Of consumption in Grace, by the R.-P. Jean-Joseph Surin
Extract from the SPIRITUAL CATECHISM OF CHRISTIAN PERFECTION, VOLUME I, Composed by RPJJ SURIN, of the Society of Jesus:
The conversion of Saint Paul, Acts of the Apostles (Countess of Segur)
From consumption to Grace
What do you mean by this consumption?
I mean the highest degree of perfection, to which man having arrived, we can say that he is consummate in virtue, confirmed in the practice of good, and as it were confirmed in grace.
What does this consumption consist of?
Besides the graces of which we have just spoken, which are specific to this state; what constitutes its character is firmness, ease of doing good, and freedom.
What is this firmness?
It is an establishment in virtue so solid that it appears to be unshakeable: it is achieved through long exercise, through the strength of holy habits and through the help of grace; in the same way that men, by dint of practicing in the particular professions that they have embraced since their youth, perfect themselves so solidly that they find nothing difficult in it, and that they seem be born into these kinds of professions. This firmness is particularly opposed to inconstancy and human weakness, from which we are only freed in the state we describe. It is through this place that the Son of God praises his holy Precursor, when he says to the Jews: What did you go to see in the desert? A reed that the wind shakes? as if he were saying that most men, very different from John the Baptist, are like reeds that bend in every wind; that they soon forget their holy resolutions; that they practice virtue for a time, and then abandon it, not only through their unfaithfulness to grace, and because they fall, but also through inconstancy and pure levity. Consummation in grace protects man from this inconstancy.
How should the firmness of this state appear?
In three main points, which embrace all perfection, and on which we must be invariable. The first is the design to be God's by preference, to give oneself to him without reserve, and to persevere in his service with inviolable attachment. The second is the execution of this design, which consists of giving all one's attention to God, to everything that concerns the service of God, and especially to the maxims which concern self-denial, victory for oneself, and innocence of life. We must fill ourselves with these maxims, fix our esteem and our taste on them, until we have no inclination and movement except for the practices of perfection. The third is the continuation not only in a type of life conforming to the evangelical counsels, as is that of the Religious and of several people of the century devoted to devotion,but also in fervor, which is a disposition of the soul to always do what is most perfect and most pleasing to God. To be strengthened in this state of fervor, apart from the idea of perfect good, which we must always have present; apart from the continual application to put this idea into practice, there is also a need for a holy ardor and a certain vivacity which keeps the mind always attentive and ready to act: almost like the soldiers who are on duty, to whom one does not never allows you to fall asleep or get distracted. In this tireless vigilance properly consists of fervor, which is the effect of great grace and faithful correspondence; and the consumption of which we speak is the strengthening of the soul in this continual vigilance; not by dint of fighting, as beginners do, but by inclination, by state, and by the ease that acquired habit gives.
Do people who are thus consumed no longer have difficulty practicing virtue?
They no longer have any on the side of their will, which easily turns to good by the force of the holy habits they have acquired: it will cost them much more to abandon the type of life they have embraced, than It doesn't cost them to support him. However, they always feel the pain that comes from the difficulty of the things they undertake; but as it is a pain that they are very happy to have, they like to suffer it, and they would be sorry to be delivered from it. This is how sufferings are changed into joys and delights, and how this word of Our Lord is fulfilled: My yoke is easy, and my burden is light (Matt., 11, 10).
In what does facility for good consist, which is the second effect of consummation in grace?
It consists of a gentle inclination and a situation of mind, which disposes the soul with regard to the practices of virtue, like the natural inclinations with regard to sensible objects. These people have, by the virtue of grace and by the force of habit, the same inclination to love God, and all that pertains to his service, as others, men to love their children and their own lives: they consider it impossible to deliberately act against the will of God. This is the disposition in which Saint Bernard was, when he said: My God, when I see your will in something, I do not know how I could be capable of not conforming to it .
Where does this great ease come from?
Of grace which, after having established itself in man, and intimately united with him, perfects him entirely, elevates him to a supernatural and divine order, and performs in him the office of a second nature, which brings his heart to God, and disposes his will to good in a particular way. Everything that is most difficult is then done easily; and this remnant of concupiscence and corruption of nature, which we cannot get rid of in this life, is as if relegated by grace, far from the will, and put out of a state of harm; as well as the snakes which, dampened by the cold and the frost, remain hidden and without movement, as if they had no life.
How then is it that people of this elevation offend God, and confess?
They bring to the Sacrament the faults they commit, which are very slight, and done with little reflection: for it is difficult to understand how faults committed deliberately, which suppose some desire to displease God, could sympathize with the grace of this state, and to be found in people who regard God as their husband, and whom God regards as his wives. This constant residence of the Holy Spirit, which makes the practice of good seem natural to the people we are talking about, by dint of facilitating it for them, has given occasion to some mystics to use a rather extraordinary expression, and to say that these souls have God substantiated in their depths ; which means nothing else, except that God, through his Holy Spirit, has taken possession of these souls; that he united himself intimately with them, and that then from their faithful correspondence he became the principle of their actions, in the manner that we explained when speaking of the divine union. But these are mysteries that we will only fully understand in Heaven.
What is the effect of this facility?
It is to dispose the heart in such a way that we take pleasure in all that is most difficult in the service of God, and that we do not believe we can live without fasting and mortification. , Prayer, Communion and other holy exercises.
Does it never happen that souls consummate in grace, after having long practiced virtue with ease, experience the revolts of nature and the attacks of the devil?
God, to test them and to perfect them further, sometimes allows their passions to rise, and for the enemy of salvation to lead them to evil through strong impressions. But it is so that these temptations of the devil, and these revolts of nature, make them more humble, and establish them more solidly in virtue: as we see that certain trees and certain plants are strengthened by frost,and cast deeper roots. And although the souls thus tested do not perceive the design that God has for them, because they are only occupied with the danger of their state; they nevertheless derive great advantages from these trials. This conduct of God is not ordinary; it concerns only a few people, among whom there are some whom God leaves in sorrows and temptations until death, and who always fear being lost. However, in the midst of their struggles and their harsh trials, words so full of the spirit of God sometimes escape them; and when it is necessary to act for him, they do it with so much strength and generosity that it is easy to judge that they are in no way inferior to those whom God treats with gentleness, and that they are neither less faithful nor less consumed by virtue. It is true that it is difficult to reconcile continual sorrows with the state of spiritual marriage, which the Mystics, after experiencing it, called a species of Paradise. Therefore it must be said that there is more than one kind of consummation in grace; that spiritual marriage is usually the reward for great trials; and that when it pleases God to grant this signal favor with extreme penalties, he uses it in this way to make his servants understand that present life passes in a continual vicissitude of good and evil; that they must regard themselves as pilgrims and travelers on earth; and that no one is assured of his salvation except he to whom God has made a particular revelation, as happened to some Saints.
In what does freedom consist, which is the third effect of consummation in grace?
It does not consist of not being as exact and restrained as before, but of being so without embarrassment and without constraint, and of doing what one does in an easy manner, and which has nothing to do with it. the scrupulous timidity and embarrassing restraint of beginners. Besides this, people consummate in virtue can do innocently, and even with merit, things from which they formerly refrained with great care and which they could not have done without danger and without some prejudice to their perfection. On certain occasions they speak of themselves, and of the graces that God has given them, like Saint Paul, who said that he had worked more than all the other Apostles . They grant their body relief that they formerly denied it; and in this they do nothing against humility and mortification, because they only have God in view, they relate everything to him, as to the author of all good, and only in the reliefs that they take, they only consider the affairs with which they are charged for his glory,and in no way to their own satisfaction. It should come as no surprise that these people are enemies of constraint and will do whatever they want; they only want good, and it is the Holy Spirit who moves them and leads them in all things; they have a very great aversion to sin and to all kinds of imperfection: they have the freedom to do evil; but they regard it as a harsh slavery, and a shameful necessity. Didn't Saint Augustine say: Love and do what you will? The Francis of Assisi, the Xaviers, and several others firmly established in this love, went, came and flew wherever the Spirit of God took them, like the animals that the Prophet Ezekiel saw. Men of this character see nothing greater than God; everything else seems small to them: they are not subject to the fears and desires that act on other men: they speak to Princes and Kings with marvelous intrepidity, and they sometimes dare to say what others would not dare to think: witness the reproaches of John the Baptist to Herod, of Elijah to Ahab. It is the Spirit of the Lord who inspires this boldness in men consummate in grace. As they are elevated to a supernatural and divine order, they do not feel the weaknesses of nature: as they are established in God, who has no limits, they enjoy all the extent that they find in this Infinite being: and thus this truth is fulfilled: Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (1 Cor.); whereas embarrassment and constraint are the share of those who seek themselves, and who follow the inclinations of nature.
How can we achieve this consumption?
There are two. One is extraordinary; and it is a special gift, by which God confirms man in grace: this gift was granted to the Apostles, when the Holy Spirit descended on them; and to Saint Paul, at the time of his conversion. The other is more ordinary, and it is the long exercise and constant practice of the virtues. Man, after having gone through great labors, through terrible nights, and through the terrible trials that we encounter on the path to perfection, finally arrives, with the help of grace, at the state that we have just described. .
Is there any state in this life where one can have complete security?
There are not any. However rich one may be in virtue and merit; whatever facility for good, and whatever freedom one has acquired, one always has reason to fear; We must always watch over ourselves, to keep away from everything that is bad. No matter how much we tame self-esteem and combat the inclinations of corrupt nature, we never really destroy them in this life; they are enemies always attentive to opportunities to restart the war, and always capable of losing a man, who allowing himself to be dazzled by his progress in virtue, would forget that all good comes from grace, and that he always has a principle of badly in his own heart. We must therefore always fear pride and laxity, however saintly we may be. It is true that in certain states where God communicates himself to souls in a sublime and at the same time very loving manner, this fear is not perceptible, and that it sympathizes with complete confidence, and with perfect peace ; which is enough to justify what we have just said, that the good man can be happy before death, when he is consummated in grace: and in fact this state is a foretaste of Paradise.
