Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	church_n	faith_n	tradition_n	1,984	5	9.0083	5	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A41099	The maxims of the saints explained, concerning the interiour life by the Lord Arch-bishop of Cambray &c. ; to which are added, Thirty-four articles by the Lord Arch-Bishop of Paris, the Bishops of Meaux and Chartres, (that occasioned this book), also their declaration upon it ; together with the French-King's and the Arch-Bishop of Cambray's letters to the Pope upon the same subject.; Explication des maximes des saints sur la vie interieure. English	Fénelon, François de Salignac de La Mothe-, 1651-1715.; Fénelon, François de Salignac de La Mothe-, 1651-1715. Correspondence.; Louis XIV, King of France, 1638-1715. Correspondence.; Noailles, Louis-Antoine de, 1651-1729.; Godet des Marais, Paul, 1647-1709.; Bossuet, Jacques Bénigne, 1627-1704. Instruction sur les estats d'oraison, où sont exposées les erreurs des faux mystiques de nos jours.	1698 (1698)	Wing F675; ESTC R6318	100,920	267

is united to God without any medium either by the Veil of Faith or the infirmity of the Flesh since the fall of Adam nor by the medicinal Grace of Jesus Christ by whom alone one may in every state go to the Father To speak at this rate is to renew the Heresie of the Beggards Condemned by the Council of Vienna XLI ARTICLE True THE Spiritual Wedding uniteth immediately the Bride to the Bridegroom essence to essence substance to substance that 's to say will to will by that entirely pure Love so often mentioned Then God and the Soul make no more but one and the same Spirit as the Bride and the Bridegroom in Marriage are made but one Flesh He who adheres to God is made one and the same Spirit with him by an intire conformity of the will which is the work of Grace The Soul is then fully satiated and in a Joy of the Holy Ghost which is the bud of Coelestial happiness She is in an entire purity that 's to say without any defilement of Sin except those daily Sins which the exercise of Love can immediately blot out and consequently she may without Purgatory be admitted into Heaven which no unclean thing can enter into for Concupiscence which remains always in this life is not incompatible with this entire purity since it is neither Sin nor a spot in the Soul But this Soul hath not her Original integrity being not exempt either from daily faults or from Concupiscency which are incompatible with their integrity To speak so is to speak with the Salt of Wisdom wherewith all our Words ought to be seasoned XLI False THE Soul in this state hath her Original integrity she sees God face to face she does enjoy him as fully as the Blessed To speak at this rate is to fall into the Heresie of the Beggards XLII ARTICLE True THE Union called by mystical Men essential and substantial consisteth in a simple and disinterested Love which fills all the affections of the whole Soul and which is exercised by Acts so peaceable and so uniform that they seem to be but one though they be several really distinguished Acts. Several mystical Writers have termed these Acts essential or substantial to distinguish them from Acts that are froward unequal and made as it were by the out-goings of a Love which is yet mixt and interested To speak so is to explain the true sense of mystical Writers XLII False THis Union becomes really essential between God and the Soul so that nothing is capable either to break or to alter it any more This substantial Act is permanent and indivisible as the substance of the Soul it self To speak at this rate is to teach an extravagancy as much contrary to all Philosophy as to Faith and to the true practice of Piety XLIII ARTICLE True GOD who conceals himself from the Wise and great ones reveals and communicates himself to the little ones and to the simple The transformed Soul is the Spiritual Man S. Paul speaks of that 's to say a Man acted and led by the Spirit of Grace in the way of pure Faith This Soul hath often both by Grace and by experience for all things of simple practise in the tryals and exercise of pure Love a knowledge which the Learned who have more science and humane Wisdom than experience and pure Grace have not She ought nevertheless to submit with heart as well as mouth not only to all the decisions of the Church but also to the Conduct of her Pastors as having a special Grace without exception to lead the Sheep of the flock XLIII False THE transformed Soul is the Spiritual Man of S. Paul so that she may judge of all the truths of Religion and be judged by no body She is the Seed of God that cannot Sin Unction teacheth her all so that she hath no need of being instructed by any body nor to submit to superiours To speak at this rate is to abuse the passages of Scripture and turn them to ones ruine 'T is to be ignorant that Unction which teacheth all teacheth nothing so much as obedience and suggesteth all truth of Faith and of practice only by inspiring the Ministers of the Church with an humble Docility In a word 't is to establish in the midst of the Church a Damnable Sect of Fanaticks and Independents XLIV ARTICLE True THE Pastors and Saints of all Ages have used a kind of an Oeconomy and secret in not speaking of the rigorous trials and of the most sublime exercise of pure Love but to those Souls to whom God had given already both attraction and light to it Though this Doctrine was the pure and simple perfection of the Gospel noted throughout the whole body of Tradition the Ancient Pastors proposed usually to the generality of Just Men no other than the practise of interested Love in proportion to their Grace and thus gave Milk to Infants while they distributed Bread to strong Souls To speak thus is to say what S. Clement Cassian and divers other Holy Authors both Ancient and Modern do constantly affirm XLIV False THere has been in all Ages among those that live Contemplative Lives a secret Tradition and such as has been unknown even to the body of the Church her self This Tradition would include secret Opinions beyond the truths of universal Tradition or these Opinions at least would be contrary to those of the common Faith and would exempt Souls from exercising all those Acts of an explicite Faith and dislimited Vertue which are no less essential to the ways of pure Love than to that which is interested To speak thus is to annihilate Tradition instead of multiplying it It is the way to make a sect of secret Hypocrites in the Bosome of the Church without her being ever able to discover them or to free her self from them Hereby the impious secret of the Gnosticks and Manicheans will be revived and all the Traditions of our Faith and Morals undermined ART XLV True ALL the Internal ways that are most eminent are so far from being above an habitual state of pure love that they are but the way to arrive at that bound of all perfection all inferiour degrees do not come up to this true estate The last degree which Mystick Writers call by the name of Transformation or Essential Union without any Medium is no more than a simple reality of this love without a peculiar interest This when true is the most safe state because it is the most voluntary and meritorious of all the states of Christian Justice and because 't is that which referrs all to God and leaves nothing to the Creature But on the contrary when 't is false and imaginary it is the heighth of illusion The Traveller after many Fatigues Dangers and Sufferings arriving at length upon the top of a Mountain from thence discerns at a distance his Native City and the end of his Journey and all his toils he is presently

than in pure Contemplation it self God whom they in supream simplicity do possess is enough for them They ought not to concern themselves either about the Divine Persons or the Attributes of the Divine Nature To speak at this rate is to take away the corner Stone It is to snatch from the Faithful Eternal life which consists wholly in knowing the only true God and Jesus Christ his Son whom he hath sent 'T is to be that Antichrist who rejects the Word made Flesh It is to deserve the Anathema pronounced by the Apostle against those who shall not love the Lord Jesus XXIX ARTICLE True IT may be said that positive Contemplation is infused because it prevents the Souls with a sweetness and Peace greater yet than do the other graces which prevent the common sort of Just Men. It is a grace more freely given than all the others given for Merit because it worketh in Souls the most pure and perfect Love But passive Contemplation is neither purely infused since it is free and meritorious nor meerly free since the Soul co-operates with Grace in it It is not miraculous since according to the Testimony of all the Saints it consists only in an Amorous knowledge and that Grace without a Miracle is sufficient for the most lively Faith and the most purified Love Lastly this Contemplation cannot be Miraculous since it is supposed to consist in a state of pure and dark Faith in which the faithful is not led by any other light but that of simple revelation and of the Authority of the Church common to all Just Men. 'T is true that several Mystical Writers have supposed this Contemplation to be Miraculous because in it is Contemplated a Truth that hath not been received in by the senses and through the imagination This true also that these Writers have acknowledged a bottom of the Soul which did work in this Contemplation without any distinct Operation of the faculties But these two things had only their Origin from Scholastick Philosophy whereof these Mystical Men were preconceited All this great Mystery vanisheth away assoon as one supposes with S. Augustine that we have without Miracle intellectual Ideas which have not passed through the senses and when it is supposed on the other side that the bottom of the Soul is not really distinguished from her powers Then all passive Contemplation is reduced to some thing very simple and which hath nothing miraculous 'T is a chain-work of Acts of Faith and of Love so simple so direct so peaceable and so uniform that they don't seem to do more than one only Act or even that they don't seem to do any Act at all but a repose of pure Union This is the reason why S. Francis of Sales won't have it called Union for fear of expressing a motion or action towards uniting but a simple and pure unity Hence it comes that some as S. Francis of Assisium in his great Song have said that they were able no longer to perform any acts and that others as Gregory Lopez have said that they did a continual Act during their whole life Both the one and the other by expressions seemingly opposite mean the same thing They do no more any eager acts and marked by an unquiet motion They produce Acts so peaceable and so uniform that these Acts though very successive and even interrupted do seem to them one only Act without interruption or a continual rest Hence it is that this Contemplation hath been call'd silent or quiet Prayer Hence it is Finally that it hath been called passive God forbid it should ever be called so to exclude from it the real positive and meritorious Action of the Free-Will or the real and successive Acts which ought to be reiterated every moment It is called Passive only to exclude the Activity or interested eagerness of Souls when they will yet agitate themselves in order to feel and see their operation which should be less mark'd were it both more simple and more united Passive Contemplation is nothing else but pure Contemplation The Active is that which is mixt with forward and discursive Acts. So when Contemplation hath yet a mixture of interested forwardness which is called Activity it is yet Active When it hath further remains of this Activity it is entirely Passive that 's to say Peaceable and uninterested in its Acts. In fine the more the Soul is Passive towards God the more Active is she in that which she ought to do That is to say that the more she is supple and pliant to the Divine impulse the more efficatious is her motion though without self agitation For it is always equally true that the more the Soul receiveth from God the more ought she to restore to him of what she hath from him This ebbing and flowing makes up all the order of Grace and all the fidelity of the Creature To speak so is to prevent all illusion 't is to explain the bottom of Passive Contemplation which cannot be denied without a notorious rashness and cannot be carried further without extremity of danger 'T is to disintricate whatever the Saints have said in terms which by the subtilty of some Divines have been somewhat darkned XXIX False PAssive Contemplation is purely Passive so that the Free-Will co-operates no more therein with Grace by any real and transient Act. It is purely infused and entirely a free gift and without Merit on the part of the Soul It is miraculous and draws while it lasts a Soul from the state of pure and dark Faith It is a possession and a supernatural rapture which prevents the Soul It is an extraordinary inspiration that puts the Soul out of the common rules It is an absolute binding or evacuation of the powers so that both the understanding and the will are then in an absolute impotency to any thing which without doubt is a miraculous and extatick suspension To speak at this rate is to overturn the System of pure Faith which is that of all good mystical Men and especially of the Blessed John of the Cross 'T is to confound Passive Contemplation which is free and meritorious with gifts meerly free and extraordinary and which as we are advised by the Saints ought never voluntarily to possess us It is to contradict all Authors who place this Contemplation in a free amorous and meritorious look and consequently in the real but simple Acts of these two Powers 'T is to contradict S. Theresa herself who assures us that the Seventh mansion hath none of the raptures which do suspend against the order of nature the operations of the understanding and of the will 'T is to oppose all the Eminent Spiritual Persons who have said that these suspensions of natural operations are so far from being a perfect state that on the contrary they are a sign that nature is not yet enough purified and that such effects as these do cease by how much the more the Soul is purified and grown

would rather never eat meat than Offend the least of his Brethren for whom Christ died How can we then be tied to any expression that gives Offence to a weak Soul Mystical Men therefore should take away all equivocal terms when they know the same are abused in order to corrupt the soundest Doctrine Let those who have spoken after an improper and exaggerated manner and without precaution explain their meaning and suffer nothing to be wanting for the edification of the Church let those who have been erroneous as to main Doctrinals not content themselves with condemning the Errors but let them confess they have believed them and give the Glory to God let them not be ashamed that they have erred as being what is natural to the race of Mankind but let them humbly confess their Errors since they remain to be no longer theirs after they have made an humble Confession of them It s in order to distinguish Truth from Falshood in so nice and important a matter that two great Prelates have Published Thirty-Four Articles that in substance contain all the Doctrine of the internal life and I have no other design in this undertaking than to give a larger Explanation of the same All these Internal ways have a tendency to pure or disinterested Love This pure Love is the highest degree of Christian perfection It is the end or boundary of all the ways known unto the Saints Whoever allows of nothing beyond that contains himself within the bounds of Tradition Whoever exceeds this bound is already out of the way If any one should doubt of the Truth and perfection of this Love I make an offer of shewing an universal and clear Tradition for it from the times of the Apostles to that of St. Francis de Sales without any interruption and I will thereupon publish when I am desired to do it a Collection of all passages out of the Fathers School-Men and holy mysticks who unanimously speak of it It will appear from this Collection that the Ancient Fathers spoke as vigorously to the matter as St. Francis de Sales and that they for the disinterest of Love have made the same Suppositions concerning Salvation that our disdainful Criticks so much laugh at when they meet with them in the Writings of the Saints of the last Age Even S. Augustine himself whom some have taken to be an Opposer of this Doctrine hath taught it as much as any other It 's true indeed the main Thing is to explain this pure Love aright and to mark out the exact Bounds beyond which its Disinterest could never go The Disinterest thereof can never exclude the Will from loving God without Bounds neither in regard to the Degree nor the Duration of that Love This can never exclude a Conformity in us to the good Pleasure of God who not only wills our Salvation but would have us will it with him for his Glory This Disinterested Love is always tied to the written Law performs entirely the same Acts and exercises the same distinct Vertues as Interested Love does with this only Difference that it doth exercise the same in a simple and peaceable Manner and such as is disengaged from every Motive of Self-Interest This holy Indifference that is so much praised by St. Francis de Sales is nothing else but the disinterest of this Love which is always indifferent and without any interested Will for itself but the same is always determined to and positively wills all that God would have us do according to his written Law and that by the Attraction of his Grace In order to the attaining to this State our Love must be purified and all our internal Trials are but the purification of it even Contemplation itself that is of a most passive Nature is nothing else but the peaceable and uniform Exercise of this pure Love We cannot insensibly pass from Meditation wherein we perform methodical and discursive Acts into Contemplation whose Acts are simple and direct but in proportion to our passing from interested to disinterested Love This passive State and Transformation together with the Spiritual Marriages and essential or immediate Vnion are no other than the entire Purity of this Love the Habit whereof without being ever either invariable or exempted from venial Sins very few Souls are endued with I do not speak of all these different Degrees that are so little known to the Generality of the Faithful but because they are Consecrated to us by being made use of by a great many Saints whom the Church hath approved off and have in these Terms explained their Experiences neither do I relate them for any other end than to explain them with the strictest Precaution Finally all these internal Ways tend to pure Love as to their End an habitual State whereof is the highest Degree attainable in the Pilgrimage of this Life it 's the Foundation and the top Stone of the whole Building Nothing can be rasher than to oppose the Purity of this Love that is so worthy of the Perfection of our God to whom all is due and of his Jealousie which is a consuming Fire But again there is nothing can be so rash as to go about to take away from this Love the reality of its Acts in the Practice of distinct Vertues by a Chymerical refining of it Lastly It will be no less dangerous to place the Perfection of the Internal Life in some mysterious State beyond the Bound fixed to it of an habitual State of pure Love It 's in order to prevent all these Inconveniences that I have taken upon me to treat of the whole Matter in the following Articles that are digested according to the various Degrees that have been remarked unto us by Mystical Men in the Spirittal Life Every Article will consist of two parts the first will be the true one which I shall approve of and which shall contain all that is Authorized by the Experiences of the Saints and pursuant to the sound Doctrine of pure Love The second shall be the false part where I shall exactly explain the very Place where the Danger of Illusion lies and as I shall give an Account also of what is exorbitant in every Article I shall qualisie the same and censure it according to the strict Rules of Theology And thus the first part of my Articles will be a Collection of exact Definitions of the Saints Expressions in order to reduce them all to an uncontestable meaning that can neither be liable to any Equivocation nor alarm the most timorous Souls It will be a kind of Dictionary for Definitions in order to know the exact meaning of every Term These Definitions together will make up a plain and compleat System of all the Internal Ways including a perfect Vnity seeing the whole thereof will be clearly reduced to the Exercise of pure Love that has been as vigorously taught by all the Fathers as by the more modern Saints But on the other hand the second part

Poyson XVIII False WE ought to conform our selves to all the Wills of God and to his permissions as to all his other Wills We ought therefore to permit Sin in our selves when we know God is about to permit it We ought to love our Sin though contrary to God by reason of its abjection which purifies our love and takes from us all pretence and desert of a reward Lastly the attraction or inspiration of Grace requires from Souls in order to render them more disinterested for the Eternal reward the breaking of the Written Law To Speak at this rate is to Teach Apostacy and to put the Abomination of Desolation in the most holy place it is not the Voice of the Lamb but of the Dragon XIX ARTICLE True VOcal without Mental Prayer that 's to say without the attention of the Mind and the Affection of the Heart is a Superstitious Worship which honoureth God with the Lips while the Heart is far from him Vocal Prayer is not good and meritorious but in as much as it is directed and animated by that of the Heart It is much better to recite but a few Words with great recollection and Love than long Prayers with little or no recollection when they are not Commanded To Pray both without attention and Love is to Pray as the Heathens did who thought to be heard for the Multitude of their Words One Prays no further than one desires and one doth not desire but by how much one loveth at least with an interested Love Nevertheless Vocal Prayer ought to be respected and consulted as being good to awake the Thoughts and the Affections which it expresses as having been taught by the Son of God to his Apostles and practised by the whole Church in all Ages To make light of this Sacrifice of Praises this fruit of the Lips that does confess the Name of the Lord would be an impiety Vocal Prayer may be troublesome for a while to those Contemplative Souls who are yet in the imperfect beginnings of their Contemplation because their Contemplation is more sensible and affecting than pure and quiet It may be also burthensome to Souls who are in the last Tryals because every thing in that state disturbs them But one ought never to give them for a rule to forsake without the permission of the Church and without a true impotency known to be so by their Superiours any Vocal Prayer which is obligatory Vocal Prayer taken with simplicity and without scruple when it is according to the Command may well be troublesome to a Soul in relation to those things we have already noted But it is never contrary to the highest Contemplation Experience even shews that the most Eminent Souls in the midst of their most sublime Communications have familiar Communications with God and that they read or recite with a loud Voice and in a kind of Transport some inflamed Words of the Apostles and Prophets To Speak so is to explain the soundest Doctrine with the most correct Words XIX False VOcal Prayer is nothing but the gross and imperfect Doctrine of beginners It is intirely unprofitable to Contemplative Souls They are by the eminency of their state dispensed with as to the reciting of Vocal Prayers Commanded them by the Church because their Contemplation eminently comprehends what is more edifying in the different parts of Divine Worship To Speak at this rate is to despise the Reading of the Scriptures it is to forget that Christ hath Taught us Vocal Prayer which contains the perfection of the highest Contemplation It is to be ignorant that pure Contemplation is never perpetual in this Life and that in its intervals one may and ought to recite faithfully the Office which is Commanded and which of it self is so apt to nourish in our Souls the Spirit of Contemplation XX. ARTICLE True REading ought not to be done either out of Curiosity or desire of judging of our State or deciding it according to what we Read nor out of a certain relish of what we call Witty and sublime We ought not to read the most holy Books nor even the Scriptures but with dependency upon the Pastors and Directors who are in their stead 'T is they who are to judge whither each faithful Christian is prepared enough if his Heart is sufficiently purified and Docible for each different Reading They ought to distinguish the Food that is agreeable to every one of us in particular Nothing causeth so much illusion in the interiour Life as the indiscreet choosing of Books 'T is best to Read little and make long interruptions by way of recollection that we may let Love more deeply to imprint in us the Christian truths When recollection causeth our Book to drop out of our hands we must let it fall without scruple We shall take it up again time enough afterwards to renew in its turn our recollection Love Teaching by its Unction surpasses all the rational discourse we can make upon Books The most powerful of all perswasions is that of Love Nevertheless we must take in hand again the outward Book when the inward Book ceaseth to be open Otherwise the empty Spirit would fall into a rambling and imaginary Prayer which would be a real and pernicious idleness This would bring a Man to neglect his own instruction about necessary truths and forsake the Word of God and never to lay solid foundations both of the exact understanding of the Law and of revealed Mysteries To Speak thus is to Speak according to Tradition and to the Experience of holy Souls XX. False THe Reading of the most holy Books is unprofitable to those whom God teacheth entirely and immediately by himself 'T is not necessary that such persons as these should have laid the foundation of common instruction They need only to wait for all the light of truth that doth arise from their Prayer As for their Readings when they are moved to any they may choose without consulting with their Superiours such Books which Speak of the most advanced states They may Read the Books that are suspected or censured by their Pastors To Speak at this rate is to destroy instruction which is the food of Faith It is to substitute instead of the pure Word of God an interiour Fanatical inspiration On the other side it is to permit Souls to Poyson themselves with contagious Readings or at least such as are disproportionate to their true needs It is to teach them dissimulation and disobedience XXI ARTICLE True WE ought to distinguish between Meditation and Contemplation Meditation consists in discursive acts that can be easily distinguished the one from the other because they are distinguished by a kind of a noted motion because they are varied by the diversity of Objects they are applied to because they draw a conviction concerning the truth of the conviction of another truth already known because they draw an affection from several Motives methodically assembled Lastly because they are done and reiterated with

a little less pure and disinterested It 's enough for this State that the Acts of Vertue are performed therein very frequently with that perfection that Charity diffuses there and with which the same are animated All these things are agreeable to our thirty four Articles I shall joyn to the Book which I have published most Holy Father a Collection in Manuscript of the Sentiments of the Fathers and Saints of the last Age concerning the Pure Love of Contemplatives to the end that that which is but plainly set out in the First Book may be proved in the Second by the Testimonies and Opinions of the Saints of all Ages I entirely submit Most Holy Father both the one and the other Pieces to the Judgement of the Holy Roman Catholick Church who is the Mother Church of all and has taught all the rest I devote all that is mine and my self to your Holiness as a Son ought to do that is full of Zeal and Respect towards you But if my Book in French hath been already brought unto your Holiness I most humbly intreat you most Holy Father to decide nothing concerning it 'till such time as you have seen my Latin Version that will be dispatched away with all speed There is nothing now remaining for me save to wish a long Pontificate to the chief of Pastors who Rules the Kingdom of Christ with so disinterested an Heart and who says with so much applause from all the Roman Catholick Nations to his Illustrious Family I know you not In doing thus daily I think I seek the Glory and Consolation of the Church the Re-establishment of its Discipline the propagation of the Faith the Extirpation of Schisms and Heresies and lastly an abundant Harvest in the Field of the Soveraign Father of the Family I shall for ever c. The Lord Arch-Bishop of Cambray 's Letter of August the 3d 1697. SIR BE not concerned for me the business of my Book is gone to Rome if I am under a mistake the Authority of the Holy See will undeceive me and this is that I wait for with a gentle and lowly Mind if I have illy exprest my self they will reform my expressions If the matter appears to require a more large explication that I will readily do by way of Additions If my Book contains nothing in it but what is pure Doctrine I shall have the consolation to know exactly what a Man ought to believe and what to reject I shall not in this Case fail to make all those Additions which without weakning the truth will be conducive to enlighten and edifie such Readers as are most subject to take the allarm But Sir in short if the Pope condemns my Book I shall be the first God willing that will condemn it and put out a Mandate to forbid the reading of it in the Diocess of Cambray I shall only intreat the Pope to do me the favour exactly to note those passages he condemns and the sense whereon he grounds his Condemnation to the end that I may subscribe thereunto without restriction and that I may never run the risque of defending excusing or tolerating the sense it s condemned in Being thus disposed thro' the blessing of God I am at rest and have nothing to do but to wait the disposition of my Superiour in whom I acknowledge the Authority of Jesus Christ to be lodged disinterested Love must not be defended but with a sincere disinterest We have not to do herein with a point of Honour nor with the Opinion of the World nor yet with that profound humiliation wherein Nature may fear to meet with ill success I think I act with integrity I am as much afraid of being presumptuous and possessed with a base shame as to be feeble politick and fearful in the defence of truth If the Pope condemns me I shall be thereby undeceived and the vanquished shall reap all the real fruits of the Victory Victoria scedet victis saith St. Augustine But if on the other side the Pope does not condemn my Doctrine I shall endeavour both by my silence and respect to pacifie those of my Fraternity whose Zeal has animated them against me by laying a sort of Doctrine to my charge which I abhor and always did as much as they do Perhaps they will do me justice when they see my sincerity There are but two things that my Doctrine was intended to comprehend the first whereof is that Charity is a love to God sor his own sake distinct from that motive of blessedness that we find in him Secondly that Charity in the life of the most perfect Souls is that which precedes all other Vertues which animates them and commands the acts so as to make them bear to its end insomuch that the Just thus qualified do then ordinarily exercise hope and all other Vertues with all the disinterest of Charity it self because this same state of the Soul is not without its exception being no other than an habitual one and not immutable God knows I have never intended to teach any thing else that exceeded these limitations And hence it is that I have said in my speaking concerning pure Love which is Charity so far as it animates and commands all other distinct Vertues Whoever allows of nothing beyond that is within the confines of Tradition whoever passeth those bounds is already out of the way I do not think there is any danger that the Holy See should condemn a Doctrine so well grounded upon the Authority of the Fathers of the Schools and of so many great Saints that the Church of Rome has Canoniz'd As for the manner of Expressions contained in my Book if they should be any ways prejudicial to truth for want of being correct I consign them to the judgement of my Superiour and I should be very sorry to trouble the repose of the Church were there no more in it than the interest of my Person and of my Book These are my thoughts of the matter Sir I go for Cambray having Sacrificed unto God with my whole heart all that I could Sacrifice to him thereupon permit me to exhort you to be of the same mind I have introduced nothing that related to Humane Affairs and Temporals into the Doctrine which I was convinced of the truth of neither have I forbore to let the Pope know any of those Reasons that could support this Doctrine This is enough let God do the rest if it be his Cause that I have vindicated let us not be concerned at the intentions of Men or their proceedings it is God alone that is to be looked to in all this let us be the Children of Peace and Peace will rest upon us it will be bitter but the same will be so much the more pure Let us not spoil good intentions by an humour by any Heat by any Humane Industry by any Natural Impression for the justifying of our selves Let us plainly give an account of our Faith let us