There is but one thing to be done here below: to love Jesus, and to save souls for Him that He may be more loved. We must not let slip the smallest opportunity of giving Him joy. We must refuse Him nothing. He is in such need of love. We are His chosen lilies. He dwells as a King in our midst--He lets us share the honours of His Royalty--His Divine Blood bedews our petals--and His Thorns as they wound us spread abroad the perfume of our love. VII October 22, 1889. MY DEAREST CELINE,--I send you a picture of the Holy Face. The contemplation of this Divine subject seems to me to belong in a special way to my little sister, truly the sister of my soul. May she be another Veronica, and wipe away all the Blood and Tears of Jesus, her only Love! May she give Him souls! May she force her way through the soldiers--that is, the world--to come close to His side. . . . Happy will she be when she sees in Heaven the value of that mysterious draught with which she quenched the thirst of her Heavenly Spouse; when she sees His Lips, once parched with burning thirst, speaking to her the one eternal word--love, and the thanks which shall have no end. . . . Good-bye, dear little Veronica;[11] to-morrow, no doubt, your Beloved will ask some new sacrifice, a fresh relief for His thirst . . . but "let us go and die with Him!" VIII July 18, 1890. MY DEAR LITTLE SISTER,--I send you a passage from Isaias which will comfort you. Long ago the Prophet's soul was filled with the thought of the hidden beauties of the Divine Face, as our souls are now. Many a century has passed since then. It makes me wonder what is Time. Time is but a mirage, a dream. Already God sees us in glory, and rejoices in our everlasting bliss. How much good I derive from this thought! I understand now why He allows us to suffer. Since Our Beloved has "trodden the wine-press alone,"[12] the wine-press from which He gives us to drink--on our side let us not refuse to be clothed in blood-stained garments, or to tread out for Jesus a new wine which may quench His thirst! When "He looks around Him," He will not be able to say now that "He is alone"[13]--we shall be there to help Him. "His look as it were hidden."[14] Alas! it is so even to this day, and no one understands His Tears. "Open to Me, My Sister, My Spouse," he says to us, "for My Head is full of dew and My Locks of the drops of the night."[15] Thus Jesus complains to our souls when He is deserted and forgotten . . . _To be forgotten._ It is this, I think, which gives Him most pain. And our dear Father!--it is heartrending, but how can we repine since Our Lord Himself was looked upon "as one struck by God and afflicted"?[16] In this great sorrow we should forget ourselves, and pray for Priests--our lives must be entirely devoted to them. Our Divine Master makes me feel more and more that this is what He asks of you and me. IX September 23, 1890.