Page:AceticLibraryV2PreparationForDeath.djvu/247



In this life the greatest pain that can afflict the souls who love God, and who are desolate, is the fear that they do not love, and are not loved by God. " No man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before them." (Eccles. ix. i.) But in heaven the soul is certain that it loves God, and that it is loved by God, and it sees that it is happily lost in, the love of its Lord; and that God holds it in His embrace as if it were a dear child; and it sees that this love will not be dissolved even in eternity. The better knowledge that it will then acquire, will increase the blessed flames of that love which led God to become man, and to die for us, of that love which instituted the Holy Communion, in which God becomes the food of worms. The soul will then see distinctly even all the graces which God has given to it in liberating it from so great temptations, and the dangers of being lost; and then it will see that those tribulations, weaknesses, persecutions, and losses, which it called the punishments and chastenings of God, were all of love, and that they came by Divine providence to conduct it to heaven. It will see particularly the patience that God had in bearing with so great sins, and the long-sufferings that He has exercised in giving it so many lights and so many calls of love. It will see there, from that blessed mountain, so many souls condemned to hell for less sins than its own; and it will see itself saved, in possession of God, and secure of never losing that Highest Good for all eternity.

For ever then will that blessed soul, enjoy that happiness which, through all eternity, at every moment will be for ever new, as if that moment was the first in which it enjoyed it. It will ever enjoy that happiness and will ever obtain it; ever thirsting and ever satisfied; ever satisfied and ever thirsting. Yes, since the desire of heaven brings no pain, and the fulfilment of it brings no weariness. In short, as the lost are vessels of wrath, so the blessed are vessels of joy. S. Teresa says that, even in this world, when God brings a soul into " the banqueting house," where it partakes of this Divine love, He renders it so happily