Conclusion
In Which It Is Shown That This Third Part Refers to the Unitive Life
We have now, aided by the grace of God, reached the term of our labour in attaining to the end of the Unitive Life, which consists in intimate union with God, our Sovereign Good. The mere titles of the chapters of this Third Part sufficiently show how suitable are the matters of which it treats to unite our soul with its last End. It unites it to the First and Increated Truth by faith; to the Infallible Fidelity by hope; to the Infinite Goodness by charity; and finally, by constant perseverance in good, it consummates all these holy unions. Whence I have a right to conclude that the subjects treated of in this Third Part relate to the Unitive Way.
I do not even except that of the second chapter, which treats of the evils which menace the tepid. For the remembrance of the anxiety experienced at death, the thought of judgment, and the excruciating torments that follow it, do not so exclusively appertain to the purgative life, as that a soul may not animate itself by this salutary fear, to the attainment of the sublime perfection of the Unitive Way. Such was the opinion of St. Ignatius, that experienced master of the spiritual life, when he proposed these very subjects for the second week of his exercises as most suitable motives to stimulate us to make a good election.
Let us, therefore, walk henceforward with a constant and firm step in the paths of the spiritual life, remove the obstacles to solid virtue, employ the means presented to us for its acquisition, and cease not to meditate on the motives which incite us to become perfect, that by the sanctity of our life and our perseverance in good, we may be eternally united to Him who is the term of the spiritual life and the end of all things.
