inexhaustible beneficence were to her subjects that she could never be weary of considering. The sole thought that she was in the presence of the majesty of God, that infinite majesty that fills with its being heaven and earth and the abysses, was sufficient to raise her above every created thing and transform her into God Himself. One subject, nevertheless, beyond every other, occupied Rita's mind--that of the Passion of Jesus Christ. It almost seems as if she had inherited from her parents this particular devotion, and that upon it she had laid the foundation-stone of her sanctity. It was to the Passion that she was accustomed from childhood to direct her thoughts and affections, her sighs and tears. The reader may remember how at a tender age she shut herself into the little room at home, and there continued to meditate on the sorrowful mysteries, which also were depicted in the pictures which hung on the walls, and, better still, were carved on her heart. The senses should do their part the better to assist the soul in its efforts after piety, and this was the reason why Rita procured and kept in her cell in the convent certain representations of the Passion of her dear Jesus. To this end she kept in two distinct parts of her cell objects that recalled to her the history of the Passion. In one place she constructed a representation of a mountain, which, whenever she looked upon it, recalled Mount Calvary and all the torments which the Saviour of the world suffered there. She meditated with sighs and tears on her Divine Spouse arriving there, falling under the terrible weight of His torments, His cross, and all the sins of men. With an outburst of weeping she thought of Him deprived of His garments and fixed to the cross with rough nails. She meditated with the liveliest compassion on the cruel strokes of the hammer that tore His hands and feet, and on all the other terrible torments that Jesus suffered for love of men. In another corner of her cell she had a representation of the Holy Sepulchre, and at sight of it she considered how the adorable body of Christ was placed in it, how for three days it remained buried, how His spirit went down to console the holy fathers in Abraham's bosom, and, finally, how the Redeemer rose again to a new life triumphant and glorious. During these meditations our saint was always alone; as Jeremias says, 'she sat solitary and held her peace, and was raised above herself';[3] in that sweet silence, in those loving soliloquies, in that intimate intercourse with God she was superior to passion, to nature, and to herself. So great was her mental exaltation during her meditation on the Divine mysteries that she was often raised above the life of the senses and rapt in delicious ecstasies, and on one occasion, so strong was the ecstatic influence, the nuns thought she was dead.