ould never dare to
penetrate. My heart beats no faster in his presence. I think, indeed,
it beats more slowly but of this I am not sure. Dear Jeanne, I could not
possibly speak more honestly than I have done, therefore I beg you, I
entreat you, not to imagine anything different!

For the present I am not thinking of going to Belgium. I may possibly
go there for a short time, later on. My kind regards to your brother. I
should like to know if he has sent the old priest and the young woman to
Formalhaut at last! I myself sometimes think of his Formalhaut! Tell
him that if you and he come to Rome this winter, we will make music
together. Good-bye I embrace you!

BENEDETTO TO DON CLEMENTE

_(Never sent)_

_Padre mio_, the Lord has departed from my soul, not, indeed, giving me
up to sin, but He has taken from me all sense of His presence, and the
despairing cry of Jesus Christ on the cross thrills, at times, through
my whole being. If I strive to concentrate all my thoughts in the one
thought of the Divine Presence, all my senses in an act of submission to
the Divine Will, I derive only pain and discouragement from it. I feel
like the beast of burden which falls under its load, and which, at the
first cut of the whip, makes an effort to rise, and falls again; at
a second blow, at a third, or a fourth, it only shivers, and does not
attempt to rise. If I open the Gospels or the _Imitation_, I find no
flavour in them. If I recite prayers, weariness overpowers me, and I am
silent. If I prostrate myself upon the ground, the ground freezes me. If
I make complaint to God at being treated thus, His silence seems to grow
more hostile. If, on the authority of the great mystics, I say to myself
that I am wrong to feel such affection for spiritual joys, to suffer
thus when deprived of them, I answer myself that the mystics err, that
in the state of conscious grace one walks safely, but that in this
starless night of spiritual darkness one cannot see the way; there is no
other rule than to withdraw one's foot when it touches the soft grass,
and that is not sufficient, for there is also the danger of setting the
foot in empty space. Father, _Padre mio_, open your arms to me, that I
may feel the warmth of your breast, filled with God! There are a hundred
reasons why I should not go to Santa Scolastica, and in any case I
should prefer to write. You are here present with me more than in the
body; I can become one with you, can mingle wit