God delights in those who make themselves little and become as little children; He keeps them near His person, and nourishes them with the milk of divine love, in order to prepare them for the sweet wine of holy love, which inebriates those who drink it; but it is a blessed wine, which gives daily more wisdom.
–Saint Paul of the Cross (1694-1775)
Sometimes, in prayer, God communicates to the soul, all at once, His treasures of lights and heavenly graces. Imagine that you have in your hand a golden dish, that you pour into it the extract of the rarest and most exquisite perfumes, and that you steep into it a fine cambric handkerchief; this handkerchief will yield a delicious and inexplicable odor, composed of all the perfumes. It is thus my soul feels when I receive those intimate and hidden communications.
–Saint Paul of the Cross (1694-1775)
If your desire and aim is to reach the destination of the path and home of true happiness, of grace and glory, by a straight and safe way then earnestly apply your mind to seek constant purity of heart, clarity of mind and calm of the senses. Gather up your heart’s desire and fix it continually on the Lord God above.
–Saint Albert the Great (c. 1206-1280)
Furthermore, while the soul is withdrawn from everything and is turned within, the eye of contemplation is opened and sets itself up a ladder by which it can pass to the contemplation of God. By this contemplation the soul is set on fire for eternal things by the heavenly and divine good things it experiences, and views all the things of time from a distance and as if they were nothing. Hence when we approach God by the way of negation, we first deny him everything that can be experienced by the body, the senses and the imagination, secondly even things experienceable by the intellect, and finally even being itself in so far as it is found in created things. This, so far as the nature of the way is concerned, is the best means of union with God, according to Dionysius.
–Saint Albert the Great (c. 1206-1280)
Above all one should accept everything, in general and individually, in oneself or in others, agreeable or disagreeable, with a prompt and confident spirit, as coming from the hand of his infallible Providence or the order he has arranged.
–Saint Albert the Great (c. 1206-1280)
A heart which is free from thoughts and affections alien to God is like a temple consecrated to the Lord, in which we can contemplate him even in this world.
–Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274)
