IV LETTER TO MÈRE AGNÈS DE JÉSUS In this world we must not become attached to anything--not even things the most innocent, for they fail us at the moment when we are least expecting it. The eternal alone can satisfy us. I LETTER TO SR. MARIE DU SACRÉ-CŒUR This prayer she bore upon her heart on the day of her Profession: “O Jesus, my Divine Spouse, grant that the robe of my baptism be never sullied! Take me, rather than suffer me here below to stain my soul by committing the slightest wilful fault. May I never seek nor ever find but Thee alone! May all creatures be nothing to me, and I nothing to them! May no earthly thing disturb my peace! * * * * * “Grant that I fulfil my engagements in all their perfection; that none concern themselves about me; that I may be trodden underfoot, forgotten, as a little grain of sand. I offer myself to Thee, O Well-Beloved, that Thou mayst ever perfectly accomplish Thy holy will in me, without let or hindrance from creatures.” HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. VIII With jealous care all must be kept for Jesus; it is so good to work for Him, and for Him alone! How joyous then the heart and how buoyant the spirit!... VI LETTER TO MÈRE AGNÈS DE JÉSUS I have never wished for human glory, contempt it was, that had attraction for my heart; but having recognized that this again was too glorious for me, I ardently desire to be forgotten. VII LETTER TO MÈRE AGNÈS DE JÉSUS If you only knew to what a degree I wish to be indifferent to the things of the earth! What matters to me all created beauty? I should be truly unfortunate were I to possess it. Oh! how great, how noble, seems my heart when I look at it in relation to this world’s goods, since all of them put together could never satisfy it; but when I consider it with reference to Jesus, how _small_ it then appears to me. II LETTER TO MÈRE AGNÈS DE JÉSUS Yes, I now am able to say I have received the grace of being no more attached to the goods of mind and heart than to those of earth. If it happens that I repeat to my Sisters some thought of mine which pleases them, I think it quite natural that they should look on it as their own; this thought belongs to the Holy Ghost not to me, seeing that St. Paul tells us _that without the Spirit of Love we cannot give to God the name of Father_.[48] The Holy Spirit assuredly is free to use me as the means of conveying a good thought to a soul and I may not consider this thought as my property. HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. X “There is one only means of constraining the good God not to judge us at all, it is to appear before Him with our hands empty.” “But how?” they asked her.