conditions of men: "Such a man rejoices in every type that he sees,
saying: Thanks be to Thee, Eternal Father, that Thou hast many mansions in
Thy house.... He rejoices more in the differences among men than he would
in seeing them all walk in the same way; for so he sees more manifest the
greatness of the goodness of God. He gets from everything the fragrance of
roses."

In the letter to Sister Daniella, Catherine develops these ideas further.
Of this "great servant of God" nothing is known except what Catherine's
letters to her show. Something may be inferred from the fact that she is
one of the few people to whom the greater woman writes as to a spititual
equal. She repeats to Daniella the letter to Father William--such
warnings, indeed, being needed by all persons leading the consecrated
life--and then goes on, in the remainder of the letter as here given, to
discuss those farther reaches of perfection in which charity has done its
perfect work. Two things she wishes herself and Daniella to observe: the
first is abstinence from critical thoughts. Let us not "judge the minds of
our fellow-creatures, which are for God alone to judge." It is the key to
her own method in her great cure of souls which she here gives us: "When
it seems that God shows us the faults of others, keep on the safer side--
for it may be that thy judgment is false. On thy lips let silence abide.
And any vice which thou mayest ascribe to others, do thou ascribe at once
to them and to thyself, in true humility. If that vice really exists in a
person, he will correct himself better, seeing himself so gently
understood, and will say of his own accord the thing which thou wouldst
have said to him."--The other point which Catherine urges on Daniella is
the secondary importance of that life of mortification to which she firmly
believes that they have both been called. "Good is penance and maceration
of the body; but do not present these to me as a rule for every one. If
either for ourselves or others, we made penance our foundation ... we