Note 331 — Chapter I

This Prayer of Silence became hers at an early period in her religious career, not as the result of direct effort in pursuance of a theory, but simply as the consequence of overpowering emotion. She says, ‘I had a secret desire given me from that time to be wholly devoted to the disposal of my God, let it be what it would. I said, ‘What couldst Thou demand of me, that I would not willingly sacrifice or offer Thee? Oh, spare me not.’ I could scarce hear speak of God, or our Lord Jesus Christ, without being almost ravished out of myself. What surprised me the most, was the great difficulty I had to say the vocal prayers I had been used to say. As soon as I opened my lips to pronounce them, the love of God seized me so strongly that I was swallowed up in a profound silence, and a peace not to be expressed. I made fresh essays, but still in vain. I began, but could not go on. And as I had never before heard of such a state, I knew not what to do. My inability therein still increased, because my love to God was still growing more strong, more violent, and more overpowering. There was made in me, without the sound of words, a continual prayer, which seemed to me to be the prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ Himself; a prayer of the Word, which is made by the Spirit, which, according to St. Paul, ‘asketh for us that which is good, perfect, and conformable to the will of God.’—Autobiography, part I. c. xiii.

Here we find genuine devout fervour, emancipating itself, very naturally in private, from allotted forms of prayer; but no mysticism, till we come to the last sentence—even that, admitting a favourable explanation.