the foot of the Crosse holding your Son dead between your armes You take off the Crowne of thornes you wipe his wounds you wash his body with teares and kisse a thousand times the bruises of his flesh You suffer likewise with him the ignominies and dolors of the Crosse so that humiliations crosses afflictions are both in you and in Jesus In him and you they are become divine sanctified and rendred acceptable And for this cause they are worthie of being esteemed and desired by Christians What must I then doe O holy Virgin if I will love you what other thing can I doe but affect Crosses and humiliations with you and humble my selfe like you I desine and purpose it thus in my soule procure me only the grace that in all occasions I may beare every thing with fidelity and patience in such sort as God requires of me and you desire I should Point III. THe holy Virgin holding her Son between her armes offers him to God and the divine Iustice for satisfaction of our offences And as the Father hath given his Son to the world and the Son delivered himselfe up to the Crosse to save us So the holy Virgin both with heart and will sacrificeth her owne Son that she may in this sort minister unto our Salvation Give her thanks for this extraordinary Charity and beseech her to render you faithfull to all the graces which the death of the Son of God hath acquired PRAYER YOu have been chosen ô Mother of grace and mercy to be the repairer of the world and to co-operate in a most peculiar manner to the salvation of all mankind You did when you gave your Sonne Christ Jesus to be delivered up to the death of the Crosse and you do it when holding him dead between your armes you offer him to the divine Justice as a Victime and Sacrifice of propitiation which satisfies God for the sinnes of the world And in this respect you are our Repairer for Jesus who is the Saviour of men is yours he is your Sonne and you are his Mother And in this quality you have right to his life his preservation and all his condition Neverthelesse O Mother of our Soules you consent to his death you incourage him to torments you conduct him to the Crosse and like another Abraham you sacrifice in will and affection your only Sonne and you sacrifice him for my sinnes so great is your charity and love towards me But what can I doe in recognition of so sublime a benefit Wherein am I able to acknowledge O benigne Virgin so ardent a Charity At least since you give your Sonne for me procure that I may be your slave and since you resigne him to efface the sinnes of the world and that hee may merit for us such graces as are necessary for our salvation be pleased to mediate that I may be faithfull to all the graces which he hath purchased for me by his death and that I may live no longer but for his honour and yours as you give him to the Crosse and deliver him up to death for me Our LADIE of Compassion Point I. Since the Eternall Father can have no compatency in the dolours of his Son he substituted the holy Virgin imprinting in her heart and Spirit the vertue of the Crosse and the Spirit of his sufferings and piercing her heart with the sword of sorrow he made her suffer with her Sonne that in some manner she might co-operate to our Salvation Consider what Jesus and the holy Virgin suffer for you and from henceforth take delight in the thought of their sufferings and in the love of the Crosse PRAYER O Virgin and mother of my Iesus I render you thanks for having contributed to our salvation not only by giving your Sonne but also in taking your share in his Passions for if he indure you suffer with him The scourges the thornes the nailes and the lance have pierced his body but love and sorrow have transpierced your heart and gauled your soule Wherefore holy Virgin the true refuge of sinners I adore Iesus for my Saviour but I reverence you as his Mother and acknowledge you for the Repairer of the Universe since you cooperate doubly in the good of our soules For you give us your Sonne and suffer with him for us Be pleased also to mediate O Virgin spring of life and grace that I may be from henceforward the object of your commiserations And since you have loved me so much as to give me your Sonne and to give him even for the Crosse since your love and charity fastens you to my interests and makes you suffer for mee procure that I may suffer all for you but chiefly engrave in my heart such a hatred of sinne as I may rather indure a thousand deaths then so much as once offend my Jesus your Sonne who died
for you and I dare say in a manner necessary 7. The subject which you are to take for your entertainment shall be the Passion of the Son of God or the foure finall ends of man sometimes Gods love towards you sometimes the vanity of all things finally take some point of Faith or of the Creed for your application 8. The manner and method which you are to observe herein must be very naturall I doe not require to make use of reason or discourse but of your affection and will Apply your whole heart unto it and that sufficeth procure also that your attention therein bee entire 9. The first thing you must doe is to place your selfe in the presence of God because in all your prayers you speak with God and treat of things of great consequence for you speak to him of the honour and love you owe him you treat concerning your owne salvation and the benefits of your soule 10 This exercise or practice of the presence of God is absolutely necessary for you for if you have a care of your salvation and desire to live in the feare of God surely you ought to know how to keepe your selfe continually in the presence of God remembring still that in what place sâ—eveâ— you are God sees and considers you not exterâ—â—lly onely but even into the center of your heart The presence of God is an exercise which detaines the soule and obligeth her to act nothing which may bee unworthy of God 11. Moreover when you will pray and what Prayer soever you make were it but saying the Pater noster or your Beads you still ought to doe it with respect and attention for sure you cannot performe these Devotions as you ought if your spirit be not recollected Now the means of recollecting your minde is to place your selfe in the presence of God Wherefore I advise you to habituate your selfe in this exercise I meane to place and keepe your selfe often in the presence of Almighty God 12. You will say peradventure that you are not able to fix your spirit to which I answer that it is no good signe and for this reason you ought to pity your self For how can you hear well the holy Masse say well your ordinary prayers use the Sacrament of Penance or communicate as you ought if you know not how to setle your cogitation see you not that this is to be sick indeed without discerning it Now the practice of the presence of God as I will explicate it to you is the true only remedy for your disease 13. It is a practice which is common necessary for all good Christians who are willing to avoid sin preserve themselves in grace or desire to treat with God with that respect as becoms them this is what I desire that in the beginning of your prayer you place your self attentively in the presence of God 14. You may do it in two manners The first by imagination when you recall your mind and all the powers of your soul and when you represent God unto your self with a Majesty worthy God and figuring to your selfe that you are prostrated before the Throne of his infinite greatnesse and that you remain there to treat with him about the affaires of your soule and what concerneth the service and worship which you owe him 15. The other manner is by faith then you make no use of your imagination but having sweetly called back your soule into it selfe you conceive your selfe to be before God whose greatnesse and Majestie is infinite and incomprehensible that this is the same God whom the Angells and Saints do serve and adore You consider how faith teacheth you that this self same God is every where and he presides in the bottome and center of your soule with the same Majesty Power and Love as he doth in Heaven Rest somtime upon this thought and if you can procure to enter into your owne heart to adore God as you conceive him to be there 16. This last manner of considering the Presence of God seems to me more beneficiall then any other and hath more force to recall our spirit and to bring back our soule into her selfe it teacheth us to seeke God not as farre distant from us or in Heaven but in our selves and in the center of our heart And for this reason I advise you to make often use of this exercise for I promise that you shall derive from it great advantages And if you shall persevere you will make a little Paradise of your heart and your soule will performe on earth what the Angells doe in Heaven §. III. A manner how to recollect ones selfe for mentall Prayer 1. AT the first entrance then into Prayer place your self in the presence of God conformably to the manner I have newly exhibited to you And if this thought of Gods presence possesseth your soule and retaines you in great attention keep your selfe therein as long as you can were it during the whole Masse and omit without scruple the rest of your devotions for you enter not into the Church and apply not your selfe unto Prayer but to remaine before God to adore him with respect and humility and to keepe your selfe in his presence as his devout servant When you have attained unto this rest content since God seems to be so with you And in this case you are to desire nothing more because you have all when God is satisfied 2. And if this thought of Gods presence will not serve to entertaine you any long time in that case take presently some verity or mystery for your meditation For example consider how Iesu Christ hath loved you so much as to suffer death for you Then pawse a while how little soever you please to consider this benefit strive onely to ponder it with attention And out of this consideration endeavour to extract some little affection or frame some conference with God upon that which you considered Now to the end it may prove more facile to you I prescribe at the end of this Booke some Meditations upon the principall points of the Passion of our Lord Iesus Christ which will serve you for a Modell 3. During the little time you shall employ in this manner of Prayer if God gives you some good inspiration or pious desire do not neglect it but hearken unto God and receive his grace and inspiration with respect and love Resolve to put in practice what God proposeth to you and give your selfe unto Christ Iesus and his holy Mother the Virgin Mary to the end they may be pleased to preserve in your soule the good desires which you feele and supplicate them to give you the grace to put them in practice conformable to that manner which God requires of you 4. The profit which I would have you to make of this exercise which I call recollection of spirit is to establish and preserve your selfe in the feare of God to excite and advance
a band which ought to fasten and unite us unto God 9 It is not my designe to entertaine you with prescribing you instructions for the reception of these two Sacraments since you have so many Bookes which treat of it I will onely say that if ever you stand in need of all the Entertainments which I have newly given you it ought to be in the reception of these two Sacraments which are two fountaines of love and mercy For love and recollection by the presence of God as I have explicated serve us for a disposition to prepare us to receive worthily the Sacrament of Penance and the Eucharist I beseech our Lord Jesus Christ who came into this world to establish therein the Kingdome of charity and to bring thither the fire of his love and who died on the Crosse to draw us unto God and withdrawn from death the world and sin that he will vouchsafe to give us the grace to feele and he are the effects of his Crosse I beseech him to consume us in the flames of his love and to fasten us so indissolubly unto himself as wee may never more sever our selves from him but that he would place us rather in a happy inability of offending him and in a more blessed servitude never more to estrange and separate our selves from him nor to act any thing but for his fake Amen MEDITATIONS Upon the Principall Mysteries of the Passion of JESUS CHRIST PREFACE IT is a great happinesse for a man to be able to entertain himselfe with God and to speak to him as often as he desireth He may do it by vocall and mentall Prayer wherein he treats with his God It is a favour which Jesus Christ hath acquired for him for it is by him saith the Apostle that we have accesse unto God I call it a favour in as much as man having severed himselfe from God by sinne and being expelled out of his presence and banished from his amiable company the Sonne of God came into the world to expiate sinne and to establish both in heaven and earth a new alliance between God and Man One of the meanes which Jesus Christ himselfe hath left us to preserve our selves in this happy alliance and the way which he hath pointed out to bring us neer unto God is Prayer for by Prayer we enter into society with God we entertain our selves with him we elevate and unite our selves unto him and treat with him of the ineffable Grandeurs of his Divinity of che effects of his incomprehensible goodnesse of the necessities and miseries of our life finally by a holy commerce we speak to God and God vouchsafes to speak to us There are an infinity of objects upon which the soule may entertain her selfe with God and forme her meditations for as God is an inexhaustible sea of greatnesse so is he the object of an infinite entertainment unto a Christian soule But the most reasonable most profitable and easiest subject wherein our Spirit may imploy it selfe is the life and death the depressions and humiliations the torments and sufferances of Jesus Christ For as much as in the misteries of the Passion and in all the moments of the life and death of Iesus the soule discerns therein the excessive love which God beareth us In the sufferings and ignominies of the Crosse she conceives the weight of sinne and the punishments which our crimes doe merit And considering what Iesus Christ hath done what he hath said and his holy and adorable Vertues in all the misteries of his death she learns thereby the Vertues which she ought to practice and the way which she is to follow to attaine unto the glory which Iesus Christ himself hath acquired for her at the price of life and precious bloud It is for this reason devout Reader that having undertaken to present you with Entertainments conformable to the common life of all Christians I have added the Meditations upon the principall misteries of the death of the Sonne of God to the end you may make use of them for your advancement in the love and feare of God and that by often considering them you may learne to imitate his Vertues and place your glory and affiance in the death of Christ Iesus Would to God you could say with S. Paul I will no longer glory but in the Crosse of my Iesus I will place my content and love therein I will follow him in the Crosse that I may possesse him in glory This is that which I desire of you with my whole heart and I wish that the death of the Sonne of God may be the Spirit and life of your soule The Prayer of IESUS in the Garden Point I. COnsider the love which God the Father beareth you deprivâ—ng his Sonne of joy and glory to invest him with sorrow and load him with paines and reproaches exposing him unto the rigors of tin divine Iustice for the expiation of your offences Desire ardently that this selfe same spirit of love may divest you of all vanity selfe-love and your own private interest A Prayer to the eternall Father I Adore your goodnesse O eternall Father and the love which invited you to give me your Sonne to set him in the opprobriousnesse of the Crosse and to victimate him in the sufferances of an ignominious death that he might be my Saviour and my Jesus The love which you beare me hath beene the cause that you have not spared your own Sonne but have cloathed him with our infirmities and loaden him with the confusion and paines which I have merited to undergoe for my offences After so great a benefit is it not just for mee to love you How happy should I be O God of mercy if you would fill my heart with this love how happy should I be if you would consume mee in the flames of this divine fire It is all that I desire and a grace which I aske of you above all the graces which you can give me Grant then O God of goodnesse that I unloofe my selfe from all other love to love you alone grant that the power of your love may strip mee of all vanity and annihilate my selfe-love to the end loving nothing but you I may live onely for you Point II. BEhold how the Sonne of God lies prostrated on the ground bearing the weight and confusion of the sins of the whole world and in this sort he is made the object of the anger of God You have your part therein by reason of your sins beg then of him the engraving in your soule a desire and ability to satisfie for your offences and the granting you a true contrition for your sinnes PRAYER ALas what shall I doe for if my Iesus who is the Power of Heaven if my Iesus who is the vertue of God falls and remaines under the weight of my offences what will become of me and how shall I beare them when dying I shall be presented before the Tribunall of the
be esteemed and honoured by men Wherefore in view of the contempt which you indure I purpose to alter my course of life and to imitate you if I can and with this resolution I cast my selfe at your feet O my Iesus I adore your profound humility I implore the power of this vertue to come upon me and I give my selfe intirely to you to beare the effects thereof in such sort as to you shall seem good I know very well that I ought to affect humiliations confusions and contempts I know that they are my portion they are the most conformable to my state since I am a sinner But my perverted spirit and quite corrupted nature is averse thereunto Neverthelesse Lord I will love you succour only my weaknesse annihilate my aversions and fortifie my will that I may put in practise the good resolution which I have taken in your presence Point III. IESUS beares the Rigours Dolours and Humiliations which our sinnes have merited It is for this cause he presents himselfe unto the people to suffer and unto his Father to satisfie his justice Cast your selfe at his feet O my soule and say affectionately Behold the man whom I seeke for he is my Jesus my Saviour and my All I see him I embrace him and I resolve that he shall be my King and reigne alone in my heart PRAYER AT the sight of what you act and suffer for me O my Iesus I remaine distracted and fall into a kind of rapture for what am I Lord And what need have you of me that you should seeke my salvation at the cost of so many labours What is there in my soule capable of inviting you to offer your selfe unto your Father to appease by your torments his Justice which I have irritated by my offences Surely is is nothing but love which exercising the power and rigour thereof made you become man and suffer death for me O Love how powerfull art thou since thou hast reduced my Iesus into state wherein I contemplate him in his life and death O Love how strong is thine arme since thou hast drawne my Iesus from the Throne of his glory to place him in humiliations and to subject him to so many paines Love if thou hast power over my God must not thou have it over my heart No there is no meanes to withstand it whatsoever it costs I must love him who hath loved us more then his own life who in giving himselfe requires nothing but our love I resigne my self then unto you ô Love of my Soule to love you with my whole heart Grant onely if you please that I may love nothing but you for you both command and oblige me to love you I am content but unable to do it without your grace Effect then this work in me of loving you and loosen my heart from all earthly affections to the end I may entirely unite my selfe to you And be pleased to give mee a holy inability which may render me uncapable of severing my selfe from you and of loving any other IESUS carrieth his Crosse Point I. COnsider the hunger and insatiable thirst the extreme love and desire which Jesus hath to suffer for us having never said It is enough nor refusing any torments which are inflicted on him allowing all persons to torture him Ask of Jesus that he would vouchsafe to estrange you from the pleasures of the world and admit no longer any repugnancy in your selfe to indure for his sake PRAYER O Amiable Iesus How just is it that I now confesse the excesse of your love and acknowledge the mercies which you shew me for you are not satisfied in purchasing me by the profusion of your bloud and appeasing the divine Justice by your death but excited by the love which you beare me and by a desire of my salvation you expose your selfe to all sorts of confusions and by a divine patience you refuse no tortures and shun no paines which impiety invents to make you suffer At the sight of so much goodnesse and at the object of your vertues what can I do lesse whereby I may become the most acceptable to you then imitate your life and imbrace with you all crosses and sufferances For I know you have said of it that he is unworthy of you who beares not his crosse with you and refuses to follow you I purpose then O Saviour of my soule I purpose willingly to follow you and renouncing my owne pleasures sufferance shall be my onely love and delight I cannot effect it without your grace be pleased therefore to bestow it on me for without you I can do nothing and with you I am inabled to doe all things Point II. IESUS loaden with his Crosse sinkes under the burthen not of the heavinesse of the wood but under the weight of our offences wherewith he charged himselfe before the Iustice of his Father And in view of the whole world he carrieth the confusion and contempt which our crimes have merited Beg of him the spirit and gift of Penance to the end taking part in the satisfactions of Christ Jesus you may endeavour in some measure by your self to satisfy God whom you have so often offended PRAYER MY Iesus give me light to discerne the weight of sinne the grace to detest it as it deserveth and love to become repentant as I ought for I intend Lord to doe Penance I know that you have suffered for me and that you died to give me life and to associate me to the number of your children And true it is that all that you have done was only to obtaine pardon for my offences and to satisfie for the paine due unto my crimes finally it is true Lord that your merits are infinite But yet it is likewise just and you give it me in command that I alter my course of life and doe Penance to sati fie your divine Justice for otherwise I cannot partake of the satisfaction of your Crosse nor of the merits of your sufferings Be pleased then to bestow on me the spirit of Penance and the zeale of your Justice that I may exercise it on my selfe But vouchsafe to give it me from this instant for feare lest I be surprized and excepting the houre of death and the day of vengeance I find my selfe unworthy of mercy I desire to prevent lest I be prevented It is a blessing which depends on you and which I beg of you with my whole heart Point III. COnsider the humiliation which Jesus hath borne in the thoughts and judgements of men who esteemed him strucken and reproved condemned and abandoned even of God himselfe judging him worthy of all the torments which he indured Render him thanks for supporting all this in satisfaction for the pride of men and from henceforth strive to affect humility and learn to despise the vaine judgements which may be made of you PRAYER ALl the sinnes of men O amiable Iesus are the cause of your death but pride which
not fall and governe me by your Spirit that I wander not in the nations of my perverse inclinations Defend me good Iesus and deliver me from my selfe and permit me not to adhere to my affections nor to follow my owne appetites I renounce them all since they separate me from you and I conjure your goodness to annihilate them to the end that adhering wholly unto you I may be for nothing but your selfe for such is my desire you know it O love of my soule To ask the love of God OBject of all Love perfect Beauty ineffable Goodnesse who can choose but love you I purpose it but am unable I will love to death and will die but in loving you Transpierce my heart with your love and my body with your feare effect O powerfull God! effect powerfully that your Spirit may consume in me all that is of my selfe that I may bee wholly yours and love none but you and that living in you I may die to all other things A protestation of Love Shall I be alwaies overlightned in my selfe distracted in my thoughts inconstant in my motions How long will you permit me Lord to follow my owne inclinations and to be violently affected with the Creature Recall my spirit withdraw it from all things to retaine it for your selfe Let not your just conduct O most amiable goodnesse abandon me for leaving me to my self blind that I am I should lose my selfe in my Cupidities and separate my selfe from you to live no longer but for my selfe Let death rather force me away yea fill O God of love fill rather my life with bitternesse my heart with feare and my soule with continuall displeasure then permit that to please the Creature or to satisfie my selfe I may displease your divine Majesty An Act of Love WHy shall I not love you O most amiable goodnesse You oblige me thereunto by your love you attract me by your benefits and you command it by your goodnesse I will then love you because I ought and I desire that my heart may love you with all his power because nothing is amiable but your selfe But I cannot love if you inspire me not with love Abide then in me O desirable love live in me to the end that following the lawes of your love I may live and consummate my selfe in you Aspirations of Love VVhether are you gone sweet Spouse of my soule Alas I carry a heart replenished with bitternesse when I have no sense of you I keep my self aloofe from you loft in my thoughts I perceive my selfe wandring in various objects for a heighth of miserie I walke in the night of a heart darkened with selfe-love My life is all humane and as a child of Adam my life is in the old man I know not whether I have a being or no only I know that I am miserable but to live in this sort is a cruell death it is not to live at all to live without you it is too long a Martirdome Take pitty on my soule returne and possesse me entirely Restore me your spirit give me your life and change my whole heart Why can I not like a Phoenix consume my selfe in the ardors of your eternall love and alter my course of life being to be no longer but in you to live no longer but for you You can effect this O God who can do all things Sighes of Love MY eyes are bathed in teares and my voice is broken with sighes my life is but a death and all things are but a Martirdome to me when I thinke where my God is Alas this thought makes me powr out all my soule and I languish both day and night when I know that I must remain in this abode of miserie I cry out from the bottome of my heart How long Lord how long And must I yet live for a long time in the land of the dead and absent from your face remain among the perills of this miserable life Must I being oppressed with my body feele my selfe removed from the sweet attractives of your Caresses I am content with it since it is your Pleasure Great God Master of my soule your will is my delight your love my direction But effect O God who can do all things effect by your mercy that as your Son and my Iesus lives only in love and this love makes him die so I may live no longer then in loving you and that love may make me suffer To sue for the contempt of all things TOo long O my soule doest thou seeke vanity and affect lies This world hath nothing in it stable permanent all is perishable therein Goodnesse truth peace and repose are found only in God thou losest thy selfe in selfe-loving and seeking thy selfe thou art estranged from God Come then to my succour O Saviour of my soule and reach me your hand dissipate all these allurements which detaine me captive Open to me your heart O my so amiable Iesus to shelter me in the midst of so many surprizes see Lord see how from all sides snares are laid for me to make roe fall in love with this world Doe not permit it O love of my soule my heart is for you alone preserve it then as yours Another MY eyes discerne not O Adorable verity the errour of vanity and my heart feels not the horrour of all vices But come O Sun of Iustice come and shine upon my soule consume with your beames all that is displeasing to you give me your spirit which opens my eyes to discerne verity which inspires me with love to adhere unto it which redresseth my will and teacheth it to detest the world and gives me the grace to seek you alone and to live only for the love of you To demand light and direction for your soul SUnne of Iustice illuminate the darknesse of my spirit Comforter of soules draw me out of the ignorance wherein I live I walke in the shadow of death amidst the perils of this life and severing my selfe from you who are the way and life of my soule I run like a vagabond into the curious research of the objects of my senses Do you not see it O my God who see all things Come then to my succour light of my soule I aske nothing but your selfe my heart fighes after you and my eyes seeke you every where Dart therefore O Iesus a glance of your face infuse a ray of your beauty into the bottome of my Soule to call me back to you and make me know who you are and what I am to the end I may be wholly yours and that being no longer mine I may love you alone To invoke Grace GReat God! your Treasures are unexhaustible and your hands full of gifts You are rich only in goodnesse and in shewing mercy you evidence what you are Mercy then Lord mercy for I am a sinner one glance of your eye one word of your mouth can deliver me from evils for while you look on me I shall love you while you speake to me I shall follow and run after you in the odour of the sweet perfumes of your heavenly grace To call for Contrition FRom the depth of my misery I elevate my heart unto you O God of goodnesse my soule sighes after you God of mercy And now that I am sensible of my misfortune that the weight of my sins oppresse me within I cry aloud unto you lend me your eares and fix on me your benigne eyes to withdraw me from the evill whereunto I find my selfe fastned Give me your arme Father of mercy to sustaine the yoke of my offences light to know them teares to bewaile them and the zeale of your justice to satisfy for them I can no longer endure the foulenesse of my life nor to live any longer distant from you O happinesse of my soule I pant after you you know it but I cannot escape out of the place which captivates me nor breake the bands which fasten me if the power of your Spirit and the Spirit of your love doe not dissolve and break them in pieces loosen them then O Lord and render me the liberty which you have purchased for your children at the price of your life Affection to accomplish our good purposes I Feel my selfe seized with a flame of love which makes me protest never more to forsake you O Jesus the love of my soule I am weary to see my selfe in the midst of so many inconstancies I desire to be entirely yours you know it very well Lord for it is of you as of a spring of goodnesse that my soule is full of desires and my will of good affections it is a gift of your hand preserve it by your grace and give me your arme and benediction to uphold me in my good purposes and that I may punctually accomplish what I have promised you stimulated and incited by the motions of your Spirit alwayes holy to the end you may finish and perfect in me what you have begun by your infinite mercy for without you I can doe nothing and by you am enabled to doe all things FINIS A PRAYER which the Church useth to invoke the love of God DEVS qui diligentibus te facis cuncta prodesse da cordibus nostris inviolabilem tuae charitatis affectum ut desideria de tua inspiratione concept nullâ possint tentatione mutari Per Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum c. Amen