AT THE CONVENT OF SAINT AGNES OF MONTEPULCIANO


Two nieces, daughters of Bartolo Benincasa, were nuns in the Convent of
Montepulciano. To one of them the following letter is addressed. One can
read between the lines a lively solicitude. Never cloistered herself,
Catherine had a close intimacy with cloisters, and knew their best and
worst. She held in hearty and loyal respect the opportunities which they
offered for leading an exalted life; to this Convent of St. Agnes she was
peculiarly attached. At the same time, she was well aware, as other
letters beside the present show, that even the best of cloisters afforded
at this time scant shelter to young girls from emotional temptation, gross
or fine. Her warnings to her niece have the authoritative tone of anxiety.
Let us hope that Eugenia took them to heart; and that, leading the
disciplined life of Catherine's desire, she became not unworthy to receive
and apprehend in its full beauty the penetrating meditation on Prayer
which forms the second part of the letter. The thoughts of this
meditation, like many others in Catherine's letters, will be found
amplified in her Dialogue--a colloquy between God and her soul, composed
and dictated in trance during the year 1378. The following quotation
illustrates an interesting passage of the letter:--

"In this way, vocal prayer can be useful to the soul and do Me pleasure,
and from imperfect vocal prayer it can advance by persevering practice to
perfect mental prayer. But if it aims simply to complete its number (of
paternosters), or if it gave up mental prayer for the sake of vocal, it
would never arrive at perfection. Sometimes, when a soul has made a
resolution to say a certain number of prayers, I may visit its mind, now
in one way, now in another: at one time with the light of self-knowledge
and contrition over its lightness, at another, with the largesse of My