CHAPTER VII.
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Caussade, Jean Pierre de, McMahon, Ella, and Ramière, Henri
The broad, solid, firm rock upon which the faithful soul stands sheltered from tides and storms is the order of the divine will, which is ever present with us, veiled under crosses or the most ordinary duties. Behind these shadows is hidden God’s Hand, which sustains and upholds those who abandon themselves to Him.
The moment the soul is firmly established in this perfect self-abandonment she is henceforth safe from the contradiction of tongues, for she ceases to have anything to do or say in her own defence. Since the work is God’s, from no other source must its justification be sought. Its consequences and effects will sufficiently justify it. We have but to leave it to its own development. Dies diei eructat verbum.
When we are no longer guided by our own ideas we need not defend ourselves by words. Our words can only represent our ideas, and where an absence of ideas is admitted no words are needed. Of what avail are they? To give a reason for what we do? But we know not this reason; it is hidden in the principle which animates our actions, and which impresses us only in a most ineffable manner.
We must therefore leave to the results of our actions the task of justifying their principle. All is metely sustained in this divine procession; everything therein has a firm and solid basis, and the reason for that which precedes is manifest in the result which follows. It is no longer a life of thought, imagination, multiplied words: these no longer occupy, nourish, or sustain the soul. She no longer knows where she walks, or where her path may lie in the future; she ceases to incite herself with reflections to bear the toils and fatigues of the route; her strength lies in an intimate conviction of her own weakness. A way is opened to her feet; she enters and walks unhesitatingly therein with pure, straightforward, simple faith; she follows the straight path of the commandments, leaning upon God Himself, whom she finds at every turn of the way; and this God, the sole object of her life, will take her justification upon Himself, and so manifest His presence that she will be avenged of her detractors.