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To abandon one's self to to count one's self as nothing. Those who have learned what that renunciation is, knows it revolts our nature. The origin of our trouble is, that we love ourselves with a blind passion that amounts to idolatry. If we love anything beyond, it is only for our own sakes. We must be undeceived respecting all those generous friendships, in which it appears as though we so far forgot ourselves as to think only of the interests of our friend. The more delicate, the more concealed, and the more proper in the eyes of the world it is, the more dangerous does it become, and the more likely to poison us by feeding our self-love.
However little we may have looked within to study the occasions of our pleasures, we shall have no difficulty in admitting that pride, as it is more or less delicate, has various tastes. But give it what taste you will, it is still pride; and that which appears the most restrained and the most reasonable is the most devilish.
We may be sure, then, that it is only the love of God that can make us come out of self. If his powerful hand did not sustain us, we should not know how to take the first step in that direction. There is no middle course; we must refer everything either to God or to self; if to self, we have no other God than self; if to God, we are then in order, and regarding ourselves only as one among the other creatures of God, without selfish interests, and with a single eye to accomplish his will, we enter into that self-abandonment which you desire so earnestly to understand.
The reason why no creature can draw us out of ourselves is, that there is none that we perceive is more worthy than ourselves. But God does two things, which He only has the power to do. First, He reveals himself to us, with all his rights over the creature, and in all the charms of his goodness. Then we feel that, not having made ourselves, we are not made for ourselves; that we are created for Him who was pleased to form us. He is too great to make anything except for Himself, and therefore all our perfection and our happiness point to Him.
This is what no created thing, dazzling though it may be, can make us realize in respect to itself. Far from finding in them that infinity which so fills and transports us in God, we discover only a void, a powerlessness to fill our hearts, an imperfection that continually drives us into ourselves.
The second miracle which God works is, to operate in our hearts that which He pleases, after having enlightened our understanding. He is not satisfied with having displayed his own charms; He makes us love Him by producing, by his grace, his love in our hearts; and He thus himself performs within us, what He makes us see we owe to Him.
There is little difficulty in comprehending that we must reject criminal pleasures, unjust gains, and gross vanities, because the renouncement of these things consists in a contempt which repudiates them absolutely, and forbids our deriving any enjoyment from them; but it is not so easy to understand that we must abandon property honestly acquired, the pleasures of a modest and well-spent life, the honors derivable from a good reputation, and a virtue which elevates us above the reach of envy. The reason why we do not understand that these things must be given up, is, that we are not required to discard them with dislike, but, on the contrary, to preserve them to be used according to the place where God places us.
We have need of the consolation of a mild and peaceful life, to console us under its troubles; in respect to honors, we must regard "that which is convenient," and we must keep the property we possess to supply our wants. How then are we to renounce these things at the very moment when we are occupied in the care of preserving them? We are to do what is in our power to retain them, in order to make a sober use of them, without desiring to enjoy them or placing our hearts upon them.
[Chart by Steve Hudgins, http://executableoutlines.com/charts.htm]
I say, a sober use of them, because, when we are not attached to a thing for the purposes of self-enjoyment and of seeking our happiness in it, we use only so much of it as we are necessarily obliged to; as you may see a wise and faithful steward study to use only so much of his master's property to meet his necessary wants.
The abandonment
of evil things then, consists in refusing them with horror;
of good things, in using them with moderation for our necessities, continually studying to reduce all those imaginary wants which comes from a greedy nature.
Remember that we must not only renounce evil, but also good things;for Jesus has said, "Whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all he hath, he cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:33) It follows, then, that the Christian must abandon everything that he has, however innocent. For if he does not renounce it, it ceases to be innocent. He must abandon those things which it is his duty to guard with the greatest possible care, such as the good of his family, or his own reputation, for he must have his heart on none of these things; he must preserve them for a sober and moderate use; in short, he must be ready to give them all up whenever it is the will of God to deprive him of them.
He must give up those whom he loves best, and whom it is his duty to love; and his renouncement of them consists in this, that he is to love them for God only and be ready to part with them whenever God wills it, and never to seek in them the true rest of his heart. It is thus that we use the world and the creature as not abusing them, according to Saint Paul. (1 Cor. 7:31) We do not desire to take pleasure in them; we only use what God gives us, what he wills that we should love, and what we accept with the reserve of a heart, receiving it only for necessity's sake, and keeping the heart for a more worthy object. It is in this sense that Christ would have us leave father and mother, brothers and sisters, and friends, and that he is come to bring a sword upon earth.
God is a jealous God; if, in the recesses of your soul, you are attached to any creature, your heart is not worthy of Him: You must reject it as a spouse that divides her affections between her bridegroom and a stranger.
Having abandoned everything exterior, and which is not self, it remains to complete the sacrifice by renouncing everything interior, including self. The renouncement of the body is frightful to most delicate and worldly-minded persons. They know nothing, so to speak, that is more themselves than this body, which they flatter and adorn with so much care; and even when deprived of its graces, they often retain a love for its life amounting to a shameful cowardice, so that the very name of death makes them shudder.
Your natural courage raises you above these fears, and I think I hear you say, I desire neither to flatter my body, nor to hesitate in consenting to its destruction, whenever it shall be the will of God to waste and consume it to ashes.
You may thus renounce the body, and yet there may remain great obstacles in the way of your renouncing the spirit. The more we are able, by the aid of our natural courage, to despise the body, the greater tendency we have to set a higher value our understanding, our wisdom, and our virtue, as a young and worldly woman values her beauty. We take pleasure in them; it gives us a satisfaction to feel that we are wise, moderate, and preserved from the worldly excitement which we see in others; we are intoxicated with the pleasure of not being intoxicated with pleasure; we renounce with courageous moderation the most flattering temptations of the world; we are content with the satisfaction that we are able to practice self-control.
What a dangerous state! What a subtle poison! How prideful are you to God, if you yield your heart to this refinement of self-love! You must renounce all satisfaction of self-worth.
Remember, the purer and more excellent the gifts of God, the more jealous He is of them. He showed mercy to the first human rebel, but denied it to the angels. Both sinned by the love of self, but as the angel was perfect, and regarded as a sort of divinity, so God punished his unfaithful angels with a fiercer jealousy than He did man's disobedience. We may infer from this, that God is more jealous of his most excellent gifts than He is of the more common ones; He would have us attached to nothing but Himself, and to regard his gifts, however excellent, as only the means of uniting us more easily and intimately to Him. Whoever contemplates the grace of God with a satisfaction and sort of pleasure of ownership, turns it into poison.
Never credit exterior things to yourself then, such as favor or talents, nor even things the most interior. Your good will is no less a gift of God's mercy, than the life and being which you receive direct from his hands. Live, as it were, on trust; all that is in you, and all that you are, is only loaned you; make use of it according to the wi ll of Him who lends it, but never regard it for a moment as your own.
Herein consists true self-abandonment. It is the use of ourselves with a single eye to the movements of God, who alone is the true master of all his creatures. Self-abandonment is not accomplished by means of painful reflections and continual struggles; it is only by refraining from self-contemplation, and from desiring to master ourselves in our own way, that we lose ourselves in God.
[Francois Fenelon's Spiritual Progress: Instructions in the Divine Life of the Soul, Chapter 10, On Self-Abandonment, paraphrased]
