by Divine Power in all the Cities Villages Private houses as well Religious as Secular whither the Divine Providence conducted him to enlighten men with the knowledge of God and his Son Christ Jesus To inkindle in their hearts perfect Charity and bring them to a good life In all which he was exceedingly blessed with happy success as shall be shewed hereafter Being one day at Paris in the time of Lent going to a poor mans house to exercise some of his ordinary acts of Charity and hearing a great noise of people singing and dancing in the next house he left his poor man and went in thither and look'd upon them who were so surprized and astonished at his presence that they presently quitted their dancing and singing And he fell into a discourse against those disorders and dissoluteness in that holy time of Lent with such fervour as drew tears from their eyes and wrought so effectually upon some of them that the next day they went to Confession Another time he visited a poor maid who being abused by a young man and gotten with childe was lest in great necessity whom he found plunged in so deep a melancholly that she had resolved to make away herself yet by the grace and power which God gave to his good counsel he comforted her dejected spirits and brought her into such a condition that she went to Confession After this he went to seek out the young man who at the first onset behaved himself very ill contemning his wholesome advice But after several arguments inforced from the danger of his soul and other threatnings of Gods Judgements hanging over his head he melted into tears promising to do whatever he pleased to command him insomuch that by his advice he was reconciled to God by true repentance and to the maid by wedlock and since that time have led a good life together During his abode at Amiens a poor woman had undone herself by selling salt a thing forbidden in France under heavy penalties and being taken in it Who thereupon fell into an excessive sadness and grief retaining also such an hatred against them that had reduced her to this misery that she could not be perswaded upon any terms to forgive them whereby she became uncapable of the Sacraments in the extremity of her sickness Monsieur Renty was brought to her in the company of two or three other persons who talked with her a long time without any success Insomuch that seeing whatever he said prevailed nothing fell upon his knees in the middle of the room inviting the company to do the like and after some few prayers bespake the sick party saying and will not you joyn with us to beg mercy of God To which she yielding he caused her to repeat after him word by word certain acts of repentance and charity by which she found her minde so strangely altered that she appeared quite another woman and openly professed that she did forgive them from her heart And receiving with much meekness all his instructions prepar'd herself to the worthy receiving of the Sacraments Being one day at the great Hospital in Paris instructing the sick how to dispose themselves for a general Confession one of the Religious women intreated him to speak with a person that was newly brought in thither who had been without any cause at all run thorow the body with a sword and was so incensed against the party that he could not indure with patience any should speak of forgiving him But no sooner did Monsieur Renty urge to him the duty of a good Christian in such a case with other speeches to pacifie and sweeten his spirit but he was appeased and said he forgave him with all his heart adding that he was ready both to see and embrace him expressing moreover very much sense of Piety Certain Abbots and other Ecclesiasticks of quality and vertue met at Pontoise to settle a Mission Monsieur Renty who was very intimately acquainted with the most part of them came to visit them where according to his usual custom without speaking thereof to any one he went to the prison and meeting there with a most obstinate sinner who had continued so along time and neither by intreaty nor threatning by fair means nor foul nor by any other means which the Mission could use be brought to Confession The Mission sending for Monsieur Renty to dine with them word was brought after much search for him that they might happily meet with him at the Prison where he was found sitting at the table with the Prisoners for whom he had provided a dinner discoursing lovingly with them comforting and stirring them up to a good life Amongst the rest the foresaid party in particular upon whom he had the greatest design to whom he spake with so much power dealing with him so discreetly or divinely rather that he brought him to his bent working in him a resolution effectually to change his life and make a good confession of all his sins which gave a just occasion to one of the Mission to say That Monsieur Renty had accomplished that in three days which others would have had much ado to have brought about in three years I omit many others of the like kinde concluding with this one which seems very remarkable He was requested to visit a devout woman who was tormented with excessive pains both inward and outward and had great need of comfort and direction who received so great relief from his instructions that within some few days she writ as followeth The effect which I found by the conference I had with this worthy servant of God was such that as soon as I had gotten victory over my self to speak and lay open my heart unto him straightway my blessed Saviour communicated his goodness so powerfully to me that I was even peirced by the effects of his presence I found also a very particular assistance from the blessed Virgin whom this holy man did invoke at the beginning of our discourse And I can assure you of a truth that I was sensible of much comfort and ease of my affliction insomuch that his speeches had so great an influence upon my soul and wrought so effectually that I have continued ever since in a good condition And though my pains are not abated yet I finde such an alteration in my self that I seem to be no more my own but all that is within me breatheth after nothing but the Execution of the will of God and the accomplishment of his good pleasure at any rate And though nature suffers some difficulty in it yet she must now learn to yield to grace and make resistance no longer My torments are not changed and yet I profess to suffer nothing because I am very well content to suffer And although my inferiour sensitive part is much pained yet my superiour part cannot nor indeed is it capable of suffering by reason of its conformity to the will of God All my care during
of a Christian life and the fulfilling of Gods will was to him after the example of our Lord as most exquisite and delitious meat and viands and when any gave him opportunity or left him to his liberty to practise this Mortification it pleased him exceedingly Often at Paris when some deed of charity had drawn him far from home that he could not return to dinner he would step in all alone or unknown to a small Victualling-house or some Bakers shop and make his dinner with a piece of bread and a draught of water and so very gay and chearfull go on with his business And what he pracrised for the mortifying of his gust was in like manner done for his other senses the sight the hearing the smell and the touch Being come to Pontois on a very cold day in winter and lodging at the Carmelite Nuns he desired earnestly the Nun that was the Door-keeper to have no fire made nor bed prepared for him and after he had discoursed with some of them he old the last that he must go make some little visits and that was to visit the Prisoners the poor that were ashamed to beg and to employ himself in some other deeds of charity which he never forgot at any time how little soever was his leisure He returned about nine a clock at night when the Nuns went to say Matins and without taking any thing to eat went into the Church to his prayers which he continued till eleven a clock and then retired into his chamber not suffering a fire to be made for him although by his own confession the cold did incommode him very much He constantly kept a vigilant eye over himself in every time place occasion and even in the meanest things for the mortifying of his body daily putting it to some hardship or at least hindring it from sense of pleasure And to that end had found out some very notable and ingenious inventions so bearing continually about him the mortification of the Lord Jesus in his body that the life of Jesus might live and shine forth in it well knowing as the same Apostle elsewhere saith That those that are Christs have crucified the flesh with the affections and lust thereof And to say the truth the more a man is full of one thing the less room there is for its contrary the more one sinks into darkness the further off from light and as we said above there is nothing more opposite to the Spirit than the flesh so must we of necessity conclude the more a man pampers his flesh the more doth he indispose and estrange himself from the life of the Spirit Thus this illuminated person dealt with his body as with his enemy out of the design he had to lead a life truly spiritual Whatsoever might content and flatter his senses was insupportable to him whence it happened that one day there slipt from him this word to a confident that God had given him a great hatred of himself and this was advanc'd so far by his fervent and unsatiable desire of mortifying himself that beside the moderation that his Director was obliged to lay upon him a famous person of our days the Carmelite Nun of the Covent of Beaulne Sister Margaret of the Holy Sacrament who lived and dyed in a fragrant odour of Sanctity with whom he was most intimate in the bonds of grace did out of divine light she had in that matter much reprehend him for it and gave him her advice in the business whereunto for the confidence he had in her and that not without good cause being willing to yield he remitted something of his rigour although not without complaint which he testified to a person thus in writing I know not said he why one stould strive to keep in so lazy a beast that stands more in need of the spur than bridle For all he was thus held in he left not off the war which he made with his body in each thing he could but without transgressing the Orders he had received till he thereby came to such a point of perfect Mortification that his body became as it were dead and insenâ—ble in all things which now in a manner made no impression upon his senses eating without gust himself saying that all meats were to him alike seeing as it were without sight so that after he had been along time in some Churches most richly adorned with stately ornaments and those before his eyes when one asked if they were not very fine he answered plainly that he had seen nothing By reason of his Mortification he had no pain nor trouble at all from those things which make other men so fret and take on who are alive to themselves and enslav'd to their bodies neither was he onely without pain but which as Arâ—stotle saith is the highest perfection of a vertue he took great pleasure therein which came not to him so much from abundance of sensible consolations which may sweeten Austerities to an unmortified man but from the ground and bottom of vertue intirely acquir'd and possessed CHAP. 2. Of his Poverty SECT 1. Of his Poverty of spirit ONe of the most great and admirable Vertues that shone in Monsieur de Renty was this that in the possession of riches he was utterly disingaged from the love of them and possessed in a most high degree as we shall now declare the first of the Beatitudes which pronounceth Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven of grace in this world and of glory in the other A truth which served him for a powerful attractive to endeavour the gaining of this rich treasure Whereof writing to a person of Pietie he thus said I was the other day touch'd in reading the eight Beatudes and upon this word Beatitude I took notice that in effect there were no other Beatitudes but these for if there had our Lord would have taught them and therefore those ought to be our whole study But what shall I say we ground not our selves upon them nor desire the grace to do it but run after the Beatitudes of the world and our own Concupiscience quitting that which is clear and given us by our head Christ Jesus to be in a state of hurley-burley and confusion and consequently of trouble danger and unhappiness It was not to these kinde of Beatitudes that he ran but to those of the Gospel and in particular to the first concerning which le ts hear what one saith of him a person very credible and of his intimate acquaintance I never sew mâ—n said he in so perfect a poverty of spirit nor in so ardent a desire to feel the effects of it as was he And in the fervour of his desire he said to me Procure by your prayers that we may change this form of life when will you labour with God that this may be this habit and this wealth is to me most painful I have talked since his death
with a Father to whom he had communicated his inclinations to leave all who told me that one day he desired of him with many tears and on his knees his advice in the matter and that he was never more surpriz'd than to see Monsieur de Renty at his feet and in these sentiments of poverty And I have heard him say that the touch from God to separate him from the creatures and to make him quit the manner of living suitable to his birth was so powerful over his soul that if another touch from the same hand had not kept him back at the same time he had abandoned all and according to the example of S. Alexis had gone to live a poor life as he did but that God that imprinted this desire of poverty in him did hinder the effecting of it to keep him in the state wherein he had placed him which was to him no small cross because the desire torments and afflicts the soul in proportion to its vehemency when it cannot arrive to the possession of the thing desired But because he was absolutely conformable as it was his duty in all things to the will of God he bare this cross as contrary as it was to his affection with great peace and a perfect submission to what God had ordered Another witness of like authority gives him this testimony He told me said he often in the confidence we had together that he was ashamed when he entred into his house to see himself so well lodged in this world and that it was one of his greatest afflictions to have so much wealth and to be so much at ease that he should be ravished to see himself reduced to bread and water and to get the same by labour and the sweat of his bâ—ows Having one day asked him how he could be so quiet amongst all the faâ—idious accidents and incommodities that he suffered He answered me upon condition that I would keep it secret that through Gods mercy he found himself in a disposition of peace and state of indifferency in affliction as well as in joy and that he had no sentiments any more of fear or desire of any thing And of this my self hath seen the experience in some difficulties where the better part of his estate ran a great hazard without any appearance of the least commotion in him and his words were Seeing God hath given me the management of this estate I will do to preserve it what shall behove me and then it is all one to me what success shall follow Another reports thus He had the Evangelical poverty in its perfection being inâ—irely estranged in spirit and thought in heart and affection from all the wealth of the world and he told me that he fealt no greater cross than to have riches and that he should be extreamly glad to be a beggar and unknown if it had been the will of God Hence it came that he bare a kinde of holy envy towards the poor that he deemed them very happy that in beholding them he said sometimes with sighing but with a sigh that one might see came from the bottom his heart Ah! that I am not as they that he honour'd lov'd caress'd and kneel'd before them not onely in humility but in esteem of their estare in its disposing us so much to the perfection of the new Law and resemblance it hath with Jesus Christ Being one day visiting the poor in the great Hospital of Caen he was seen bare headed and on his knees upon the floor of the great Hall beating in a Morter some Drugs for the use of the poor sick people such was the respect and honour that he bore to those for whom he laboured that it put him into that posture But for an end let us hear him tell us himself his sentiments upon this matter and although he speak of himself le ts make no scruple to believe him as being a person most worthy of credit Behold therefore what he wrote to the Nun abovementioned Sister Margaret of the Holy Sacrament my most holy Sister I have it in my heart that the Holy Childe Jesus the Infancy of Jesus was one of the Mysterieâ— to which more particularly and profitably he applyed himself as we shall see in its due place would have something of me which he hath a desire I should beg of him and dispose my self for the obtaining of it And I avow to you that the more there comes to me of the riches of this world the more do I discover the malignity the eto affixed and that they produce nothing but garboil and trouble and afford not much means of doing good My heart is most strongly carried to an effective stâ—ipping my self of all and to follow him alone seeing he is my way as being the most poor and depressed amongst all his followers But that I know that it would be a presumption to believe my self capable of this estate and a temptation to put my self upon it being at present related as I am I â—ould pant and sigh thither ward very much that which I will draw hence is this that being ignorant of the coursels of God I cannot tell how he will dispose of me for the future and I offer my self up to whatsoever it shall please him knowing that with him I can do every thâ—ng as without him I have neither the power nor will for any thing My most dear Sister I have great need of doing penance and to be humbled I am greatly ashamed of my condition and of what I am I have the commodity and abundance of all things of this world but my family and estate of things permits it not to be otherwise and I see the Churches and the poor upon whom I would bestow it all at least as much as I may in justice part with or else to be poor as the poor are so that I may be no more ashamed of being better provided than they Thus you have his thoughts which by Gods permission are come to light to make us see what grace can do in a heart well disposed and to what a pitch arrives this perfect Poverty of spirit SECT 2. His outward Poverty THe high esteem and affection which this great servant of God had of the forsaking the goods of this world being not able to contain it self within the Interior of his soul appear'd outward and visible in a thousand effects and carried him on to the poverty Exterior in all ways possible for not to speak of the great Alms he gave to the poor far different from the course of many who though full of riches yet never think of using them according to Gods rule he divested himself of very many things to be impoverished as much as he could for he parted with some books because richly bound wore no cloaâ—hes but plain and close together used no gloves what season soever or at least a rare thing it was to see him have any in effect
not its worth from doing this or that but from an exactness in doing that which he requireth of us giving up our selves wholly to his good pleasure I see there is need of a great death to our selves and a great depth of Self-annihilation to follow so purely the conduct of grace and not to be for own forms but those of God In another of the 12. of August thus he saith I daily continue my toiling here which takes up much of my time and almost all but I dare not look aside but onely abase and submit my self to the Divine Ordinance It was a work very gross and mean for Jesus Christ to converse with men who had more of rudeness than these stones I deal with and more of opposition to his purity than they have to my workmens hands And yet he suffered all he bore all and in fine converted but a few I beseech you obtain for me a part in his obedience and his patience to the orders of God his Father And writing to one of his friends he spake to him in this sort I am here in this Countrey in the midst of four or five companies of workmen to repair a Mansion House on the Demesn of my Family which was ready to fall What can our spirit act in this work which following the Spirit of Faith ought to be a Pilgrime and Stranger upon earth without doubt it groans much not at the order of God but after its own Countrey in the midst of its occupations as things opposite to its liberty We must do penance by labouring it is so decreed by God upon the first transgression These were the Meditations which this excellent man had while he was building and which all Christians who are made to settle not on earth but in Heaven in an Eternal Mansion ought to be enlivened with when they are about the like works CHAP. 3. His Humility POverty followed the Austerities and Mortification of the body as having much connexion with them and Humility follows Poverty yet considering withal that according to S. Austine the poverty in spirit spoken of by our Lord in the first Beatitude is nothing else but humility in very deed there is no people in the world more poor in spirit than the truly humble because they account themselves to be nothing to have nothing to be able to do nothing and to be worth nothing to be the refuse and off-scourings of the earth and to have need of every thing not assuming any praise to themselves for any thing whatsoever Monsieur de Renty came to this pitch and possessed this Vertue in a most Eminent degree And in truth if Humility as the all Saints tell us be the foundation of Vertue God having a design to raise up in him a magnificent and sublime Palace for Vertues and Perfection it was necessary the foundation should be laid very low and his humility be very profound He was rooted in this vertue so solidly that it was a thing wonderful and therein performed a number of so remarkable actions that those persons who lived many years with him and singularly well knew him have assured us that it were impossible to relate them all He had in an excessive esteem this important vertue he loved it with all his heart desired it with extream ardor prayed urgently and conjured his friends to beg of God and obtain it for him And as we see the stone descend with violence and the waters fall down impetuously the same motion made he towards Humility as to his centre Out of this Sentiment he wrote thus to one of his Confidents Have pitty on me I am more unfaithful than any creature of the world Upon my knees I beg of you to believe it If our Lord did not shew me what I am Lucifer would not be a little rich but this benign Lord shews me daily through his mercy my Nothingness it is thither his grace leads me To another he wrote thus All my resolution is in these words of David Elegi abjectus esse in domo dei mei I have chosen to be little and abject in the house of God To another also thus I am carried to demand of God a life much humbled suffering and unknown to men I finde a great attraction thither And I have a Paper written with his own hand and all of it with his blood which contain these words I give you my Liberty O my God and beg of you that Nothing which every Christian must arrive at to rise purely towards you Gaston Jean Baptiste Dominus Jesus semetipsum exinanivit usque ad mortem crucis propter quod et Deus exaltavit illum This 3 of December 1644. Amen Our Lord Jesus emptied himself to death even the death of the cross wherefore God also hath exalted him You see here his inclination and attractive and not without good reason for considering first that he had propounded to himself our Lord as a pattern for his life with a determinate resolution to follow him in whatsoever he could And that secondly Humility is the proper Vertue of Jesus Christ as S. Bernard after S. Paul calls it he therefore embraced this Humility with his whole affection gave himself up to it with all his forces and practised it in its urmost latitude as we are going now to see by that which follows But before we behold him in the actions of this Vertue let us listen to what he teaches and the light he gives us concerning it Humility said he he is the Basis which carries and upholds the whole work of God in us it makes the creature so naked and so separated from it self that it leaves it not the power to make any cast of an eye upon it self but renders it so taken up in the greatness of God that it becomes lost in reverence of him in self-abasement and annihilation This is the grace of Christians in their Pilgrimage who divested and spoiled of all esteem themselves but a Nothing and very puff of being which haivng nothing but what it received from God hath no instinct or inclination but for God It s a brave humility to see nothing in ones self but Nothingness and he that sees not there nothing sees not there any thing at all So the soul which sees nothing in it self findes nothing in it self to bottom on and by this means always points towards God like a needle touched with a Loadstone that having been encombred with all sorts of trash and trifles and afterward disingaged of them would forthwith turn towards her North and thitherward remain always fixt although the tempest of the sea and winds should turn upside down the Vessel Thus have we his disposition and the aspect of ae soul truly humble beholding nothing in it self and God in his Majestie SECT 1. His Humbleness of Heart HUmility may be divided into three sorts The Humility of the heart of the words and of the works And seeing the humility of the heart
Since God gave us a heart thereto we have brought others to have a hand in it and my Wife with two others bear their part in it imitating herein St. Mary Magdalen Joanna and Susanna of whom St. Luke saith that they followed our Saviour and his Disciples ministring with their substance for the preaching of the Kingdom of God We shall endeavour to perform this without noise or shew taking a private lodging apart for the purpose Be pleased my dear Father to be our Father and Guide and assist us in Autumne if you can to break the bread of life to those who with great humility desire it of you I beg of your Reverence with tears to give ear to our request who are touched with the necessities of our poor brethren and the love of Christ who desires to unite us together in one heart even his own that therein we may live in the presence of God My dear Father I commit this charge to your care it being onely in the power of his holy Spirit to render yours and the endeavours of other Fathers successful I trust he will hear us and that we shall see abundance of his mercies I attend your sense both for the thing and the time and in the mean time you may if you please keep the thing secret between us SECT 5. Of the same Subject WE have already declared how he kept correspondence all over France and elsewhere concerning great undertakings and important affairs for the glory of God and good of his neighbour He further obliged in all places as much as he could several persons to joyn together and assist one another in the work of their own and others salvation And procured Assemblies of Piety for divers uses of which he wrote thus in one of his Letters 1648. I am now returned from Burgundy where my journey hath been full of imployment in helping the setting up of several companies of men and women also who have a great zeal for Gods service In a Memorial from Caen we have these words Monsieur Renty hath settled here many Assemblies of devout persons whom he advertised to meet once a week and consult about relief of the poor and the preventing of offences against God which hath succeeded marvellously Moreover he advised divers Gentlemen of the Countrey to meet together from time to time to encourage one another in the way of Christianity and make a Profession against Duels He writ to a Superiour of one of the Missions in these words I was united in Spirit to you on Sunday last which I conceived to be the time of opening your Mission If you think I may be any way useful in forming some little body of Gentlemen and Societies in that City as we have already performed in little Villages and Towns I most humbly intreat you to believe that I shall imploy my utmost in it though haply I may do more hurt than good When he came to Amiens where I was the precious odour of his vertue and sanctity perfumed the whole City for in less than a fortnights space he performed so many and so great things in visiting Hospitals Prisons and poor people that were ashamed to beg with several other acts of Piety as were wonderful In two onely journeys which he made to that place parly as well by his example as by his Conversation and Advice he ingaged several considerable Citizens in these Exercises of Charity which they embraced with good courage and alacrity and have continued in the same inviolably It was his earnest desire and design to plant the Spirit of Christianity in all Families and to engage people of all conditions to serve God in good earnest having special care of their Conscience He desired to be able to instruct Fathers Mothers Children Masters Mistresses and Servants in their respective duries aiming herein at their mutual benefit seeing we can put little confidence in such who truly fear not God For he that once comes to falsifie his faith to his Soveraign Lord and Saviour will not stick as we may well believe where the interest of Honour Pleasure or Profit doth byass him to do as much to one who is but that Lords Servant Wherefore he endeavoured the planting of vertue in all as the best Promoter of the Service of God the Salvation of our souls and the common utility of all relations To which purpose he drew certain rules for Gentle men and persons of quality and likewise for Ladie and Gentlewomen Since those that are above others in place and dignity are seen at a further distance and their example makes a deeper impression of good or evil than that of the vulgar These I met with written by his own hand which deserve to be inserted here as a testimony of his zeal to do good to the Publique Certain Articles to minde all persons of quality of their Obligations to their Families their Tenants and in their †Lordships †For the better understanding of these Rules the Reader must know that the Lords in France have in several Mannors the power of Justice as well Criminal as Civil and for that purpose have their Judges and Subordinate Officers in their Courts THe first and most important obligation for the conduct of a family is good example without which the blessing of God cannot be expected It is therefore meet that all the Domesticks from the highest to the lowest give good example of modesty as well in the Church as in their particular Places and Offices that by the excellent harmony of their outward behaviour it may appear that God is the primum mobile within them For Officers 1. The Lord of the Mannor ought to inform himself Whether his Judges and other Subordinate Officers belonging to his Courts behave themselves well in their places and he ought to procure for this information and redress of what is amiss persons of known ability and integrity 2. He ought to examine with prudence and privacy what complaints shall be made by the people of injustice or bribery 3. Whether they observe the Rules and Laws of his Court. 4. Whether they frequent Taverns on Sundays and Holidays or in time of Divine Service 5. Whether they observe the Precepts of the Church in forbearing to travel and work on those days without real necessity 6. Whether they punish publique crimes as Blasphemy Usury c. and whether the Laws be put in execution against Drunkards Fornicators and Oppressors of the poor Whether they banish lewd women who procure manies ruine and cause so much mischief 7. Whether there be any such Libertines who scoff at Religion and Priests or eat flesh on days prohibited 8. If some notoriously wicked person be found in the Lordship it will be convenient to begin with him if it may be that the rest may understand that no quarter is to be given to vice and that it may appear to all the world with what firm resolution you proceed in what opposition to Libertines
and pastimes and other vices 3. To prevent that their Servingmen haunt not Taverns and oppress not others 4. The Mistris of the house must provide that her servants be carefully treated and tended in their sickness that she visit them in her own person even being as our brethren and fellow-servants of the same God and Father of us all And at all other times make provision for their necessaries that they be not tempted to pilfer or murmure 5. Let her also endeavour not onely in her own house but also among her neighbours to bring in the custom of common prayers at night and if her husband be absent let her supply his place in calling them together and praying with them 6. Let her and her children be continnally in some imployment that their lives be not unprofitable or their family brought up in idleness remembring the Apostles rule that he that will not work shall not eat which thing prudently ordered will prevent many inconveniences 7. Let her often visit her poor neighbours to comfort and encourage them in vertuous living 8. Let her take into her eare the repairing of the Ornaments and Linnen of the Church lest the holy mysteries of our faith be undervalued where decency is neglected 9. Let her shew great recverence to the Clergy not regarding the meanness of their birth but the dignity to which Jesus Christ hath advanced them Hereby both putting them in minde of their honourable function and the people by her example of their duty 10. Let her entertain Visitants with the spirit of Hospitality great Charity and Christian Civility taking opportunity thereby to do some good not losing precious time in frivolous discourses 11. Let her keep no obscene or immodest pictures in her house much less permit her danghters or herself to appear such by going naked Avoiding likewise all curious and phantasticul fashions which are evident signs of impenitent hearts and breed nothing else but the nourishing the soul in its corruption and the averting it from God These are the Directions he left under his own hand for Ladies and Gentlewomen Moreover he studied for a long time how to reform Trades and free them from those abuses and corruptions which in process of time they had contracted and so to sanctifie them that some at least in each profession might live like the Primitive Christians in such sort as to make all their gain common deducting onely sufficient for their own necessary maintenance and bestowing the rest upon the poor And at length God so blessed his endeavours that he found some Tradesmen of the same minde and spirit so that at this present there be two companies in Paris one of Taylors the other of Shoo-makers and of these in two several quarters of the City and the like at Tolose who live and do all in Community They rise they go to bed they eat and work together morning and evening they say their prayers together and at the beginning of every hour in the day exercise some act of Devotion as singing a Psalm reciting their Chaplet reading in some book of Devotion discoursing of some head of the Catechism They call Brothers and live accordingly in very great unity and concord Monsieur Renty was the chief Agent in establishing this business and with the help and assistance of some Religious persons drew up Rules for the ordering of their Spiritual Exercises They chose him their first Superior in which Office he had a very particular care of them visiting them frequently and when he found them upon their knees at any of their Spiritual Exercises joyned with them not permitting them to rise to salute him or interrupt so good a work making himself as it were one of the Brotherhood Moreover besides these Tradesmen living in Community there were a great number of others of all Professions that came to him for advice instruction and assistance Whom he treated with wonderful respect and Charity most affectionately discoursing with them answering their quaeries resolving their doubts and instructing them what they should pursue and what avoid in their Vocations for the saying of their souls SECT 6. The Continuation of the same subject HIs zeal carried him on to endeavour the good of all sorts of persons He had a particular inclination to prevent the danger that threatned young Maids who wanted subsistence and to reclaim such as were faln And indeed it would be too great a task to recount all his actions of this nature and the number of those Maids whom he placed forth and contributed towards their maintenance some in houses erected for such purpose others in the Monastry of St. Mary Magdalen and others with devout Ladies who addicted themselves to this kinde of Charity Which is so highly commendable as that which doth not onely save such women as are in peril of shipwrack of their honour and vertue and retrive such as have already lost both But likewise doth prevent the destruction of many men and the committing of many enormous sins and disorders We mentioned before what is recorded of his Charity in instructing the poor at the great Hospital in Paris And now I shall relate how he behaved himself in that of St. Gervaise where passing by one day in the year 1641. he enquired to what Charities that place was devoted To which answer was made that they lodged poor Travellers He was much pleased with this Institution and perceiving withal that so great a number of poot that lodged there every night wanted instruction he found himself moved from God to perform that Office And shortly after came to beg of the Superiour with great humility and submission leave to Catechize them in the evening when they were assembled together To which the Superiour willingly assented without any knowledge of him who would not tell his name but concealed himself for the space of six-Moneths He undertook the imployment and performed it with great content because every night he found there new comers whom he duly Catechized and instructed coming thither commonly alone and on foot both Summer and Winter in â—ain and snow without light in the dark After Chatechism ended he caused them to kneel down with him to examine their Conscience saâ— their Prayers then sung the Commandments with them and distributed some Alms. This 〈◊〉 he continued for many years till some Eccle 〈◊〉 persons moved by his example undertook 〈…〉 and continued it to this day with great 〈◊〉 〈…〉 and renderness of heart was exceeding 〈…〉 poor people whom he had never seen 〈…〉 also with such humility as cannot not easily be expressed When he met any one at the Hospital he saluted them with great respect and put them before him talked with them bareheaded and very reverently If at any time they kneeled to him he did the like to them and continued on his knees till they rose first One of them observing him diligently and knowing him to be Lord of the place where himself lived was
deeply affected to see these things and came and fell down at his feet Monsieur Renty did the like to him continuing in that posture for a long time resolving not to rise before the poor man He used to receive them in his arms and embrace them with tender affection These actions proceeding from a person of his birth and quality and produced by the holy Spirit of God wrought wonderful effects And that first in these poor Passengers who astonished at such ardent Charity joyned with suth profound humility were exceedlingy moved thereby insomuch that tears of Devotion were seen flowing from their eyes and themselves falling down at his feet with signs of repentance for their sins and a design of a better life begging his counsel and assistance therein and beginning it with going to Confession and the Sacrament the next day Secondly in those Religious women that belonged to this Hospital who taking fire at his example resolved to do the like in daily serving the poor teaching them their Prayers and Catechism with the ten Commandments which offices they had never done before Together with many other good things conducing to their own attaining to perfection and the better governing of their Hospital which he infused into them and they do still continue with great Devotion he having several times told them that he hoped in time to see God greatly glorified and served among them as we see it is come to pass at this day and may truly affirm that this gallant man hath contributed not a little to so much good done there both within doors and without and doubt not but he hath already received the reward thereof in Heaven But let us further consider some other effects of his zeal Going one day with a friend to visit the holy place of Mont-Matre to which he had great Devotion after his prayers said in the Church he retired into a desolate place of the Mountain near a little spring which as it is said St. Denis made use of where he kneeled down to his prayers which ended made his dinner of a piece of bread and draught of water Grace being said he took out the New Testament which he always carried in his pocket and read a Chapter upon his knees bareheaded with extraordinary reverence In this juncture of time came thither a poor man saying his Chaplet Monsieur Renty rose up to salute him and fell into a discourse with him concerning God and that so powerfully that the good man striking his breast fell down upon the ground to adore that great God making such evident appearances of the great impressions that were wrought upon his Spirit that struck Monsieur Rexty and his friend with much astonishment Immediately after this came a poor Maid to draw water at the well Whom he asked what she was She answered a Servant But do you know saith he that you are a Christian and to what end you were created Whereupon he took occasion to instruct her in what he conceived necessary for her to know and so to the purpose that she confessing her former ignorance told him ingenuously that before that hour she had never thought of her salvation but promised from thence forward to take it into serious consideration and go to Confession Let us still proceed a little higher on the same subject In his return from Dijon after his first journey thither accompanied with two noble pious persons about some four leagues He stopped three or four times by the way to Catechize poor Passengers and one time went far out of his way to do the same to some labourers in the field instructing them how to sanctifie their work they were about A young Maid in Paris having been very cruelly used by her Uncle fell into so great disorder and desperation that all in a fury she accused our blessed Saviour to be the cause of her misery in abondoning her to the barbarous usage of such a man without releiving her In this horrid plight of conscience she went to receive the Sacrament several times in a day at several Churches that she might not be discovered And this upon design to do despite to our Saviour to provoke him to finish her destruction as it was begun letting her to fall into the abyss of misery and hell for ever Monsieur Renty advertised of this sad accident and considering the great offence against God and mischief of this poor creature was transported with zeal speedily to finde her out Which after eight days pursuit from several Churches at length he did meeting with her in the very act of Communicating Taking witnesses he conveyed her to an Hospital for Mad-folks where he took so great care both of her soul and body that she returned to herself and gave ample testimonies of her conversion and repentance for those horrid enormities Neither did his zeal reach onely to those that were near him but such also as were absent and far remote to whom he had no other relation but what was contracted by his alliance to our blessed Saviour and his own Charity Understanding the news that was current some years since of a War the Turk designed against the Knights of Malta and to besiege the Island he so far interested himself in their danger that he recommended it twice by Letter to the prayers of Sister Margaret Carmelite of the B Sacrament at Beaulne whom he deemed to have great power with God His first Letter runs thus I commend to your prayers and of the holy Family the Order of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem which is at this present in great danger and with them the whole Christian World What that common Potent enemy of our faith will do I know not one Our little Jesus who is all love and power knows how to vindicate his own glory please you therefore to commend it to him In the second Letter thus I beseech the Omnipotency of the holy Babe Jesus to preserve his children under the Cross and to purifie them for his own work This is it which I request for our Brethren of the Order of St. John Baptist of Jerusalem SECT 7. Certain other qualities of his zeal THe design of advancing the Salvation of mens souls is attended in this world with much doing and much suffering It is necessary therefore for him that undertakes the task to fortifie himself with courage and patience And both these were most eminently in Monsieur Renty being in the first place full of courage resolute and laborious imploying his body as if he had two more in reserve when that was spent dispatching more business in one half hour than others would have done in many days Very stout he was to undergo any difficulties and withal very quick and decisive A certain Lady of note made him her executor having disposed in her will very much to pious uses He was informed that her friends being persons of eminent power were displeased therewith To which he replyed with a
herself may arrive Seeing a Gentleman of his birth and age in a Secular life and the throng of so great employments attained hereto onely if we use the like diligence and be faithful to the Spirit of God the onely means to attain to this perfection CHAP. 6. His great Reverence to Holy Things MOnsieur Renty did not onely carry a great Reverence to God but likewise to all things belonging to his Service and to all Holy things which sprang from that sense of Vertue and Religion imprinted in his soul producing the like fruits Exteriourly In the first place he had a singular respect to all Holy places and it will be very hard to recoâ—n with what Respect and Devotion he behâ—ved himself in Churches At his entrance his demeanour was exceeding modest and religiously grave He never sare down there nor put on his hat not so muâ—h as in Sermon time he would abide there as long as possibly he could and hath been observed upon great Festivals to remain there upon his knees for seven or eight hours He was very silent in the Church and if any person of any condition spoke to him his answer was short and in case the business required longer time he would carry him forth or some other way free himself thereof Secondly he used great veneration to all Ecclesiastical persons even to the meanest but the Reverence he gave to Priests was wonderful He would never take the upper hand of them without extream violence as appears by that passage in the former Chapter Whensoever he met them he saluted them with profound humility and in his travel would light off his horse to do it and render them all honour possible When they came to visit him he entertained them cordially with exceeding great respect at their departure waiting on them to the gate and if any dined at his table gave them the upper place which civility he observed to his own Chaplain When any Mission was in any of his Lordships he entertained the Missioners apart where they were served in plate when other Gentlemen and persons of quality that visited him were onely in pewter waving herein all humane respects A Nobleman and his Lady came one day to him upon a visit accompanied with a Priest that was Tutor to their children After he had received them observing the Priest at the lower end of his Hall with some of their Retinue quitting civilly the Nobleman and his Lady he went down to the Priest shewing great respect to him as to the most honoatable person of the company In fine his opinion of the Priesthood was so venerable looking upon it as the most potent means for procuring the glory of God that he said to a friend That he had a design to enter into that Order if God should ever bring him into a condition capable of it And as he had this singular Reverence toward them so likewise had he an earnest desire that they and generally all Ecclesiastical persons should understand the excellency of the condition to whiâ—h God had call'd them leading a life agreeable to their Dignity He writ to his Director in the year 1645. upon occasion of several Ecclesiasticks of his acquaintance who correspond not to their Profession and Obligation that his heart melted into sorrow for them and that he prostrated himself before his Saviour and begged with tears for some Apostolike Spirits to be sent amongst us our poor Fishermen Give us O Lord our poor Fishermen I often repeated I meant the Apostles But this word ran much in my minde not being able to use any other and my spirit wronght much upon these words Pescheurs Pecheurs Fishermen and Sinners I look upon these men simple indeed in their Exteriour but great Princes in their Interiour whose life and outward appearance vile in the eyes of men and estranged from the pomp of the world converted souls by their Sanctity by their Prayers by their Vâ—gilance and restless Labours And herein I discover a great mistake ordinary in the world which believes that outward greatness and pomp is the way to keep up ones credit and render him more capable to do good to his neigbours But we are foully mistaken for it is grace that hath power upon souls and an holy and humble life that gaineth hearts With the same spirit he bewailed much the hasty and irreverent reciting of their Office in many places Being this day present at Divine Service saith he in a Letter to me many words therein put me in minde of the holiness thereof and yet I could not without much grief take notice of some chanting it hastily without devotion or spirit and others hearing it accordingly Good God what pitty is this where is our faith My eyes were ready to run over with tears but I forced my self to refrain them In the third place he had a great respect and love to Religious Persons and all such as dedicated themselves to the Service of God encouraging and assisting them with all his might This Letter he writ to one that was assaulted with great combats I must needs let you know the tender resentment I have of those tempests and present storms that you endure I know no reason why men should alarum you thus nor that you have done any thing against the Gospel which is the onely thing they should condemn you for I believe it will be very hard for them to gather a just cause of reproach from your design For my own part I do not wonder at these crosses its sufficient to know that you belong to Jesus Christ and do desire to follow him reckoning contradiction to be your portion in these days of your flesh Be you onely firm in your confidence upon our Lord suffering no storms from without to trouble you or obscure that light that hath guided and pressed you to this business I pray God deliver you from the reasonings of flesh and blood which often multiply upon us in such matters assuring you that if you give not car to them God will manifest himself unto you that is he will comfort and fortifie you in faith and in experience of the gifts of his Holy Spirit To another he writ thus Blessed for ever be the Blessed Infant Jesus for the happy entrance of those two devout souls into Religion which you mention I shall rejoyce exceedingly in their perseverance the best argument of their effectual calling If the other party you know of had a little more confidence and courage to break her fetters it would be a great step for her And surâ—ly there is not need of so much prudence and deliberation to give up our selves to him who to the Gentiles is foolishness and to the Jews a stumbling block This world is a strange cheat and amusement insinuating into and infecting every thing God hath no need of our good parts nor of our rare qualities who commonly confounds the wisdom of the wise by little things which he chuseth
finde experimentally a real union both in light and faith with the party I mentioned which is more than palpable giving me assurance that we are all one Upon this occasion I shall acquaint you in what manner my minde hath been busied these few last days and is yet full of it and to the end my relation may be more intelligible I shall take the matter somewhat higher The operation I have found in my self for these two or three years hath constantly held me fixed in the pursuit of our Saviour Christ to finde in him Eternal-Life before God the Father through the influence of his Spirit of which I have from time to time given you account And now I confess to you that though for that time I also honoured from the bottom of my heart our B. Lady the Saints and Angels and have been desirous to express it upon all occasions yet so it was that their presence and their commerce was obscured in and as it were very remote from my soul I assure you that those thoughts hath frequently run in my minde saying thus within my self I so much honour our Lady and some other Saints and Angels and I know not where they are I lifted up my heart easily towards them but there was no presence of them at all at least such as I now perceive it Some moneths ago I possessed an opening and a light in my soul accompanied with powerful effects concerning love and dear union with God making me to conceive inexplicable things of God the Father Son and Holy Ghost who is perfect Charity not by the reasonings and discourses of the understanding but by a single view most by one touch penetrating the heart with love And I beheld how the Son of God our Saviour came to advance us by his Incarnation into this love uniting himself to us whereby to reduce us all into this intimate and sweet union until he shall have compleated us all in himself to be made all of us one day all in God after he hath delivered up his Kingdom to his Father Ut sit Deus omnia in omnibus That God may be all in all And we enter into this blessed union with the Father Son and Holy Ghost Some ten or twelve days since being in my morning prayers on my knees to pray unto God I perceived in my self that I could findâ— no entrance unto him onely I kept my self there much humbled but the sight of the Father the access to him of the Son with whom I ordinarily converse with as much confidence as if he were yet upon earth and the assistance of the holy Ghost seemed at a strange distance withheld from me and I perceived an unworthiness in my self so great so real and so penetrating that I could no more lift up the eyes of my soul to heaven than these of my body Than was iâ— given me to understand that I had really that unworthiness which I felt But that I must seek my entry to God and to our Saviour in the Communion of Saints Whereupon I was on an instant possessed with a wonderful presence of the respect and love and union of the B. Virgin the Angels and Saints which I am not able to express nor to utter the greatness and solidity of this grace For this union is Life Eternal and the Ecclesiastical Paradise and this union is both for the Saints in Heaven and those on earth which I have almost always in full view and presence From thenceforward I understood that we were not made by God to be alone and separate from others but to be united unto them and to compose with them one divine total Even as a beautiful stone fitted for the head of a column is altogether unprofitable till it be settled in its place and cemented to the body of the building without which it hath neither its preservation its beauty nor its end This meditation left me in the love and in the true and experimental connexion of the communion and communication of Saints yet with a due order of those to whom I am more united which is my Life in God and in Jesus Christ our Lord. This is the contents of that Letter CHAP. 7. His devotion to the Holy Sacrament ONe of the greatest Devotions of this holy man was that to the H. Eucharist considered both as a Sacrifice and as a Sacrament of which he had ever an incredible esteem honouring it with all possible reverence and affecting it with tender love blessing and praising God for its institution and exciting both by his word and pen the whole world to do the same He was accustomed to say that it was instituted to stay and place our Saviour God and Man in the midst of us to obtain for us all the benefits of grace whereof we are capable here and to dispose us for those of glory That the great design of God in the Incarnation the Life Death and Resurrection of his Son was to convey unto us his Spirit to be unto us Life Eternal which Spirit he hath taught us by his Word merited for us by his Death doth more confer upon us from his estate of Glory And the better to convey this unto us to cause us to live thereby and dye in our selves he giveth himself to us in this most Holy Sacrament dead raised up and glorified to produce in us by the operation of his Spirit these two effects of death and life He was not onely present every day at Mass but took it for a great honour to serve the Priest himself He received every day if not hindred by very important business or some pressing occasion of Charity And as the honour we render to this B. Sacrament consists not in often receiving but in communicating well and perfectly he took all care thereof that could be expected from one of so holy life and eminent Piety He spent many hours in prayers upon his knees before the Blessed Sacrament And being once asked by a friend How he could remain there so long He answered That there he recreated his spirit receiving from thence refreshment and new forces and yet sometimes he encountred with some trouble in that Devotion which may be gathered from this Letter to his Director dated the 27 of June in the year 1647. I have been very poor all this moneth I know not whether I was ever so lumpish both in spirit and body as I was upon the Festival day of the Blessed Sacrament I was present at Service at Procession at Mass at Communion heard the Sermon at Vespers and Compline but like a very beast not knowing how to demean my self either kneeling or standing I was in a kinde of restless condition of body and very wandring and distracted in spirit onely I knew well that in the bottom of my soul I had a desire to honour God through his Son Christ Jesus After Compline I found my self so dull and heavy that seeing my self unable to remain
how much she was troubled to see him so much honoured and esteemed by men Who answered her First That she had great reason for it in that he so little deserved it And secondly upon her demand how those commendations assected him He replied I neither attend nor return any answer to them they affect me no more than a stock through the grace of God I am insensible of praise and dispraise the one nor the other make not any impression upon my spirit but I entertain them without reflexion And he had good reason since'as all the prayers men bestow upon us make us not one jot the better so neither their opprobries the worse Besides that ordinarily in the distribution of these the greatest piece of injustice in the world is committed by commending such as least deserve it but rather shame and confusion and blaming such whom God highly esteemeth In the fourth place he was dead and crucified to all supernatural good things all spiritual delights and favours which without comparison are of greatest value above all that we have named even to all gifts vertues perfections which he desired and sought after with a most disengaged and self-denying spirit not lusting after this or that vertue this or that degree of perfection but willing and desiring all according to Gods will about which he expressed himself further thus The love of our selves is so afraid to be stripped out of any thing that it suffers us not to be carried forth to our true rest as long as it can subsist and uphold it self by its own right and property which should teach us to use all diligence for the annihilation of our own desires even of those that seem to us to tend onely to vertue I say that seem to us whereas indeed if God gave us a true light we should undoubtedly see that the course which tends to our divesting of all these things carries us on secretly but most really to the true possession of them and our own preservation and that we must daily descend to our own nothingness in which alone God is to be found Thrice happy are all such poor in spirit He was also dead and annihilated to all gusts of Devotion all sensible Graces and Consolations of which our love-sick souls are so greedy Upon which subject he expressed himself thus I am better satisfied with those graces in which sense hath no part than with those that have more of the sensible of which indeed I am somewhat jealous for we finde amongst spiritual persons great store of counterfeit riches of the Spirit those I mean who are all for gusts and sensible consolations and illuminations in this state of exile wherein we ought to live rather by faith than feeling and which is much to be â—amented We meet very few that are not infected with this â—â—ch it being the natural condition of man to desire to see and to that end to affect and search for enlightnings and wanting the experimental knowledge of that which comes from God which is not to be gotten but by quitting his own he looks after that which he findes in himself mistaking it for Divine because it is modeliz'd to his own gust and fancy And in another Letter thus As for obscurities aridities and other troubles of spirit they are to be born with upon any terms and we must give up our selves as forlorn creatures throwing our selves into God on all sides of us as a fish in the Ocean which is its proper element into God at all times and for all things If we be true members of our Saviour Christ Jesus we shall see nothing but submissions and abnegations and shall sense nothing else but these He was dead and annihilated also to all glorious and extraordinary favours enjoyments of which he had no other feeling than the Sun which being covered over with light and crowned with glory yet is no way sensible thereof insomuch that having received by the mouth of a great Saint promises of some great favours from God he returned this answer to his Director Those things whereof they have given me notice and assurance must be as they may I rest nothing upon them nor confide in them knnowing it to be my duty to live by faith Being certified at another time of a special favour received from our Saviour it had no other operation upon him but the impression of a great confusion and profound humility And as they gave him all these things in writing at large he parted with them all to his Director together with all his other secrets and most important papers of Devotion especialy those written with his own blood formerly mentioned an evident demonstration of his great humility by reason that most men are taken with those parcels of piety grounding this their affection to them upon some benefit receiveable by them But the reliance which is placed upon God must be disengaged from every thing else This he made appear by this Letter to his Director I have received the paper which mentions this grace and favour whereof I send you the copy having no other reflection thereupon but to meet it with the greatest latitude of heart I can possible to bless God acknowledge his goodness and serve him for it I have burnt the original with several other papers of the like nature If you judge it not convenient that I should do so let me receive your commands accordingly for the future I could wish if there be any thing left for me to wish that I had nothing left me but my God This is the sure replenishment of the soul and rich treasure of the heart Moreover he was wholly dead to all that God wrought by him taking no share thereof nor interesting himself any more with them after they were done than if they had been performed by another Fifthly he was crucified and dead to all affections not onely such as are irregular but those also which are purely natural of all creatures and in particular of those who used his counsel and depended upon him for the conduct of their souls wherein the obligations and relations on both parts use to be more than ordinary insomuch that upon a separation there falls out de jection of spirit and distractions of Devotion To this purpose he writ to one of those persons thus I cannot without much trouble bear the great matter you make of my converse and of my removes Let us breath after God and make good our alliance with Jesus Christe to learn in and from him a profound abnegation of our selves And in another Letter thus Jesus Christ is ever the same and his grace is continually advancing and as long as I am to him so long shall I be to you for him and in him he is not wont to part souls by the separation of bodies since his custom is to separate onely what is imperfect as being that which very often brings with it some hinderances to the perfect life of
touched him so near in that he never spake word to me of it nor of his mother save onely to desire that they both might be recommended to God And from the beginning that I had the honour to speak to him when I gave him notice of the offers that divers persons had made us to ferve him he thankt me most heartily for my good will with great acknowledgment towards those persons and without speaking any more thereof he fell upon discoursing of God never after opening his mouth about that business which evidenced a wonderful disengagement and death to every thing though of never so sensible an interest There past also many other things at Dijon and since at Paris during these differences even to the death of his mother yea and after which required an extream deal of patience and which he practised in an Heroical perfection even to the astonishment of those who were acquainted with the business But it is enough of this matter we have spoken sufficiently and I doubt not Monsieur de Renty who is now as his eminent vertues give us sufficient ground to believe in the place of perfect Charity doth approve of my design in not speaking more thereof and of using reservedness towards that Lady to whom all his life he bore so much love and respect CHAP. 6. Of his Mortification WHat we have spoken hitherto in this Second Part of the Austerities of the Poverty Humility and Patience of Monsieur de Renty makes appear evidently to what height he was mortified and that he was a true grain of that mysterious wheat mentioned by our Saviour which by dying brings forth much fruit yet besides all this we shall touch here some other effects of his Mortification The grand secret of Christian-life consists in the destruction of what our nature hath in it vitious the better to give way to grace in crucifying the old man that Jesus Christ may live there who hath taught us that this is not acquired but by continual Mortification and to that end hath told us that if any man doth not take up his Cross and that dayly he cannot be my disciple This excellent Scholar of that great Master having well learnt his lesson employed all his care in the beginning of his Conversion to mortifie himself in every thing to subdue his passions to regulate his motions Interior and Exterior to annihilate his desires and to dye to all the inclinations of corrupt nacure with so great faithfulness and constancy that as soon as he perceived her to carry him to any thing with some imperfection and that his natural will enclined one way he did the quite contrary And he told an intimate person that having undertaken the endeavour to oppose his nature in each thing by the grace of God he had always surmounted it insomuch that in all things he proceeded with a spirit of death and continual sacrifice making no further use of his passions senses nor of any thing in him but with an eye always open to hinder the operations of malign nature and whatever she brought thereto of her own following the conduct of our Lord saying that a man must disengage himself from himself and every creature that God onely may be his object And accordingly he performed it exactly for when in his sickness he endured most sharp pains he was so taken up with God and abstracted from them that he thought not of them It was impossible to finde a man more reserved in speaking of that which troubled him than he For as he knew that nature is apt to seek and comfort it self in discoursing of that which hurts her so he deprived her of that satisfaction and content lifting up in the mean while his heart to God and offering him his pain without otherwise dwelling upon it being glad that Gods work went forward that the body of sin was in destroying his sacrifice advancing He that is baptized said he ought to be dead in Jesus Christ and to lead a life of suffering and in this suffering of application to God let us march on to our end which is sacrifice in each thing in the manner that God will have it upon the bottom of obedience to his orders and of the annthilation of our selves in the imitation and by the Spirit of Jesus Christ Let us be so many Victims entertained and taken up with these Interior dispositions and sentiments that Christ had from his conception to his death and to the last period of his offering up Hence it was he had often in his mouth these words Sacrifice Vnion minding to say thus that we ought to study and enforce our selves to dye in each thing to our selves and for the attaining thereof to sacrifice to God our spirit our judgement our will our thoughts our affections our desires our passions and all in the union and after the manner of Jesus Christ In these apprehensions he wrote to a person that he had great devotion to these words which the 24 Elders sang in the Revelations to the Lamb which is our Lord prostrate before his Throne Thou hast made us Kings and Priests and we shall reign upon the earth In that this divine Lamb causeth that God establisheth his Kingdom in us by reigning in our souls and in our bodies by his grace that we are Priests to offer up our selves to him in sacrifice and that by this means we shall reign for ever with him in the land of the living So that this excellent man in all occasions where it behoved him to deny something to his nature and to dye to himself cast his eyes upon this estate of sacrifice and of victime to offer up himself to the glory of God by the pattern of his Son our Lord. This great and continual care which he had to mortifie himself in each thing brought about that he had so tamed his passions so regulated the motions of his soul and body so changed his inclinations and subdued his nature that at length he came to such a point of Mortification passive and of death that he felt no more in the spirit any opposition to any thing painful and was not mortified with any thing whatsoever From thence came it that writing to his Director concerning his disposition he said that he understood not that which they call Mortification because that where there is no contradiction nor resistance there is no mortification and when there befel any thing of a much mortifying nature and would have touch'd him much if he had been as yet alive to himself if any familiar person spake to him of the pain thereof he said smiling that the thing went well and that we must gain upon our selves that nothing may mortifie us any more and that we be as it were insensible to each thing He came to this pass not by the goodness of his nature nor by a kinde of stupid indifferency which sometimes is found in certain sleepy spirits but by
his labour and vertue which had made this blessed work in him and had changed his nature for they that knew his youth report that naturally he was of a swelling hasty haughty and jeering disposition which he had so corrected or to say better annihilated that in truth it was admirable insomuch that he was become moderate staid patient humble and respectful in a degree of consummate perfection So that if we consider him well a man may say that he was of a disposition quite contrary and diametrically opposite to that which he brought from his mothers womb teaching us by an example so assured and illustrious that a man may prevail much over himself if he endeavour it sincerely and that whatever vice he hath he may at last rid himself of it if he force himself according to those words of our Lord The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force And therefore he recommended in a special manner this holy courage and the necessity of self-enforcement as being that by which we may measure what profit we have made in true vertue and a means also absolutely necessary for the gaining of perfection He wrote to a person that practised devotion thus O how much to be feared is it that we cheat our selves with the name and the appearances of devotion relying much on our exercises of piety which it may be are barely performed and in speculation onely never coming to the practise nor to the conquest over our selves In the morning we worship Jesus Christ as our Master and Director and yet our life all the day following is not directed by him we look upon him as our pattern and imitate him not we take him for our rule and guide of our affections and yet we do not sacrifice to him our appetites we make him the model of our conversation which yet is never the more holy we promise him to labour and get above our selves but it s no more than in imagination The truth is that if we know not our devotion rather by the violence and enforcement we make upon our selves and the amendment of our manners than by the multiplication and simple usage of spiritual exercises it is to be feared they will be rather practises of Condemnation than of Sanctification For after all to what purpose all this if the work follow not if we change not our selves and destroy not that which is vitious in our nature It is no otherwise but as if a builder should pile together many materials towards making of a brave Edifice and yet never begin it And yet we see the work of Jesus Christ is almost reduced to this pass amongst the spiritual persons of these times He said to another that the love which a Christian soul was obliged to bear to he vertues which Jesus Christ hath taught us ought not to end in the simple sentiments of esteem and respect toward them whereby souls of the common sort are easily perswaded that they have done their duty but therein they deceive themselves for that our Lords will is undoubtedly that they make a further entry into the solidity of his Divine practises specially in Mortification Patience Poverty and Renouncement of our selves and that is the cause why there are so few souls truly Christian and solidly spiritual yea even sometimes amongst the Religious was this that men contented themselves to make a stand at this first step I will end this Chapter and this Second Part with a Letter which he writ to his Director who had thought it fit for him to visit a person that had great need of succour and instruction for some spiritual dispositions which he performed with much success and benediction This Letter dated the 14 of May in the year 1647. will make us well see the great disengagement that he had from himself and his perfect Mortification attended with gifts inestimable and his great light whereby he clears and explicates matters of great subtilty The tenour is as followeth For the person whom you know and the visit I made him it is God and your direction that hath done all I am so much afraid to mingle therein any thing of mine that going to the place where he is yet I perceive I shall not visit him without a new order from you or that he much desire it I have not since that time so much as sent any commendations to him considering with my self that we must keep the man reserved and in great sobriety And I thought it fit to cast all this upon you as my guide in the business Ha Father the great imperfection of souls is the not waiting enough on God the natural disposition strugling and not brought into subjection comes in with fine pretexts and thinks to do wonders and in the mean while it is that which sullies the purity of the Soul that which troubles its silence and turns aside its sight from Faith from Affiance and from Love whence it hapneth that the Father of Lights expresseth not in us his Eternall Word nor produceth in us his Spirit of Love The Incarnation hath merited all not onely for the abolition of our faults but also for all the dispositions of grace whereunto Jesus Christ is minded to â—ssociate us of which this is the principal and was in him so far as he was man to do nothing our selves but to speak and act according as we receive knowing that we alone are not to do the work but that the holy Spirit which is the Spirit of Jesus and which governed him in all his ways is within us which would stamp upon us his impressions and give us the life the life real and experimental of our faith if ballasted and held back by patience we would but wait his operation This is it in which I feel my infirmity and yet whither I finde a great attractive I see that which I cannot utter for I possess that which I cannot express And the cause Father why I am so brief comes both from the imperfection of my natural disposition and from ignorance as also from a great largeness of the Divine goodness which works in me that which I cannot utter The effect of this is a fulness and a satiating of the truth and clearness of the magnificence of God of the greatness of Jesus Christ and of the riches which we have in him of the most Holy Virgin and of the Saints one sees here all praise and adoration and comtemplates them within I tell you here of many things me seems and yet all this is done with one draught so simple and so strong in the superiour part of the Spirit that I am nothing diverted from it by any exteriour employments I see all I understand all and I do though it be ill all that I have to do This is that I present you with to receive therein from you instruction and correction Thus we see the admirable benefits that come from perfect Mortification and