express to you what I have experienced regarding the love of Jesus Christ for His Father; a love which makes Him assume a body and a soul like to ours, to live a life like to ours, and which makes Him die upon the Cross to offer to God a sacrifice worthy of Him; or regarding the entire and perfect submission of the Saviour Jesus to the will of His Father, through which He sacrifices His own will to do that of His Father, or His infinite desire for the reparation of His Father's glory, or His abandonment and unlimited confidence in God His Father, into whose hands He commits His soul when dying. It is impossible for me to endeavour to express to you what I have seen of the love of Jesus Christ for all men, for His executioners, for me, and to show you the picture of light which formed itself round that word, which I saw in characters of fire in the Heart of Jesus "I thirst." It was the thirst for our salvation, for the salvation of poor sinners, with which He was devoured. He would have wished to be able to say to all what He said to the good thief: "To-day thou shalt be with Me in Paradise." That was the desire of His Heart, an immeasurable desire, which he manifested in that word of a God dying for the redemption of men-"I thirst." Vainly should I endeavour to express the humility of Jesus on the Cross, of that God who is sovereignly great and exalted, abased amidst sufferings and death. Vainly should I try to express His obedience, which made Him submit to His executioners; His patience, which prevented Him from complaining; His meekness, which made Him in His sufferings the Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world.

Each of these virtues of Jesus on the Cross kept

JESUS ON THE CROSS.

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That is all I

me a day in prayer before my Saviour. can say. If I wish to write, my pen stops, because the power of expression fails me; if I wish to speak, my tongue remains, as it were, immovable. It is impossible to render sensible by exterior word a word which is insensible and interior. I am unable to give expression to instructions which I received in the splendours of a light emanating from the Cross, by means of conventional signs proceeding from the lips of men, and called words.

Receive, Monsieur le Curé, the assurance of my profound gratitude, and my perfect respect and veneration.

Jesus on the Cross makes known to us the justice of His Father; and this knowledge is the terror of the

impenitent sinner.

also His mercy.

MONSIEUR LE CURÉ,

Jesus on the Cross manifests

It is with the most entire and perfect submission that I desire to conform to your will. You bid me make an effort and endeavour to find some mode of expressing what I experience in my meditations on the Passion.

I am about to make the attempt, and will do the best I can. Forgive me if I do not do it in such

manner as you would wish, and let my good-will plead in my excuse.

After meditating on Jesus on the Cross as the model of all virtues, I beheld unrolled before me the sequel of the general plan which I traced out to you. Jesus on the Cross makes known the justice of His Father, and this knowledge is the terror of the impenitent sinner.

This subject detained me in the Admirable Tabernacle three days at the hour of my meditation.

You know, Monsieur, and, indeed, you see how clearly the justice of God was manifested in Jesus on the Cross, since, in order to make Him satisfaction, it is a God made Man who dies upon that Cross. I will not dwell on this point. Besides, in my meditation, this view of the Divine justice executed on Jesus upon the Cross blazed only for a moment before my eyes; and I suppose it is because it is an unfathomable mystery that I was not permitted to dwell upon it. For three days my mind and heart were directed to the terror with which Jesus Crucified must inspire the impenitent sinner.

Jesus on the Cross is the victim on whom God has exercised the rigour of His justice and the severity of His judgments. Now, Jesus was just, and there was in Him only the semblance of the sin for which He came to die for the salvation of the world. What, then, ought the impenitent sinner to expect, who will not renounce his sin, and whom death will strike at an hour when he is least thinking of it?

Such is the general view which I had before me the first day on which I was permitted to enter into the Admirable Tabernacle in order to behold therein the justice of God manifested in Jesus on the Cross.

THE SOUL AND BODY OF JESUS.

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Here is the view in detail, or the instruction which my mind derived from this view :

Jesus was just, holy, and incapable of sin. The Heart of Jesus could not feel the impression of any vice, of any evil inclination, or of any the slightest imperfection; whereas the saints, even the greatest saints, through an effect of corrupt nature, have had experience of these impressions, although they did not become the victims of them. The Divinity which filled His Heart enclosed therein the perfect sanctity of God, and consequently repelled everything which was not holy, and prevented it by infinite barriers from approaching Him.

The Spirit of Jesus was enlightened with the very light of the Divinity, which divinised It; that is to say, it gave to It the most entire conformity and the greatest participation in the sanctity of God, so that It might be the Spirit of the Man-God.

The Soul of Jesus was filled with the Divinity, which communicated Itself to It in so intimate a manner that the Soul of the Saviour was wholly absorbed in the Divinity, because one with It, and yet without confusion and still preserving all Its powers and all Its faculties distinct from the Divinity. The Soul of Jesus was like that of other men, endowed with the same faculties, understanding, memory, will, and reason; but in the Saviour Jesus these faculties were divinised.

The Body of Jesus was pure and holy; for His Soul, being full of graces, possessing all virtues in a degree infinitely more exalted than it is possible to conceive, participating in the perfections of the Divinity, and being Itself divinised, could direct the Body only after a Divine manner. For it is the soul which guides the

body, making it act and operating by it what it wills. Now, the Soul of Jesus, being divinised by Its union to the Divinity, divinised the Body of Jesus by Its union with It. In the Body of Jesus were the Divinity of the Word of God and the Soul of Jesus divinised by Its union therewith; and the Body, the Soul, and the Divinity were so perfectly united that they formed but one only Being, or one only Person, the Person of the Son of God made Man; a Person just, holy, and incapable of sin. In Jesus there are three substances: the Divine substance, the substance of the soul, and the substance of the body. three substances make two natures, the Divine Nature and the Human Nature. These two natures make one only Person, the Person of the Son of God made Man, who is called Jesus Christ.

These

Man must necessarily possess a body and a soul. If he had only a body, he would not be man, he would be a machine without life, a statue without movement. If he had only a soul, he would not be man, he would be a spiritual intelligence; for a man to exist there must be union between the soul and the body, which preserve each other without confusion; for the soul does not become matter or the body spirit. They mutually preserve each other, and their union composes the man.

Jesus Christ is truly man. He is Man united to the Divinity. The union of the Divine Nature with the Human Nature does not cause confusion between the Human Nature and the Divine Nature. The Human Nature is perfectly and entirely preserved in Jesus Christ; without this He would not be Man. The Divine Nature is not confounded with the Human Nature by its union with the Body and Soul of Jesus