"The effect of this direction is to make souls conceive a love for God that is great, pure and disinterested; also a great affection for their neighbour for the love of God; while, as for their sentiments towards their Director, they approach him with reverential awe, beholding God in him and him in God, having no affection for his person beyond that due to all our fellow-men." Our Blessed Father never told me the name of this Director, nor even gave me the slightest hint as to who he was, and I therefore sought no further explanation, contenting myself with admiring the ways of God and His various desires for the good of the souls whom He calls to His service. I became penetrated, too, with the conviction that by many different routes we can reach one and the same goal. _Let every spirit praise the Lord_. ADVICE UPON HAVING A DIRECTOR. I asked him one day who was his Director. Taking from his pocket the _Spiritual Combat_, he said: "You see my Director in this book, which, from my earliest youth, has, with the help of God, taught me and been my master in spiritual matters and in the interior life. When I was a student at Padua, a Theatine Father instructed and gave me advice from it, and following its directions all has been well with me. It was written by a very holy member of that celebrated congregation, the author concealing his own name under that of his Orders which makes use of the book almost in the same way as the Jesuits make use of the Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola." I reminded him that in his Philothea[1] he recommends people to have a living Director. "That is true," he answered, "but have you not noticed that I say he must be chosen out of ten thousand?[2] Because there is scarcely one in a thousand to be found having all the qualities necessary for this office, or who, if he has them, displays them constantly and perseveringly; men being so variable that they never remain in one state, as Holy Scripture assures us."[3] I asked him if we must then run uncertainly and pursue our way without guidance. He answered: "We must seek it among the dead; among those who are no longer subject to passion or change, and who have ceased to be swayed by human interests. As an Emperor of old said that his most faithful counsellors were the dead, meaning books, so we may say that our safest spiritual directors are books of piety." "But what," I asked, "are those who cannot read to do?" "They," he replied, "must have good books read to them by people in whom they can have absolute confidence. Besides, such simple souls as these do not, as a rule, trouble themselves much about methods of devotion, or, if they do, God for the most part bestows on them such graces as to make it plain that He Himself is their Teacher, and that they are truly _Theodidacts, or taught by God_."