All consolation that does not come from God is but desolation; when the soul has learned to receive no comfort but in God only, it has passed beyond the reach of desolation.

The soul seeks God by faith, not by the reasonings of the mind and labored efforts, but by the drawings of love; to which inclinations God responds, and instructs the soul, which co-operates actively. God then puts the soul in a passive state where He accomplishes all, causing great progress, first by way of enjoyment, then by privation, and finally by pure love.

God causes us to promise in time of peace what He exacts from us in time of war; He enables us to make our abandonments in joy, but He requires the fulfilment of them in the midst of much bitterness.

We must forget ourselves and all self-interest, and listen, and be attentive to God.

Self-seeking is the gate by which a soul departs from peace; and total abandonment to the will of God, that by which it returns.

Surrender yourselves then to be led and disposed of just as God pleases, with respect both to your outward and inward state.

O my God, how true it is that we may have of Thy gifts and yet may be full of ourselves!