Catherine's beloved sister Daniella is in trouble. As happened to many others leading the dedicated life in the middle ages, she has carried her scorn of the body past all bounds of reason, has fallen ill and been obliged to care for her poor physical nature. Catherine, who is perpetually trying to raise Fra Raimondo and others in her spiritual family to more heroic heights, recognizes the different needs of this over-eager soul. She writes her friend, therefore, a long and tender letter, one of the most elaborate among her many analyses of the means that lead to perfection, urging upon her discretion and a sense of proportion in spiritual things. It is noteworthy that Catherine's exhortations to impassioned sacrifice are almost always delivered in connection with the claims of active service, to the Church or fellow-men. When writing to "contemplatives" absorbed in the ecstasies and trials of the interior life, her habitual warnings are against excess, her constant plea, as here, for a perception of relative values. She ranks, herself, alike as a great "contemplative" and as a great woman of action: both phases of experience relate to something deeper. Her soul was athirst for the Infinite, and well she knew that neither in deeds nor in ascetic ecstasy, but only in "holy desire," in the life of ceaseless aspiration "which prays for ever in the presence of God," can our mortality attain to untrammelled union with Infinite Being. In the Name of Jesus Christ crucified and of sweet Mary: