THE

LIFE OF LADY GUION.

PART FIRST.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION,

ADDRESSED BY IIER ΤΟ HER DIRECTOR.

SINCE you require me to write you the

whole series of a life so extraordinary, so fruitful of pains and trials of patience, as mine has been, I am willing with all my heart to obey your order, though to me the task appears painful in my present condition, which admits not of much reflection. I could wish extremely, that it were in my power to convey into your soul an adequate idea of all the goodness of God to me, and the excess of my ingratitude : but it would be impoffible for me to do it, as well because you desire me not to be too particular in enumerating my sins, as because I have forgot many things. I will try however to acquit myself to the best of my ability, relying on your assurance of never exposing it, and that you will burn it, when God shall have given it the effect he intends for your spiritual profit, for which I would gladly sacrifice every thing; persuaded as I am of his designs in regard to you, both for your own sanctification, and that of others.

But at the same time I assure you that you will never attain thereto, except through much pain and la

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Dour, and in a path widely different from your expectation. Nor will you be surprized thereat, if once convinced that God does not establish his great works but upon NOTHING. It seems that he destroys in erder to build, to the end that the temple, which he designs for himself, having been built up with great pomp and magnificence, yet only built by the hands of men, may be in such manner destroyed as that there may not remain one stone left upon another. Such destruction must serve for the Holy Ghost, to form a temple which shall be built by his own power only.

*

Oh that you could comprehend the depth of this mystery, and conceive the secrets of the conduct of God, † revealed to babes, but hid from the avise and great of the world, who imagine themselves to be the Lord's counselors, capable of penetrating the depth of his ways; and to have attained that divine wisdom, which is thid from the eyes of all living, that is of such as live to themselves and in their own works; and kept close from the foruls of the air, that is from those who, by the vivacity of their intellects, and the force of their elevation, mount up to heaven; and think to fathom the height, depth, breadth and extent of God.

This divine wisdom is unknown even to those who pass in the world for persons of extraordinary illumination and knowledge. To whom then is it known, and who can tell us any tidings thereof? Destruction and death assure us that they have heard with their ears of its fame and renown. 'Tis then in dying to everything, and to all regards thereto, in order to pass into God, and to live in him alone, that one has any

Matth. xxiv. 2. and Luke xxi, 5, 6. † Matth. xi. 25. and Luke x. 21. Job. xxviii. 21, 22.

comprehension of true wisdom. Oh, how little are her ways known and the conduct she holds over her choicest servants! Scarce does one discover any thing thereof, but, surprised at the difference betwixt the truth thus discovered and the ideas formerly entertained, such an one cries out with St. Paul, "Oh the depth of the knowledge and wisdom of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out."*

He judges not of things as men do, who call good evil and evil good, and who regard as great righteousness things abhorred in his sight, and which (according to the prophet) are in his estimation but tas fi!thy rags. These principles of self-righteousness, like those of the Pharisees, will meet with nothing from him but wrath, far from being the objects of his love, and subjects of his recompenses : as he assures us himself, "Except your righteousness exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven." Which of us has a righteousness that comes up any thing near to that of the Pharisees, and in doing less good has not more of ostentation? Which of us is not pleased to be righteous in our own eyes, and in those of others, and to think that sufficient to satisfy God? Yet we may see the indignation which our Lord, as well as his forerunner, manifested against such kinds of persons. He who was the perfect model of tenderness and meekness, yet such as was deep, and came from the heart, not that affected meekness, which under the form of a dove hides the heart of a hawk, constantly treated those self-righteous persons with austerity,

Rom. xi. 33. † Isai. Ixiv. 6. Matth. v. 20.

and seemed to dishonour them before men. The colours in which he represented them, appeared strange, while he looked on sinners with mercy and love; protesting that for them only he was come, that it was the sick who needed a physician; and though the Saviour of Israel, he came only to save the lost sheep of the house of Israel.*

Oh love! it seems thou art so jealous of the salva-` tion thyself gives, that thou preferest the sinner to the righteous, the poor sinner who, seeing in himself nothing but misery, is as it were constrained to hate himself. He casts himself, as otherwise lost, into the arms of his Saviour, plunges with faith in the sacred bath of his blood, comes forth white as wool, and all full of love for him who, alone able to remedy his maladies, has had the charity to do it. The more enormous his crimes have been, the more he loves him; and his acknowledgments are so much the stronger as the debts remitted have been the greater; while the righteous, buoyed up. with his good works as he presumes, seems to hold his salvation in his own hands, and regards heaven as a recompence due to his merits. He exclaims against all sinners, in the bitterness of his zeal, represents the gates of mercy as barred to them, and heaven as a place to which they have no right: while he thinks an admission into it the more secure for himself, as he appears in a higher degree to have merited it. His Saviour is in a manner useless to him, he is so laden with his own merits. Oh how long will he bear the flattering load! While those sin

* Matth. ix. 41. 12. 13,

ners, divested of every thing, fly on the wings of faith and love into the arms of their Saviour, who freely gives them what he has infinitely merited for them.

In the former how much love for themselves, and how little for God! They bless and admire themselves in their works of righteousness, which they esteem as the cause of their happiness. These works are no sooner exposed to the sun of righteousness, than it discovers all their iniquity, and makes them appear as sordid as the mischief which they do to the

heart.

:

St. Paul assures us that the faith of Abraham was imputed to him for righteousness. This is truly beautiful for it is certain that that eminent Patriarch did all his actions with very great righteousness; and yet he did not see them as such. Being entirely free from self love, and a fondness for his own actions, his faith was founded on the salvation to come by Christ. He hoped in him, even against hope itself: and this was imputed to him for righteousness, * viz. a righteousness pure, simple and genuine, merited for him by Christ, not a righteousness wrought by himself, and regarded as of himself.

All this may appear a digression, very remote from the subject I proposed at first to write upon but it will help to guide you insensibly to it, and let you see *that God takes, to accomplish his works in, either converted sinners, whose past iniquity may serve for a counterpoise to their elevation; or persons in whom he totally overturns their self-righteousness, and the temple raised by the hands of men, works built on 'the moving sand instead of being founded on the livᎠ 2 .

Rom. iv. 18. 22.