Union with Our Lord Jesus Christ in his pricipal mysteries. For all seasons of the year

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Preface To The French Edition

The Rev. Fr. John Baptist Saint-Jure, author of the book we present to the public, is too renowned for his learning and holiness of life to need any eulogium from us. The greater number of the works that gave him so distinguished a rank among the grand ascetic writers of the seventeenth century, are still in the hands of pious persons ; and for more than two hundred years "The Knowledge and Love of Our Lord Jesus Christ" " The Book of the Elect ; or, Jesus Crucified" " The Master ; or, Jesus Teaching Men" have not ceased to produce in the Church most abundant fruits of sanctity.

It is therefore with reason that we are surprised to see forgotten during this long period, one of the most excellent of the works of this apostolic man. The " Union with our Lord viii Preface to the French Edition.

Jesus Christ in His Principal Mysteries " is in our day almost entirely unknown. The Catalogue of Writers of the Society of Jesus has not even given its title, and it seems to have escaped the researches of those editors who for some years past have been so zealous in reproducing the other works of the same author.

The edition that we now reprint in English appeared but a few months after the death of Father Saint-Jure. Unlike the preceding editions, it bears his name, and it contains some new matter on the union of the soul with our Lord by charity. It is, as it were, a spiritual testament of the holy man wherein he seems anxious to declare for a last time, that admirable doctrine on the love of Jesus Christ which during his long career he never wearied of teaching.

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

This short work of Father Saint-Jure which we present to the public is peculiar in its character. It is a book suggestive of matter for reflection and meditation rather than one intended for mere spiritual reading. Consequently it appears suited particularly to persons who are trying earnestly to advance in the practice and acquisition of the Christian virtues and the imitation of our Lord. To such persons we humbly recommend it, begging their prayers for

The Translator.

Chapter I. Ox The Mysteries Of Our Lord Jesus Christ

Our. predestination and salvation depend absolutely on our union with our Lord Jesus Christ, since, as the Prince of the Apostles tells us, there is no salvation out of Jesus Christ, and God has given to men under heaven or in the whole universe no other name by which they can be saved. " Neither is there salvation in any other. For there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved." (Acts iv. 12.) And our Lord, speaking of himself, assures us that everything in heaven or on earth is subject to his power, and that God, his Father, has placed all things at his disposal. " All power is given to me in heaven and on earth." (Matt, xxviii. 18.) " The Father has given him all things into his hands." (John xiii. 3.) We must from this draw two important conclusions which we ought never to forget, but rather should recall each moment of our lives, and should, as it were, write everywhere in large characters, even with the golden rays of the sun, if this were possible. These conclusions are that we have a continual and inexplicable need of Jesus Christ for all that concerns our salvation, and that, consequently, we should exert all our efforts to unite ourselves intimately and inseparably with him.

Now this union is formed, practiced, and rendered perfect by sanctifying grace ; by acts of the virtues, in particular of the virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity; by the worthy reception of the sacred body of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament, which, for this reason, is called Communion ; by desires, by petitions, but chiefly by imitation of our Lord, which produces his likeness in us.

Inasmuch as it is in this likeness that the entire secret of our predestination and salvation consists, so he who bears it will infallibly be predestined and saved. The nearer we approach our Lord, the more we resemble

Mystei'ies of Our Lord. 15

him, the more signs of predestination and salvation, the greater number of tokens of eternal happiness we shall possess. "Whom he foreknew," says the celebrated passage of St. Paul, "he also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of his Son : that he might be the first-born amongst many brethren." (Rom. viii. 29.)

" Behold," says St. Chrysostom, " the height of glory to which God raises thee, making thee by grace what his only Son is by nature, and calling thee from dust and ashes to the honor of being his brother. But to bring this to pass thou must resemble him ; because those for whom God has from all eternity stored up special favors and whom he has looked upon with particular kindness, he has predestined to be one day like to his son in heaven, provided they be like him here on earth.

For this reason the Holy Spirit, speaking by the prophet Aggeus, gives to the Son of God a very significative and remarkable name, calling him the seal which the Father uses to mark his elect. " I will make thee as a signet, for I have chosen thee." (Agg. ii. 24.) Our Lord is the seal with which God signs all the predestinate ; he impresses it upon them, and they must all be marked with it, for it alone confirms them in their high estate and in their sovereign glory.

Thus St. Paul, writing to the faithful of the church of Ephesus, tells them that they are marked with Jesus Christ and bear his likeness. "In Christ you were signed." (Ephes. i. 13.) And St. John saw twelve thousand of every tribe of the children of Israel who were marked in the same manner. "There were twelve thousand signed." (Apoc. vii. 5.) He says that on the contrary the reprobate bear the mark of the beast, that is of Antichrist or the devil, and that it is engraved and stamped upon them.

It is, then, this mark and likeness which makes us adopted children of God, and assures our salvation. The noblest of God's designs, and the greatest work that he performs in heaven or on earth, is to form and represent his Son Jesus Christ in us.

The first and most sublime production of God the Father is the production of his Word in himself by eternal generation ; the second is the production of his Word incarnate out of himself, in the most pure womb of the ever Blessed Virgin by the incarnation ; and the third is the production of it in us by justification. The production of the Word in the

Mysteries of Our Lord. ij

bosom of the Father is the glory of the Father ; the production of the Word incarnate in the womb of the Virgin is the glory of his Mother ; and the production of Jesus Christ in us is our glory, our salvation, and the most perfect disposition in which we can be to procure great honor to God. Therefore God, anxious for his honor and our salvation, ardently desires this representation of Jesus Christ in us, and acts continually in a thousand manners to produce it.

■ The Father, moreover, desires it, because, knowing that his Son humbled and annihilated himself for his glory, he wills that as a recompense he be exalted, and be made as it were, to exist in a glorious manner in us and in all things ; for as he loves him solely he wishes to behold him everywhere, and to have no other object on which to look with complacency. The Son also desires it, so that his sufferings may not be in vain, and his designs may not remain unaccomplished ; the Holy Ghost, desires it, he who, having formed our Lord Jesus Christ in the womb of the Blessed Virgin, is constantly occupied, by means of the lights, inspirations, and assistance he gives in forming him morally in us, so that we may manifest him to the whole universe, expressed and represented in our interior, our exterior, and all our actions.

Again, the Church, our mother, exerts all her efforts for no other object than to perfect in us the image of Jesus Christ, and to make -us like unto him ; and when she sees that we do not resemble him, she says, with St. Paul : "My little children, of whom I am in labor again until Christ be formed in you," (Gal. iv. 19,) who formerly bore gloriously the image of Jesus Christ, your Father and my Spouse, and who were very like to him in the purity of your lives, now that the irregularity of your conduct has effaced from your souls the features of that divine likeness, I am constrained to conceive and bring you forth anew to Jesus Christ, to retrace his features in you until you resemble him perfectly. Behold whither all the designs of God and of the Church tend, to making us like Jesus Christ — and behold also what should be the object of all our own intentions and efforts.

To accomplish this object we should, as it were, bind and unite ourselves to his mysteries, because his mysteries are his principal actions, and, what is more, they are nothing else but himself; for the incarnation, the nativity, the passion, the death, and the resurrection of our

Lord, are our Lord incarnate,' newly born, suffering, dying, and risen. Hence to bind and unite ourselves -to his mysteries is to bind and unite ourselves to him, and by that binding and that union to put on his likeness.

Our Lord desires to continue and fulfill in us, as in his members whom he would sanctify and save, all those mysteries which are the sources of our sanctification and salvation. Thus he desires to express and consummate in us his incarnation, his birth, his passion, his death, his resurrection and ascension, becoming in a certain manner again incarnate in us, being born in our souls, and enabling us to reproduce the characteristics of these mysteries and to practice the virtues he practiced in them. So what St. Paul says, namely, that he filled up those things that were wanting to the sufferings of Christ, in his flesh (Coloss. i. 24) in a general way, must also be understood of Christ's incarnation, his nativity, and all his other mysteries ; it is necessary for us, if we would be saved, to fill up what is wanting in these mysteries, not in our Lord, in whom they were accomplished to the last degree, and who on his part did all that was requisite, but in us, who as his members and images are bound to reproduce them according to our capacity.

Hence we must unite ourselves most carefully to all our Lord's mysteries, yet the greater part of Christians fail to do this. This neglect causes St. Bernard to say : " There are Christians to whom Jesus Christ is not yet born ; there are others for whom he has not yet suffered ; others for whom he has never risen ; and others still for whom he has not ascended to heaven." (Serm. 4, de Resurr.) And then the saint gives the reason : it is because these Christians have not united themselves to these mysteries, have not been assimilated to them, and have not reproduced the virtues our Lord practiced in them.

In order not to incur this reproach, which would not only bring us confusion, but would entail upon us a great loss, we should enter into the mysteries of our Lord, considering that they are the sources of our supernatural life, and the fountains of living waters of which Isaiah said : " You shall draw waters with joy out of the Saviour's fountains." (Is. xii. 3.) You shall joyfully draw the salutary waters of grace from the fountains of the Saviour ; that is, from his mysteries, so that we may repeat with St. Paul : "We all, beholding the glory of the Lord with open face, are transformed into the same image from glory to glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord." (2 Cor. iii. 18.) We, who are true Christians, consider the glory of our Lord, that is to say his mysteries, not timidly, nor with shame at the lowliness and meanness that appear on the exterior of some of them, but with a steady countenance and a resolute eye, deeming them all glorious, and so much the more so in proportion as they are more covered with infamy and dishonor for our salvation. We present ourselves before these divine mysteries as before clear and bright mirrors, and their rays fall upon us, transforming us into their likeness ; thus, moved and impelled by the Holy Ghost, we go on from light to light — I mean from mystery to mystery — from our Lord's incarnation to his nativity, then to his circumcision, and so on to his other mysteries, in order to draw from each new traits of resemblance to Jesus Christ himself in our soul and body and in our whole being.

Xow, it must be remarked that each of our Lord's mysteries is composed of two parts : the first is the body and exterior of the mystery, the second is its interior and spirit. The body and exterior is all in the mystery that appeals to the senses : as in the nativity, the poverty, contempt, nakedness, cold, the manger, etc.; in the passion, the scourges, the thorns, the nails, the insults ; in the resurrection, the coming forth from the tomb completely victorious over death, the brightness, beauty, agility, subtilty, and immortality of his sacred body ; and the same with regard to the other mysteries.

The spirit and interior of the mystery is what passed in our Lord's soul while he accomplished^ it; first, the thoughts of his understanding with regard to God his Father, his holy Mother, his elect, all men, and every soul in particular ; secondly, the affections of his will ; thirdly, the intentions and designs he had in accomplishing the mystery, both for the glory of his Father and for our salvation ; fourthly, the virtues he practiced in it, the humility, poverty, obedience, and the like; and finally, the grace he merited for us by those thoughts, affections, intentions and virtues, to have in a certain proportion the same thoughts, affections, and intentions, and to practice the same virtues in the same mystery, which is properly to enter into the spirit and assume the features and coloring of the mystery. For we are bound to believe

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that as our Lord is the Saviour and pattern of men, he has merited for them by his operations in each of his mysteries, the assistance necessary to enable them to imitate those operations, and consequently to resemble him, and by that resemblance to make certain their predestination and eternal salvation.

It must be understood, moreover, that each mystery has its own spirit and character, that each is filled with a special grace and produces a particular impression, and that our Lord had in each different intentions for the glory of his Father and our sanctification, and thus different modes of preparing us for our beatitude. Just as the material sun produces different effects as he moves along his course and accomplishes his annual revolution, so when the Sun of Justice, our Lord, is in the mystery of his incarnation and thence casts his rays upon us, he produces effects of grace and other impressions of salvation, different from what he does when he is in the mystery of his birth or of his resurrection. Each mystery has its own light and warmth, its ideas and sentiments, its affections and virtues ; these constitute the particular spirit of the mystery, its principle, its soul, so to speak, and consequently they

24 Mysteries of Oil}' Lord.

are what we should especially endeavor to understand and to imprint in our souls.

We should not, meanwhile, forget the body and exterior of the mystery, for he who would desire to imitate only its interior and spirit would assuredly deceive himself, and would be like a person seeking a man and then contenting himself with only a soul ; for just as a man is not a soul alone, nor a body alone, but a soul and body joined and united, so our Lord's mysteries are composed of the union of the interior and exterior, and not of the one without the other. Moreover, the exterior of the mystery serves to dispose and prepare us to receive and appreciate the interior, and therefore should be studied first ; for, even as God does not create the soul of man until his body be formed and organized to a certain point, so our Lord does not produce the spirit' and interior ; that is to say, the thoughts, affections, and fruits of his incarnation, his nativity, or his passion, in a man who is not first prepared by the exterior acts of those mysteries.

It is, then, necessary for whosoever would share in the grace, and receive the spirit of a mystery, for example, our Lord's nativity, to prepare himself by some act of poverty, by some endurance of cold or discomfort ; for he who would expect to profit by this mystery while retaining an affection for riches and pleasures,, would grossly deceive himself, and would resemble a person turning his back to the place to which he desires to go ; and this because the disposition of him who desires something must always have some conformity to the object of his desire.

As our Lord's mysteries are the vital principles and causes of our salvation, it is necessary, if we would be saved, that they be applied to us and in some sort renewed in us. As it is^ not enough for our salvation that we rise and ascend into heaven in the person of our Lord, who contained us all in himself by grace and by glory, if we do not also in our own persons rise and ascend into heaven ; so it is not sufficient that we be incarnate, that Ave be born, and that we suffer and die in him, if we do not likewise accomplish these acts after his example in ourselves, because the imitation; and re-accomplishment of these last mysteries in us is the road to the glory of the first. In; the great mystery of our fall, and in consequence of our sad condemnation, not only w T e all once sinned in Adam, as St. Paul says, and

were all driven from Paradise and died in him, 3 but, moreover, we are individually stained with sin, we are banished from that place of :happiness, and we are subjected to the rigorous sentence of death. Our Lord's mysteries, the painful and the joyous, the ignominious and the glorious, must be renewed in us individually, their likeness must be impressed upon, and their effects produced in, every •individual soul.

For this reason we should take great pains to unite ourselves with them, especially at the times when the Church proposes them to us 'because then they have more efficacy. We must believe that it is not without a reason that our Lord inspires his Church to put ! before our eyes at such or such a time the mysteries of his life, but in order that then more than at another time he may render them useful to us and communicate their fruits imore abundantly. The prophet Isaiah indeed promises us that we shall draw joyfully from the fountains of the Saviour, which are his 'mysteries, the waters of grace, of the virtues, and of our salvation ; but the prophet Zachariah adds that this shall be on a certain day : " In that day," he says, " there shall be a fountain open to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem." (Zach. xiii. I.)

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It is, then, " in that day," that is at the time the Church directs, that the soul should draw those salutary waters from the mysterious fountains of the Saviour, because then they are open and send forth their waters with full force ; whereas at other times, if they are not altogether closed, they are at least not so widely open and do not pour out their streams so abundantly. So, while the precious waters flow plenteously, the soul should take advantage of them ; and thus she may reap more fruit in a single day than she would in six or eight at another season, as is related of the Blessed Mary d'Ognies in her life written by Cardinal de Vitry.

But, as dispositions are various and the movements of the Holy Spirit diverse, this does not prevent there being souls that have greater facility in entering into one mystery than into another, and drawing more profit from one than from another ; such souls should stay and draw the waters of their salvation and advancement in virtue as long as the mysterious fount remains open to them.

You ask me now liozv we may unite ourselves to these mysteries of our Lord's life and death. I reply that, granted the knowledge faith gives us of them and which is sufficicnt, it is chiefly by means of the affections and the virtues relating to them, as you will see when we treat of each of the mysteries separately.

We have arranged these mysteries and the practices of the union we should contract through them with our Lord, in the following manner :

From Advent to Christmas the practice will be upon the mystery of our Lord's incarnation. ■ From Christmas to Lent we will dwell upon the nativity, the circumcision, the adoration of the Magi, the flight into Egypt and the dwelling there, the return to Nazareth, and the entire hidden life of our Lord.

During the season of Lent we will study the passion and death of our Lord.

From Easter to the feast of the Blessed Sacrament, our Lord's resurrection and ascension, and the descent of the Holy Ghost, will be our subjects.

From the feast of the Blessed Sacrament till Advent we will meditate upon the most Holy Eucharist considered as a Sacrament and a wSacrifice ; we will endeavor to unite ourselves to our Lord in this adorable mystery by suitable affections, especially by faith, hope, charity, and imitation of him.

In each practice or exercise we shall always include six things which will be its six parts or divisions :

First, the subject-matter about which we are to occupy ourselves, that is, the mystery proposed for our consideration and practice. We shall dwell especially upon the knowledge of it given us by faith, without seeking other lights which very often only amuse and puff up the mind while drying up the will. Faith, and not learning or science, converted and instructed the world. Believe firmly the mystery just as the Church teaches it to you, and this is enough to cause it to produce in you its effects.

Secondly, tlie affections and interior acts which we must conceive and form -according to the mystery, in which the soul should carefully exercise itself, and keep itself, as it were, buried during the whole season of the mystery.

Thirdly, the virtues most prominent in the mystery and the practice of which, both interior and exterior, we should embrace with special affection, and of which we should daily produce with fidelity and confidence, but without haste or embarrassment of spirit, a certain number of acts in proportion to our disposition and strength.

Upon this point I have an important counsel to give : some persons are afflicted, and complain that their souls do not open to the mysteries of -our Lord; that when the great feasts come, then it is that they have least devotion, that then their understanding is more than ever darkened and they comprehend nothing of these wonders ; their will is more than ever arid, so that they are obliged to remain dull and dry, as it were, at the gate of the mystery, without power to enter into it. I say to these persons that they should not be troubled, and complain of this ; God does not require of them such a sensible appreciation of his mysteries, inasmuch as it does not depend upon them, but is purely his gift. They would like to have clear and beautiful thoughts, to be filled with devout affections and to burst into floods of pious tears, never considering that the key to the stores of such sensible light and devotion is not in their hands. All that God demands of them is that they apply themselves to our Lord's mysteries by an imitation of the virtues he practiced therein, by a practical reproduction of his mysteries in their daily lives ; this they can do with the help of his grace, which he is always ready to give them ; and this is the chief thing, for, as our

Lord's principal object in his mysteries was to effect our salvation and as a means to this, to render us virtuous, the accomplishment of this object in us by the practice of the virtues must be their most important and most necessary fruit.

St. Bernard, treating of the mystery of the nativity, says-: " In order that Mary, Joseph, and the Infant cradled in the manger may always dwell in us, in order that we may enter into the mystery of our Lord's nativity, and that it may penetrate our souls, let us live in this world soberly, justly, and piously." (Serm. 4, in Nat. Dom.) And St. Paul, speaking on the same subject, teaches us in positive terms the same thing — not to seek to have grand lights nor lofty conceptions: " The grace of God our Saviour hath appeared to all men, instructing us that, denying ungodliness and worldly desires, we should live soberly and justly and piously in this world." (Tit. ii. 11.) Our Saviour Jesus Christ, with infinite goodness and grace, has appeared as the Sun of Justice to the eyes of all men, to dissipate their darkness and teach them to avoid sin, to renounce worldly desires, and to lead lives of sobriety toward themselves, of justice toward their neighbor, and of piety toward

God. It is, then, in this way, a way all are capable of, that we ought to unite ourselves to our Lord's mysteries.

Fourthly, meditations on the mysteries of the season : these you can easily enough make yourself from the matter contained in each practice or exercise, dwelling upon whatever moves you most ; or you can select them from such books as you judge most suitable.

Fifthly, readings appropriate to each exercise will be indicated, without however forbidding you to select others, provided they relate to the subject.

Finally, the sixth thing will be ejacidatory verses, which should be always in the heart and often on the lips, in order to keep the mystery fresh in the memory, and, by a constant recollection of it, to unite us to it, and, through it, to our Lord.

Besides all these, there are still three things to be remarked concerning the affections :

The first is the very common and injurious delusion of taking much more pains and employing much more time to cultivate and polish the understanding than the will, although merit, sanctity, and perfection in this life, are not in the understanding, but in the will. We seek only to learn, to enlighten our mind, and to add knowledge to knowledge, and we neglect our will, which meanwhile needs to be carefully exercised in affections of piety and incited to the love and practice of humility, patience, and the other virtues, most particularly charity, wherein the perfection of the will lies. We all know quite enough, and much more than we practice. Who does not know that he ought to love God with all his heart, and ought to avoid sin above everything ? And nevertheless how few there are who do it ! The reason of this disorder is that our mind has an extreme desire to learn, and we naturally find much pleasure in the acquisition of knowledge, whereas our will is indifferent to virtue and must be constrained to practice it, thus obliging us to do violence to ourselves.

The second thing to be remembered is also another illusion that possesses a vast number of persons who in the spiritual life are governed too much by the senses ; they wish to feel their spiritual operations, and, if they are not sensibly touched and moved in their devotional exercises, they are troubled, become uneasy, and believe they are making no progress. To disabuse these persons, let me assure them that the spiritual life is, as its name implies, a life whose vital acts take place in the spirit, and not in the body. Material things make sensible impressions upon the body ; thus fire makes itself felt in the hand by means of heat, and ice by cold. Spiritual things do not act upon the soul in the same manner, but insensibly, producing in it spiritual effects : which action consists in causing it to avoid evil and to do good, in enlightening its understanding with knowledge necessary for salvation, in strengthening its will so as to regulate its affections, that it may bear patiently its aridities and all its trials, govern rightly the movements of the body, and, in a word, practice all virtue.