Читать книгу Saint Teresa of Ávila: Collected Works. The Life of St. Teresa, The Interior Castle, Way of Perfection онлайн

127 страница из 303

22. At this time, that illness befell my father of which he died; ssss1 it lasted some days. I went to nurse him, being more sick in spirit than he was in body, owing to my many vanities--though not, so far as I know, to the extent of being in mortal sin--through the whole of that wretched time of which I am speaking; for, if I knew myself to be in mortal sin, I would not have continued in it on any account. I suffered much myself during his illness. I believe I rendered him some service in return for what he had suffered in mine. Though I was very ill, I did violence to myself; and though in losing him I was to lose all the comfort and good of my life--he was all this to me--I was so courageous, that I never betrayed my sorrows, concealing them till he was dead, as if I felt none at all. It seemed as if my very soul were wrenched when I saw him at the point of death--my love for him was so deep.

23. It was a matter for which we ought to praise our Lord--the death that he died, and the desire he had to die; so also was the advice he gave us after the last anointing, how he charged us to recommend him to God, and to pray for mercy for him, how he bade us serve God always, and consider how all things come to an end. He told us with tears how sorry he was that he had not served Him himself; for he wished he was a friar--I mean, that he had been one in the Strictest Order that is. I have a most assured conviction that our Lord, some fifteen days before, had revealed to him he was not to live; for up to that time, though very ill, he did not think so; but now, though he was somewhat better, and the physicians said so, he gave no heed to them, but employed himself in the ordering of his soul.