The following are two letters to Father Alfred Snow, from Lady Anne Cecil Kerr's biography:
“In the name
of the Adorable and undivided Trinity, and to the glory of Jesus my
divine Spouse and only Treasure, in honour of Mary my Immaculate Queen
and Mother, and in obedience, I will try and write something of those
things which He has vouchsafed to me the very least of His little ones. I
have written an account of the unspeakable favour which Jesus Christ
the Son of God and the ever blessed Virgin Mary has granted to me, and
when I read it over it seemed in no way to convey what He really has
accomplished, for the change that has come over my soul is so astounding
that I cannot express it or convey by any comparison what has really
been done. I feel and realise those wondrous words of our dear Lord, ‘My
peace I give you’ etc. and it brings such a sweet bright light in the
soul that they only can understand who experience it, and our dear Lord
has taught me the hidden things of God with such excessive delights that
all the senses enjoy such an immense degree of sweetness that nothing
here could in any way describe. And if you wish me to tell you what I
have seen or what He has taught me, I can only say He has taught me
great truths hidden in His immensity. He has laid open His secret and I
have drunk to excess, and yet, as there is no image of any sort
represented to the understanding, the soul learns and enjoys without
knowing what she learns and enjoys. These things may seem to you to be
folly on my part, but perhaps it is on account of my nothingness and
misery that I am not able to give you a better idea of what passes now
or how my soul is contained or held in God and how He acts with her. But
even if it is so, oh how I thank Him for knowing nothing and having
nothing but Himself, oh how rich I am in His possession! And though the
soul may be astounded at first at His condescension, yet afterwards when
she considers His immense love, she lies as it were in peace without in
any way considering herself. Yet she knows and understands how He is
all hers and she is all His, but she has no thought but of Him. I mean
she forgets her own misery and sins and does not wish to do this or that
but only His adorable Will, and this she hungers and thirsts for as He
makes her understand like Him she ‘must be about her Father’s business’
and testify to the world the love and goodness of Jesus, her divine
Spouse. Oh that I had the tongue of men and angels that I might proclaim
to the whole world what He is and His wonderful love, that I could tell
or give them to taste how sweet is the Lord and what they lose who run
after the empty bubbles of the world. Oh all we could do or suffer for
ages would be nothing to purchase so great a good. Oh that I could tell
what I experience in Him who is all good, all powerful, all Wisdom. My
soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour
because He hath regarded the humility of His handmaid.
Mystical marriage of St. Catherine
“Oh my
Father, you must pardon me. I do really wish and desire to make all
clear to you, and I beg of Him, whom I know will not refuse my request,
to teach you by experience and show you my soul as He sees it, that so
you may know how to guide and take me with you to His eternal
possession.
“Ah what a foretaste I have already of that eternal
bliss, for the soul seems to have become one with God in such a close
bond of union that all fear of losing Him seems out of the question, for
it seems that the soul as a little drop of vapour is drawn up into the
immeasurable ocean of God’s infinity. Here she feels to possess all and
she cares not whether she lives or dies.
“I don't know but what
those great impetuosities may return, but at present I feel as though I
had not to run after God as it were, but that I possessed Him and was
more closely united to Him than my soul is to my body, that He is the
soul of my existence and that I feel and live in Him, that He does all
and that I do nothing.
“He has taught me oh so clearly too, all
that He has done for me and how miserable a wretch I should have been
without Him, and when He shows me the beauty with which He has clothed
me and the wonderful works He has accomplished in me, I am forced as it
were to sink in the abyss of my own nothingness and praise Him for His
mighty acts. And instead of trying to run away as it were at telling
you, I feel as though I were robbing Him of that which is His if I did
not try to tell you as I know things myself, for all is His and I am and
have nothing, and it would seem to be a false humility that I have
hitherto had – wishing to hide His favours, as though I considered they
were in some way mine, or that I had anything to do with them.
“I
seem to have become as a powerful eagle that can soar to and gaze on the
midday sun, and as those who look at the sun can see nothing but it for
some time, so now I see nothing but Him in all things and all things in
Him. That great fear of death and desire of it are gone and I feel such
a real disengagement from all created objects, and I feel to have
gained such a great dominion over myself that I don’t think anyone can
understand but those to whom our dear Lord my Spouse and only Love has
given it, for I know too so well that I never could have acquired it no
matter how I worked or exerted myself. It is all His work and I feel
myself so freed out of this prison of death that I lie basking in peace
in the light of His Truth. He has dug deep in the trench that so He
might fill me with Himself. He has filled up the valleys on a level with
the hills, and the mountains He has lowered that I may view their tops
and look down on all things beneath. Oh my Father, I could never tell
you all that in His goodness and mercy He has done for me, and it seems
to take away from it rather than anything else when I try to express
them in such cyphers as is the language of men, when trying to describe
the truths and favours of Almighty God.
“Begging of you again and
again to bless the Lord for all He has done for me, and offering His
adorable Precious Blood in thanksgiving, I unite my voice with His, with
Mary’s and the whole court of Heaven in praising and blessing our God
who sitteth upon the throne, and the Lamb who redeemed us by His blood
and made us to reign with Him for ever and ever. Amen.
“TERESA HIGGINSON “Enfant de Marie”
CLITHEROE, FEAST OF ST. WINIFRED, 1887.
“Oh my Father it seems presumption almost on my part to attempt to
describe the wonderful things our dear b. Lord has done for my poor
soul, and yet I know I must endeavour that you may thoroughly understand
His workings in me. Though it seems as if I could not comprehend at
once all that His infinite goodness accomplishes, oh how clearly He has
taught me in very truth the true estimate of all things here and to
judge rightly of His gifts and graces. Here the soul becomes as it were a
very queen of liberty, she has bound up all for Jesus and He sets His
little captive free, she has sunk in the abyss of her own nothingness
and He raises her to a most intimate union with Himself and the adorable
Trinity. She has stripped herself of all things for His sake and He
clothes her in His glory. She has tasted of the bitterness of life for
His sake and He fills her with unutterable sweetness; and now she who
was so afraid and weak is made strong and desires to fly to the heights
and gaze on and bury herself in the centre of that sun at which
sometimes she felt unable to look, for the light was too strong for her
weakness. Now she desires to plunge deeper and deeper into that eternal
Essence, to gaze into that sparkling crystal and there drink the waters
of life and eat the food of the strong. Here she is taught that she is
nothing and has nothing, that all is her divine Spouse’s, and she feels
as though she could go to the tops of the mountains and proclaim His
greatness, His wisdom, His love, and His goodness aloud to the whole
world, that all might acknowledge that He is the Lord and praise and
magnify His Holy Name.
“I feel as though I had no heart or soul
but that God Himself is my soul and there He shines and rules all in
such wonderful wisdom and peace. Oh my soul, bless the Lord and let all
that is in thee praise His Holy Name. It would seem to me as though our
dear Lord my divine Spouse and Mary my dear queen and my mother were
keeping high court within my poor soul and allowing me to understand the
glory that so many angels and saints are enjoying in His presence, for
they are present with and seem to accompany me. Oh my Father, if it were
only to witness the beauty of the stones in this circle of our union,
to behold the gems that represent His sacred Wounds, I think it is more
than human nature could endure, and it seems to fill my poor body even
with a spiritual life and brightness that it seems buoyed up so to
speak; but I do not now care what becomes of it, whether it is raised up
before others or not. His glory and Holy Will are all I desire. I feel
as though I could sing the Magnificat aloud with my more than Mother
Mary.
“T. HIGGINSON.
“Enfant de Marie.”
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