Her prayer was continual though she was habitually plunged in aridity. One day a novice entering her cell, paused, struck by the celestial expression of her countenance. She was sewing with alacrity yet seemed lost in profound contemplation. “Of what are you thinking?” asked the young Sister. “I am meditating on the _Pater_,” she replied. “It is so sweet to call the good God our Father.” And tears shone in her eyes. HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. XII I do not well see what more I shall have in Heaven than now, she once said. I shall see the good God, it is true; but as to being with Him, I am wholly with Him already upon earth. HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. XII A living flame of Divine Love consumed her. “A few days after my oblation to _God’s Merciful Love_,” she relates, “I had commenced in the Choir the Way of the Cross, when I felt myself suddenly wounded by a dart of fire so ardent that I thought I must die. I know not how to describe this transport; there is no comparison which would make one understand the intensity of that flame. An invisible power seemed to plunge me wholly into fire ... but oh! what fire! what sweetness!” The Mother Prioress asked her whether this transport was the first in her life, she answered simply: “Mother, I have several times had transports of love; once especially during my novitiate when I remained one entire week far indeed from this world; for me, there was as it were, a veil thrown over all things of the earth. But I was not consumed by a real flame, I was able to sustain those delights without expecting that their intensity would cause my earthly fetters to snap asunder, whilst on the day of which I speak, one minute, one second more and my soul must have left its prison.... Alas!--and I found myself again on earth, and aridity immediately returned to my heart!” HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. XII FOOTNOTES: [84] Prov., x, 12. [85] Cant., 1, 3. [86] Luke, x, 41 [87] Matt., v, 13. [Illustration] HOLY COMMUNION How sweet it was, the first kiss of Jesus to my soul! Yes, it was a kiss of Love. I felt I was loved, and I too said: “I love Thee, I give myself to Thee for ever!” Jesus asked nothing of me, demanded no sacrifice. Already for a long time past, He and the little Thérèse had watched and understood one another.... That day our meeting was no longer a simple look but a _fusion_. No longer were we two: Thérèse had disappeared as the drop of water which loses itself in the depths of the ocean, Jesus alone remained; the Master, the King! Had not Thérèse begged Him to take away from her, her liberty? That liberty made her afraid; so weak, so fragile did she feel herself that she longed to be united for ever to Divine Strength. HIST. D’UNE AME, CH. IV