The Death of Her Father and Her Daughter

Reflections on
the Life of
Madame Jeanne de la Mothe Guyon.

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Incidents of 1672. Presentiment of her father’s death. A message reaches her soon after with the news of his last sickness. His death. Remarks. Affectionate eulogium on her daughter.  Her sickness and death.

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Thus passed the year 1671. I am particular in the periods of time, so far as I am able to ascertain them, which is not always easy to be done. And the reason is, that by connecting the dealings of God and the progress of the inward life with specific times and situations, the mental operation is aided, and we can hardly fail to have a clearer idea of the incidents which are narrated. Another year had now opened upon her, and found her renewedly consecrated to God, and growing wiser and holier through the discipline of bitter experience. Her trials had been somewhat less in this year than in the preceding, but still they were not wholly suspended. And as God designed that she should be wholly his, there were other trials in prospect, which were designed to aid in this important result. We proceed, therefore, in our narrative, with such incidents and facts as we are able to gather from the sources of information found in her own writings and in the writings of some of her contemporaries, which remain to us.

Enduring Trials While Subjected in Will to God

Another mark or characteristic of the man, whose will has passed from his own unsafe keeping to the high custody of a divine direction, is this. He has no disposition to complain, when God, in the course of his providences, sees fit to send disappointments and afflictions upon him. This remark will apply not only to afflictions, which originate in the loss of health, of property, and of friends, but to all others of whatever nature, and coming from whatever source. We have sometimes thought, that the entire subjection of the will is seen particularly in the quietness and silence of spirit, with which misrepresentations and persecutions are endured. That the people of the world should be greatly agitated, and should find in themselves the movings of a rebellious and belligerent spirit, when their motives are aspersed and their characters injured, is entirely natural. And, unhappily, when persecution arises, we see too much of this unquiet and rebellious spirit, even in those whom charity requires us to recognize as Christians. Not so with those Christians of a higher grade, whose wills act in perfect harmony with the divine will. That they are afflicted, when they are subject to unjust persecutions, is true; but they are not rebellious; they are not disquieted; and although they are afflicted, it cannot be said with truth that they are destitute of happiness. Connecting with the instrument which troubles them, the hand of God, which permits the agency of that instrument, they regard the persecutions they endure as the lot which God has appointed them; and as such they rejoice in it. But this could not be, if their wills, renouncing all private and selfish modes of action, did not move harmoniously with the divine will.