III. The most holy names of Jesus and Mary are sweeter to my mouth than honey; they are so sweet to my palate that I often catch myself licking my lips. Even the simplest awareness, recollection, or attention, or the inner repetition of these sweetest names is like gentle flames that penetrate my heart and sweetly wound it with love for them.
I do not indulge in this loving devotion through my own effort, nor with some complexity of spirit, but I am drawn and led to it by an inner spirit, quietly and simply from the depths of my heart.
I am being taught internally how to perform these pious expressions ever more detachedly in spirit, without any admixture of sensory powers, or at least with very little. For instance, loving turns of the heart, addresses, and outpourings of love towards Jesus, Mary, and Joseph occur much more in spirit, in a much nobler, more detached, and exalted manner, not with such tenderness and sensory satisfaction of nature. This I learn to gradually let go.
I focus on them and experience their presence in spirit, in the unity of divine essence, in which all three are completely immersed and perfectly united. I constantly direct my gaze towards them, and this does not hinder the immediate contemplation of the formless divine essence. After all, they appear to my spirit as overshadowed by it, filled with it, and perfectly clothed, so that I cannot look at them, nor turn to them with love without immediately and unobstructedly seeing the highest good, so I cannot lose or forget this highest good and be deprived of the divine essence, of seeing it and experiencing it. This is because in them I see and love nothing but God and that which is divine. Thus, it happens that their images or representations seem not to harm me in God and do not take away my simplicity of gaze. I already recognize how the blessed in heaven see and love each other in God and mutually love God, and this does not obstruct the blessed gaze upon God, the constant reception of God, and love for Him.
I will clarify here somewhat more clearly how I understand this Marian life as a dual divine life and one degree higher than the simple divine life and the simple union with the divine itself. This can be likened in essential glory to that of substantial glory, and the latter to the case-based glory experienced more or less by some blessed souls alongside the essential glory that all the blessed share together.
Sometimes I am granted an inner life in Mary, peace in Mary, experiencing Mary, merging with Mary, or being consumed by Mary, union with Mary. However, this occurs in such a way that while the spirit is turned with all simplicity, nakedness, and calmness towards the formless divine essence and is captivated by it in a dear adhesion, contemplating and experiencing this simplest essence, my soul clings, contemplates, and experiences Mary as she is one in God and united with God, so that when I experience God, I also experience Mary, as if she were just one with God and indistinguishable from Him, so that from the side of the soul, it seems that God and Mary are but one, almost as it is with the sacred humanity of Christ, which is united with the divinity so that the two natures unite in one person. Although in Mary there is no personal union with the divinity as in Christ, but only substantial and gracious, infinitely greater and more perfect than in anyone else, even the most exalted of creatures. This most perfect union of Mary with God is at that time presented to the soul by God in such a way that Mary appears to her as one in God and with God without any intermediary.
Sometimes it seems to me that I kiss Mary, embrace her… with a strange merging of the soul with her and with God. Often it seems to me that I am taken and enclosed in her most pure, most loving, and most ardent heart, as if intoxicated and maddened with love for her and at the same time for God, and thus everything directs and flows to one and into one, and it is thus one dual and at the same time simple divine life. It is a very pure, noble, high, and perfect way of loving the most blessed Virgin, even if known by only a few by experience. This Marian life in Mary and for Mary, and at the same time divine in God and for God, belongs only to her special beloved ones, the dearest Benjamins and children that she herself has chosen for it.
IV. The Marian life, or life in Mary, for Mary and with Mary, has its dignity, uniqueness, nobility, and perfection from Mary's union with God and from the abundance and sharing of divine graces and perfections that are poured into her almost without measure, in a way that surpasses every expression and every understanding of human reason, almost infinitely beyond every creature. Therefore, the contemplation, embrace, love of her in such a veiled, clothed, overshadowed, illuminated, and united manner with the divinity is as unique and noble as the inexhaustible abyss of all goods.
