Life of St Teresa of Jesus, Teresa of Avila [top ten books to read TXT] 📗

it was and so

it happened, that it may be the better known, O my Bridegroom,

Who Thou art and what I am.

5. It is certainly true that very frequently the joy I have in

that the multitude of Thy mercies is made known in me, softens

the bitter sense of my great faults. In whom, O Lord, can they

shine forth as they do in me, who by my evil deeds have shrouded

in darkness Thy great graces, which Thou hadst begun to work in

me? Woe is me, O my Maker! If I would make an excuse, I have

none to offer; and I only am to blame. For if I could return to

Thee any portion of that love which Thou hadst begun to show unto

me, I would give it only unto Thee, and then everything would

have been safe. But, as I have not deserved this, nor been so

happy as to have done it, let Thy mercy, O Lord, rest upon me.

6. The change in the habits of my life, and in my food, proved

hurtful to my health; and though my happiness was great, that was

not enough. The fainting-fits began to be more frequent; and my

heart was so seriously affected, that every one who saw it was

alarmed; and I had also many other ailments. And thus it was I

spent the first year, having very bad health, though I do not

think I offended God in it much. And as my illness was so

serious—I was almost insensible at all times, and frequently

wholly so—my father took great pains to find some relief; and as

the physicians who attended me had none to give, he had me taken

to a place which had a great reputation for the cure of other

infirmities. They said I should find relief there. [6]

That friend of whom I have spoken as being in the house went with

me. She was one of the elder nuns. In the house where I was a

nun, there was no vow of enclosure. [7]

7. I remained there nearly a year, for three months of it

suffering most cruel tortures—effects of the violent remedies

which they applied. I know not how I endured them; and indeed,

though I submitted myself to them, they were, as I shall

relate, [8] more than my constitution could bear.

8. I was to begin the treatment in the spring, and went thither

when winter commenced. The intervening time I spent with my

sister, of whom I spoke before, [9] in her house in the country,

waiting for the month of April, which was drawing near, that I

might not have to go and return. The uncle of whom I have made

mention before, [10] and whose house was on our road, gave me a

book called Tercer Abecedario, [11] which treats of the prayer of

recollection. Though in the first year I had read good

books—for I would read no others, because I understood now the

harm they had done me—I did not know how to make my prayer, nor

how to recollect myself. I was therefore much pleased with the

book, and resolved to follow the way of prayer it described with

all my might. And as our Lord had already bestowed upon me the

gift of tears, and I found pleasure in reading, I began to spend

a certain time in solitude, to go frequently to confession, and

make a beginning of that way of prayer, with this book for my

guide; for I had no master—I mean, no confessor—who understood

me, though I sought for such a one for twenty years afterwards:

which did me much harm, in that I frequently went backwards, and

might have been even utterly lost; for, anyhow, a director would

have helped me to escape the risks I ran of sinning against God.

9. From the very beginning, God was most gracious unto me.

Though I was not so free from sin as the book required, I passed

that by; such watchfulness seemed to me almost impossible. I was

on my guard against mortal sin—and would to God I had always

been so!—but I was careless about venial sins, and that was my

ruin. Yet, for all this, at the end of my stay there—I spent

nearly nine months in the practice of solitude—our Lord began to

comfort me so much in this way of prayer, as in His mercy to

raise me to the prayer of quiet, and now and then to that of

union, though I understood not what either the one or the other

was, nor the great esteem I ought to have had of them. I believe

it would have been a great blessing to me if I had understood the

matter. It is true that the prayer of union lasted but a short

time: I know not if it continued for the space of an Ave Maria;

but the fruits of it remained; and they were such that, though I

was then not twenty years of age, I seemed to despise the world

utterly; and so I remember how sorry I was for those who followed

its ways, though only in things lawful.

10. I used to labour with all my might to imagine Jesus Christ,

our Good and our Lord, present within me. And this was the way I

prayed. If I meditated on any mystery of His life, I represented

it to myself as within me, though the greater part of my time I

spent in reading good books, which was all my comfort; for God

never endowed me with the gift of making reflections with the

understanding, or with that of using the imagination to any good

purpose: my imagination is so sluggish, [12] that even if I would

think of, or picture to myself, as I used to labour to picture,

our Lord’s Humanity, I never could do it.

11. And though men may attain more quickly to the state of

contemplation, if they persevere, by this way of inability to

exert the intellect, yet is the process more laborious and

painful; for if the will have nothing to occupy it, and if love

have no present object to rest on, the soul is without support

and without employment—its isolation and dryness occasion great

pain, and the thoughts assail it most grievously. Persons in

this condition must have greater purity of conscience than those

who can make use of their understanding; for he who can use his

intellect in the way of meditation on what the world is, on what

he owes to God, on the great sufferings of God for him, his own

scanty service in return, and on the reward God reserves for

those who love Him, learns how to defend himself against his own

thoughts, and against the occasions and perils of sin. On the

other hand, he who has not that power is in greater danger, and

ought to occupy himself much in reading, seeing that he is not in

the slightest degree able to help himself.

12. This way of proceeding is so exceedingly painful, that if the

master who teaches it insists on cutting off the succours which

reading gives, and requires the spending of much time in prayer,

then, I say, it will be impossible to persevere long in it: and

if he persists in his plan, health will be ruined, because it is

a most painful process. Reading is of great service towards

procuring recollection in any one who proceeds in this way; and

it is even necessary for him, however little it may be that he

reads, if only as a substitute for the mental prayer which is

beyond his reach.

13. Now I seem to understand that it was the good providence of

our Lord over me that found no one to teach me. If I had, it

would have been impossible for me to persevere during the

eighteen years of my trial and of those great aridities because

of my inability to meditate. During all this time, it was only

after Communion that I ever ventured to begin my prayer without a

book—my soul was as much afraid to pray without one, as if it

had to fight against a host. With a book to help me—it was like

a companion, and a shield whereon to receive the blows of many

thoughts—I found comfort; for it was not usual with me to be in

aridity: but I always was so when I had no book; for my soul was

disturbed, and my thoughts wandered at once. With one, I began

to collect my thoughts, and, using it as a decoy, kept my soul in

peace, very frequently by merely opening a book—there was no

necessity for more. Sometimes, I read but little; at other

times, much—according as our Lord had pity on me.

14. It seemed to me, in these beginnings of which I am speaking,

that there could be no danger capable of withdrawing me from so

great a blessing, if I had but books, and could have remained

alone; and I believe that, by the grace of God, it would have

been so, if I had had a master or any one to warn me against

those occasions of sin in the beginning, and, if I fell, to bring

me quickly out of them. If the devil had assailed me openly

then, I believe I should never have fallen into any grievous sin;

but he was so subtle, and I so weak, that all my good resolutions

were of little service—though, in those days in which I served

God, they were very profitable in enabling me, with that patience

which His Majesty gave me, to endure the alarming illnesses which

I had to bear. I have often thought with wonder of the great

goodness of God; and my soul has rejoiced in the contemplation of

His great magnificence and mercy. May He be blessed for

ever!—for I see clearly that He has not omitted to reward me,

even in this life, for every one of my good desires. My good

works, however wretched and imperfect, have been made better and

perfected by Him Who is my Lord: He has rendered them

meritorious. As to my evil deeds and my sins, He hid them at

once. The eyes of those who saw them, He made even blind; and He

has blotted them out of their memory. He gilds my faults, makes

virtue to shine forth, giving it to me Himself, and compelling me

to possess it, as it were, by force.

15. I must now return to that which has been enjoined me. I say,

that if I had to describe minutely how our Lord dealt with me in

the beginning, it would be necessary for me to have another

understanding than that I have: so that I might be able to

appreciate what I owe to Him, together with my own ingratitude

and wickedness; for I have forgotten it all.

May He be blessed for ever Who has borne with me so long! Amen.

1. Antonio de Ahumada; who, according to the most probable

opinion, entered the Dominican monastery of St. Thomas, Avila.

It is said that he died before he was professed. Some said he

joined the Hieronymites; but this is not so probable (De la

Fuente). Ribera, however, says that he did enter the novitiate

of the Hieronymites. but died before he was out of it

(lib. i. ch. vi.).

2. Juana Suarez, in the Monastery of the Incarnation, Avila.

3. See Relation, vi. § 3.

4. The nuns sent word to the father of his