p. 109Thoughts of M. Vianney on the Joys of the Interior Life

The Curé of Ars was once speaking of the joys of prayer and of the interior life; it was a subject which he never approached without his heart being immediately melted:

“To be a king,” he said, “what a poor position! a king is only for men! … but to be for God, to be wholly for God! To be for God without reserve; our body for God, our soul for God! … A chaste body, a pure soul! Oh, there is nothing so beautiful!” and tears stifled his voice.

“Prayer is the only happiness of man upon earth. O beautiful life! beautiful union of the soul with our Lord! Eternity will not be long enough to comprehend this happiness. … The interior life is a bath of love into which the soul is plunged; … it is, as it were, drowned in love! … God holds the interior man as a mother holds the head of her child in her hands, to cover it with kisses and caresses.” …

“I often think of the joy of the Apostles when they saw our Lord again. The separation had been so cruel! Our Lord loved them so much! He was so good to them! We may presume that He embraced them when He said to them, ‘Peace be with you!’ So He embraces our soul when we pray. He says to us also, ‘Peace be with you!’”

“We love a thing in proportion to what it has cost us. You may judge by that of our Lord’s love for our soul, which has cost Him all His Blood. He is eager for communications and intercourse with it. He longs to see it, to hear it.” …

“There are two ways of uniting ourselves with our Lord and of saving our souls: prayer and the Sacraments. All those who have become saints have frequented the Sacraments, and have raised their souls to God by prayer. We ought in the morning on awaking, to offer to God our heart, our mind, our thoughts, our words, our actions, our whole selves, to serve for His glory alone. We should renew our baptismal vows, thank our guardian angel, ask for the protection of that good angel who has remained by our side during our sleep.”

“Some good Christians are in the habit of saying, ‘I will make so many acts of the love of God, so many sacrifices to-day;’ … I like that practice very much.” …

“We should often, in the course of the day, ask for the light of the Holy Ghost. Oh, how much we stand in need of it, that we may know our poor misery! We should say a Pater and Ave for the conversion of sinners, for the souls in purgatory; … and often repeat, ‘O my God, have pity on me!’ like a child saying to its mother, ‘Give me a bit of bread; … give me your hand; … embrace me!’” …

“He who does not pray is like a hen or a turkey that cannot rise into the air. If they fly a little, they soon fall down, and, scratching a hole in the earth, they nestle in it, cover their heads with dust, and seem to have no other pleasure. He who prays, on the contrary, is like an intrepid eagle, which soars in the air, and seems always to wish to approach nearer to the sun. Such is the good Christian on the wings of prayer. Oh, how beautiful is prayer! The man who is in favour with God does not require to be taught to pray; he knows naturally how to pray, because he knows his own wants.”

“Union with Jesus Christ, union with the Cross: that is salvation. Love is the distinctive mark of the elect, as the mark of the reprobate is hatred. No reprobate loves another reprobate; the brother detests his brother, the son his father, the mother her child; and this universal hatred is concentrated upon God: this is hell.” “The saints love every one; above all, they love their enemies. … Their heart, inflamed with divine love, dilates itself in proportion to the number of souls that the good God puts in their way, as the wings of the hen extend in proportion to the number of her young ones.” “The heart of the saints is as steadfast as a rock in the midst of the sea.”

“Those persons who practise devotion, who go often to confession and communion, and who fail to do works of faith and charity, are like trees in blossom. You think there will be as much fruit as flower; but there is a great difference.” …

“Oh, how beautiful will be the day of the resurrection! we shall see those beautiful souls come from heaven, like suns of glory, and unite themselves to the bodies which they animated on earth. The more those bodies have been mortified, the more they will shine like diamonds.”

“None are really miserable but bad Christians, who forsake prayer and the Sacraments, and wallow in sin; for good Christians feel no misfortunes. … To possess God, that is the joy of joys. That happiness makes us forget all else. Like that good saint whose life I was reading, who remained in ecstasy from Shrove-Tuesday till Easter-Day, he returned to his senses just in time for the Resurrection. … That happiness also makes us forget sufferings. … Once the wind carried away the bear-skin with which St. Simeon was covered. When people saw that he did not stir upon his column, they went up, and they found him frozen. They plunged him into warm water to revive him: ‘Why did you not leave me alone?’ he said; ‘I was so happy.’”

“To pray well, we need not speak much. We know that the good God is there, in the holy Tabernacle; we open our heart, we take pleasure in His holy presence; that is the best sort of prayer.” “Like the good M. de Vidaud; he used to rise very early in the morning, and go to adore the Blessed Sacrament as soon as the church was open. One day, when he was at a country house, they were obliged to send three times to the chapel to fetch him to breakfast; the mistress of the house grew impatient. At the third message, he came away from the presence of our Lord, saying, ‘O my God, can one not remain, then, a moment in peace with Thee!’” The Curé of Ars added, weeping, “He had been there since four o’clock in the morning! There are some good Christians who would thus pass their whole lives absorbed in adoration before God. Oh, how happy they are!”

One day, when he had been presiding over the renewal of vows which the Sisters of St. Joseph are accustomed to make every year on the 2d of July, M. Vianney came out from the ceremony with a full heart, unable to contain his joy; he gave utterance to it in sweet words: “How lovely is religion!” he said. “How great is the multitude of Thy sweetness, O my God, to them that fear Thee! … I was thinking just now, that between our Lord and those good religious there was a strife of generosity, who should give the most. … But our Lord always wins. The religious give Him their heart, and He gives His Heart and His Body. … While the Sisters said, ‘I renew my vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience,’ I said to them as I presented the Host, ‘May the Body of our Lord keep your soul for life everlasting!’” Then, taking occasion to dilate upon his beloved subject, he added:

“If we could but comprehend all the blessings that are contained in Holy Communion, nothing more would be required to satisfy the heart of man. The avaricious would no longer run after treasures, nor the ambitious after glory; every one would forsake the earth, would shake off its dust, and take flight towards heaven. Communion! Oh, what honour God does to His creature! He reposes on his tongue, passes over his palate as over a little road, and stays in his heart as upon a throne! O my God! my God! some people have known how to appreciate this honour. Thus, a holy Bishop has been known to sweep the church himself, and to put on his rochet for this function, which appears degrading, but which he esteemed so highly that he wore his insignia of a Bishop to perform it. A king used formerly to press the grapes with his own hands for the consecration of the Chalice, and to prepare the flour for the Hosts.”

“One Communion well made is sufficient to inflame the soul with the love of God, and to make it despise the earth. It is not long since a great person of this world came here to go to Holy Communion; he had a fortune of three hundred thousand francs: he gave a hundred to build a church, a hundred to the poor, a hundred to his relations, and went to La Trappe. After him there came a very learned lawyer; he made a good Communion, and set out to go and put himself into the hands of Père Lacordaire. Oh! one Holy Communion, one alone, is enough to disgust a man with the earth, and to give him a foretaste of heavenly delights!”

“One ought to be a seraphim to say Mass! … I hold our Lord in my hands. I put Him on the right, and He remains on the right! I put Him on the left, and He remains on the left! … If we knew what Holy Mass is, we should die! We shall never, till we are in heaven, understand the happiness of saying Mass! Alas! my God! how much is a priest to be pitied, when he does it as if he were doing an ordinary action!” …