capacity, which capacity God continually enlarges. Therefore the longer Christians live in this divine condition, the more they expand, and their capacity becomes continually more immense, without anything being left for them to do or desire; for they always possess God in His fulness, and He never leaves an empty corner in their hearts. As they grow and enlarge, He fills them with Himself, as we see with the air. A small room is full of air, but a large one contains more. If you continually increase the size of a room, in the same proportion the air will enter, infallibly though imperceptibly: and thus, without changing its state or disposition, and without any new sensation, the soul increases in capacity and in plenitude. But this growing capacity can only be received in a state of nothingness, because in any other condition there is an opposition to growth. It may be well here to explain what may appear a contradiction, when I say, that the soul must be brought to nothing in order to pass into God, and that it must lose all that is its own; and yet I speak of capacity which it retains. There are two capacities. One is natural to the creature, and this is narrow and limited: when it is purified, it is fitted to receive the gifts of God, but not God Himself; because what we receive within us must of necessity be less than ourselves, as that which is enclosed in a vase must be of less extent, though it may be of greater value, than the vase which contains it. But the capacity of which I speak here is a capacity to extend and to lose itself more and more in God, after the soul has lost its appropriation, which confined it to itself; and this capacity being no longer restricted nor limited, because its annihilation has deprived it of all form, disposes the soul to flow into God, so that it loses itself, and flows into Him who is beyond comprehension. The more it is lost in Him, the more it develops and becomes immense, participating in His perfections, and being more and more transformed in Him, as water in communication with its source continually mingles with it. God, being our original source, has created us with a nature fit to be united, transformed, and made one with Himself. CHAPTER IV. THE FIRST MOVEMENTS OF THESE SOULS ARE DIVINE--THEIR SUFFERINGS ARE NOT BY REFLECTION, BUT BY IMPRESSION--GREATNESS OF THESE SUFFERINGS, WHICH, HOWEVER, DO NOT VARY THEIR REST OR CONTENTMENT BECAUSE OF THEIR DEIFICATION, WHICH PROGRESSES INFINITELY, BUT GRADUALLY--THEIR PEACE DISTURBED NEITHER BY GOOD NOR EVIL, AS GOD IS NEITHER TROUBLED NOR DISTURBED BY THE SIGHT OF MAN'S SIN, ALL THINGS CONTRIBUTING TO HIS GLORY.