human
What is the matter with you?
gpt
This has lasted, he said,
human
and he added,
gpt
Yet I never could have believed that the soul could suffer so much.
human
Rejoice, my brother, you have been treated here like a monk.
gpt
How is that?
human
Yes, this agony, for there is no other word to define the horror of the state, is one of the most serious trials which God inflicts on us; it is one of the operations of the purgative life. Be happy, for it is a great grace which Jesus does to you.
gpt
And this proves that your conversion is good,
human
God! But it was not He at any rate who insinuated doubts about the Faith, who caused to be born in me that madness of scruples, who raised in me that spirit of blasphemy, who caressed my face with disgusting apparitions.
gpt
No, but He allows it. It is frightful, I know it, said the guest-master.
human
God conceals Himself, and however you may call on Him, He does not answer you. You think yourself deserted, yet He is very near you; and while He effaces Himself, Satan advances. He twists you about, places a microscope over your faults, his malice gnaws your brain like a dull file, and when to all this are joined, to try you to the utmost, impure visions....
gpt
It would be nothing to be in presence of a real temptation, of a true woman in flesh and bone, but these appearances on which imagination works, are horrible!
human
And I used to think there was peace in the cloister!
gpt
No, we are here on this earth to strive, and it is just in the cloister that the Lowest works; there, souls escape him, and he will at all price conquer them. No place on earth is more haunted by him than a cell, no one is more harassed than a monk.