Sister Mary,
I prefer to answer your letter in two words rather than not answer it at all. I have you as present in my heart as if I wrote you every day. I beg you only to not remember at all past things, and to never speak about them but to make die in silence all these infidelities and all these fears, all these miseries and these errors that you speak about. There is absolutely no greater penitence than the humility and the simplicity that we show to God and to men, and even to our spiritual directors, by never speaking about ourselves, neither anything good nor bad except as much as is necessary. God will accomplish in his eternity everything he decided to do with us before we were created. But we should do nothing other during the course of our lives except to be simple in our words and in our thoughts, saying little, and doing everything we can in order to obey him and to serve him during the rest of our lives. It’s in that that consists the thanks we owe him for the extraordinary graces he has given us. I pray him to put me in this condition when I will be on my deathbed, that men hear nothing from me, and that he alone sees that all my bones are humbled by the feelings I have from his grace in my heart. It is not only for Saint Agatha to triumph by expressing words of love both during her life and while dying. Innocence praises and sings, penitence humbles itself and is silent.
Translated from the French by Daniel McNeill
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