St. Francis de Sales - Introduction to the Devout Life - Excerpt

[Shin]

CHAPTER XXIV. All Evil Inclinations must be purged away.

FURTHERMORE, my daughter, we have certain natural inclinations, which are
not strictly speaking either mortal or venial sins, but rather
imperfections; and the acts in which they take shape, failings and
deficiencies. Thus S. Jerome says that S. Paula had so strong a tendency to
excessive sorrow, that when she lost her husband and children she nearly
died of grief: that was not a sin, but an imperfection, since it did not
depend upon her wish and will. Some people are naturally easy, some
oppositions; some are indisposed to accept other men's opinions, some
naturally disposed to be cross, some to be affectionate in short, there is
hardly any one in whom some such imperfections do not exist. Now, although
they be natural and instinctive in each person, they may be remedied and
corrected, or even eradicated, by cultivating the reverse disposition. And
this, my child, must be done. Gardeners have found how to make the bitter
almond tree bear sweet fruit, by grafting the juice of the latter upon it,
why should we not purge out our perverse dispositions and infuse such as are
good? There is no disposition so good but it may be made bad by dint of
vicious habits, and neither is there any natural disposition so perverse but
that it may be conquered and overcome by God's Grace primarily, and then by
our earnest diligent endeavour. I shall therefore now proceed to give you
counsels and suggest practices by which you may purify your soul from all
dangerous affections and imperfections, and from all tendencies to venial
sin, thereby strengthening yourself more and more against mortal sin. May
God give you grace to use them.

[Consecrated one]

Thank you.

[Brigid]

St Francis de Sales gives so many of us who don't have access to a confessor, who pays attention to venial sins (let alone imperfections!). Okay......let us have his good advice (if you would).

[Shin]

PART II. CONTAINING SUNDRY COUNSELS AS TO UPLIFTING THE SOUL TO GOD IN PRAYER
                        AND THE USE OF THE SACRAMENTS.
     _________________________________________________________________

CHAPTER I. The Necessity of Prayer.

   1. PRAYER opens the understanding to the brightness of Divine Light, and the
   will to the warmth of Heavenly Love nothing can so effectually purify the
   mind from its many ignorances, or the will from its perverse affections. It
   is as a healing water which causes the roots of our good desires to send
   forth fresh shoots, which washes away the soul's imperfections, and allays
   the thirst of passion.

   2. But especially I commend earnest mental prayer to you, more particularly
   such as bears upon the Life and Passion of our Lord. If you contemplate Him
   frequently in meditation, your whole soul will be filled with Him, you will
   grow in His Likeness, and your actions will be moulded on His. He is the
   Light of the world; therefore in Him, by Him, and for Him we shall be
   enlightened and illuminated; He is the Tree of Life, beneath the shadow of
   which we must find rest; He is the Living Fountain of Jacob's well, wherein
   we may wash away every stain. Children learn to speak by hearing their
   mother talk, and stammering forth their childish sounds in imitation; and so
   if we cleave to the Savior in meditation, listening to His words, watching
   His actions and intentions, we shall learn in time, through His Grace, to
   speak, act and will like Himself. Believe me, my daughter, there is no way
   to God save through this door. Just as the glass of a mirror would give no
   reflection save for the metal behind it, so neither could we here below
   contemplate the Godhead, were it not united to the Sacred Humanity of our
   Saviour, Whose Life and Death are the best, sweetest and most profitable
   subjects that we can possibly select for meditation. It is not without
   meaning that the Saviour calls Himself the Bread come down from Heaven; just
   as we eat bread with all manner of other food, so we need to meditate and
   feed upon our Dear Lord in every prayer and action. His Life has been
   meditated and written about by various authors. I should specially commend
   to you the writings of S. Bonaventura, Bellintani, Bruno, Capilla, Grenada
   and Da Ponte.

   3. Give an hour every day to meditation before dinner; if you can, let it be
   early in the morning, when your mind will be less cumbered, and fresh after
   the night's rest. Do not spend more than an hour thus, unless specially
   advised to do so by your spiritual father.

   4. If you can make your meditation quietly in church, it will be well, and
   no one, father or mother, husband or wife, can object to an hour spent
   there, and very probably you could not secure a time so free from
   interruption at home.

   5. Begin all prayer, whether mental or vocal, by an act of the Presence of
   God. If you observe this rule strictly, you will soon see how useful it is.

   6. It may help you to say the Creed, Lord's Prayer, etc., in Latin, but you
   should also study them diligently in your own language, so as thoroughly to
   gather up the meaning of these holy words, which must be used fixing your
   thoughts steadily on their purport, not striving to say many words so much
   as seeking to say a few with your whole heart. One Our Father said devoutly
   is worth more than many prayers hurried over.

   7. The Rosary is a useful devotion when rightly used, and there are various
   little books to teach this. It is well, too, to say pious Litanies, and the
   other vocal prayers appointed for the Hours and found in Manuals of
   devotion, but if you have a gift for mental prayer, let that always take the
   chief place, so that if, having made that, you are hindered by business or
   any other cause from saying your wonted vocal prayers, do not be disturbed,
   but rest satisfied with saying the Lord's Prayer, the Angelic Salutation,
   and the Creed after your meditation.

   8. If, while saying vocal prayers, your heart feels drawn to mental prayer,
   do not resist it, but calmly let your mind fall into that channel, without
   troubling because you have not finished your appointed vocal prayers. The
   mental prayer you have substituted for them is more acceptable to God, and
   more profitable to your soul. I should make an exception of the Church's
   Offices, if you are bound to say those by your vocation in such a case these
   are your duty.

   9. If it should happen that your morning goes by without the usual
   meditation, either owing to a pressure of business, or from any other cause,
   (which interruptions you should try to prevent as far as possible,) try to
   repair the loss in the afternoon, but not immediately after a meal, or you
   will perhaps be drowsy, which is bad both for your meditation and your
   health. But if you are unable all day to make up for the omission, you must
   remedy it as far as may be by ejaculatory prayer, and by reading some
   spiritual book, together with an act of penitence for the neglect, together
   with a stedfast resolution to do better the next day.

[Shin]

"He is the Tree of Life, beneath the shadow of which we must find rest; He is the Living Fountain of Jacob's well, wherein we may wash away every stain."

 

Prayer is so essential! And peaceful prayer appreciating and taking joy in the beauty of God and Heaven!

'We are not drawn to God by iron chains, but by sweet attractions and holy inspirations.'

St. Francis de Sales

[Brigid]

8. If, while saying vocal prayers, your heart feels drawn to mental prayer,
   do not resist it, but calmly let your mind fall into that channel, without
   troubling because you have not finished your appointed vocal prayers. The
   mental prayer you have substituted for them is more acceptable to God, and
   more profitable to your soul.

Seems to me, and I may be wrong, that St. Teresa of Avila also said something like this.

[Shin]

8. If, while saying vocal prayers, your heart feels drawn to mental prayer,
   do not resist it, but calmly let your mind fall into that channel, without
   troubling because you have not finished your appointed vocal prayers. The
   mental prayer you have substituted for them is more acceptable to God, and
   more profitable to your soul.

Seems to me, and I may be wrong, that St. Teresa of Avila also said something like this.

They do tend to agree.. 

[Brigid]

 

[Consecrated one]

That's Beautiful!

[Shin]

The next instructions are on how to meditate, which you can find wholy right here.

There are also some meditations from him if you click the 'Meditations' link. 

[Consecrated one]

I have to be very careful regarding meditation and how my brain functions, but I am sure many people will get a lot out of this.

[Shin]

I really love book meditations, they are so much easier for me to meditate with.

[Brigid]

I really love book meditations, they are so much easier for me to meditate with.

They are for me also (unless, of course, they are too long online when I have trouble concentrating and my eyes have trouble focussing). But yours are fine in this way.

[eschator83]

It seems to me that it is a very amazing coincidence that I found this thread today.  The first reason is that my bride has been listening to several videos today, which i almost never have much interest in, but I found myself listening to several and gradually came to the realization that good videos or other verbal presentations (tape, radio, etc) can be very helpful to stimulate meditation.  I regret to admit that I find myself  to be generally more interested in my own meditation than in that of others, but I was just previously reading about the importance of the testimony of people whom God sends to us.  I hope I can find that passage and report it more specifically, but for now I'm motivated to say that that this book was one of the first guides to Catholic Life that I read and has been very important to me, along with other early readings of St Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises (hence my interest in another thread about My Daily Bread) and also the Rule of St Benedict.  They all seem highly regarded, yet have significant differences, which I pray to reconcile.