ch an immersion of the soul into Him,
that I could scarcely speak. This ascension of the spirit, wherein God
draws the soul so powerfully, not into its own inmost recess, but into
Himself, is not operated till after the death of self. The soul
actually comes out of itself to pass into its divine object. I call it
death, that is to say, a passage from one thing to another. It is truly
a happy passover for the soul, and its passage into the promised land.
The spirit which is created to be united to its divine Origin, has so
powerful a tendency to Him, that if it were not stopped by a continual
miracle, its moving quality would cause the body to be drawn after it
by reason of its impetuosity and noble assent. But God has given it a
terrestrial body to serve for a counterpoise. This spirit then, created
to be united to its Origin, without any medium or interstice, feeling
itself drawn by its divine object, tends to it with an extreme
violence; in such sort that God, suspending for sometime the power
which the body has to hold back the spirit, it follows with ardency.
When it is not sufficiently purified to pass into God, it gradually
returns to itself; as the body resumes its own quality, it turns to the
earth. The saints who have been the most perfect have advanced to that
degree, as to have nothing of all this. Some have lost it toward the
end of their lives, becoming single and pure as the others, because
they then had in reality and permanence what they had at first only as
transient fruitions, in the time of the prevalence or dominion of the
body. It is certain then that the soul, by death to itself, passes into
its divine Object. This is what I then experienced. I found, the
farther I went, the more my spirit was lost in its Sovereign, who
attracted it more and more to Himself. He was pleased at first that I
should know this for the sake of others and not for myself. Indeed He
drew my soul more and more into Himself, till it lost itself entirely
out of sight, and could perceive itself no more. It seemed at first to
pass into Him. As one sees a river pass into the ocean, lose itself in
it, its water for a time distinguished from that of the sea, till it
gradually becomes transformed into the same sea, and possesses all its
qualities; so was my soul lost in God, who communicated to it His
qualities, having drawn it out of all that it had of its own. Its life
is an inconceivable innocence, not known or comprehended of thos