Profit from the counsels

Do you profit from our counsels and from what we say to you daily? No; very little. Coming out of one of your meetings, you entertain the curiosity of the fact and the greater or lesser interest it aroused in those present. But will there be even one among you who asks himself whether he can apply the moral, the counsel we have just prescribed, and whether he has the intention of doing so? He asked, he solicited a communication; he obtained it: this is enough for him. He returns to his daily occupations, promising himself to come back to see again so interesting a spectacle; he recounts the facts to his friends in order to excite their curiosity, and only to prove that the learned can be confounded; very few do it with a view to preaching morality; very few, even, seek to improve themselves. My lesson is severe; yet I do not wish to discourage you. Bring always good will, only with a little more good sentiments turned toward God and less desire to want to annihilate those who do not wish to believe: these concern time and God.

Marie. (Familiar Spirit.)