I went into a retreat, and stayed twelve days. Here I made
vows of perpetual chastity, poverty and obedience, covenanting to obey
whatever I should believe to be the will of God also to obey the
church, and to honor Jesus Christ in such a manner as He pleased.

At this time I found that I had the perfect chastity of love to the
Lord, it being without any reserve, division, or view of interest.
Perfect poverty, by the total privation of everything that was mine,
both inwardly and outwardly. Perfect obedience to the will of the Lord,
submission to the church, and honor to Jesus Christ in loving Himself
only; the effect of which soon appeared. When by the loss of ourselves
we are passed into the Lord, our will is made one and the same with
that of the Lord, according to the prayer of Christ, "As thou Father
art in me, and I in thee, grant that they also may be one of us." John
17:21. Oh, but it is then that the will is rendered marvelous, both
because it is made the will of the Lord, which is the greatest of
miracles; also because it works wonders in Him. For as it is the Lord
who wills in the soul, that will has its effect. Scarcely has it willed
but the thing is done.

But some may say, Why then so many oppressions endured? Why do not
these souls, if they have such a power, set themselves free from them?
We answer that if they had any will to do anything of that sort,
against divine providence, that would be the will of flesh, or the will
of man, and not the will of God, John 1:13.

I rose generally at midnight, waking at the proper time; but if I wound
up my alarm-watch, then I used not to awake in time. I saw that the
Lord had the care of a father and a spouse over me. When I had any
indisposition, and my body wanted rest, He did not awake me; but at
such times I felt even in my sleep a singular possession of Him. Some
years have passed wherein I have had only a kind of half-sleep; but my
soul waked the more for the Lord, as sleep seemed to steal from it
every other attention. The Lord made it known also to many persons,
that He designed me for a mother of great people, but a people simple
and childlike. They took these intelligences in a literal sense and
thought it related to some institution or congregation. But it appeared
to me that the persons whom it would please the Lord that I should win
over to Him, and to whom I should be as a mother, through His goodness,
should have the same union of affection for me as