aeternus

“In order to pray well, then, we must acknowledge that we  are poor, and we must greatly humble ourselves; for do you not see how a  marksman with a crossbow, when he wishes to discharge a large arrow, draws  the string of his bow lower the higher he wants it to go? Thus must we do  when we wish our prayer to reach Heaven; we must lower ourselves by the  awareness of our nothingness. David admonishes us to do so by these words:  When you wish to pray, plunge yourself profoundly into the abyss of your  nothingness that you may be able afterward, without difficulty, to let your  prayer fly like an arrow even up to the heavens. [Cf. Ps. 130:1-2; Sir.  35:21].

…if you ask how it is that prayer  can rise to Heaven, you will be told that it rises there through the descent of humility. The spouse in the Song of Songs’ astonishes the angels  and makes them say: Who is this who comes from the desert, and who rises  like a column of smoke, laden with myrrh and frankincense and with every  perfume known, and who is leaning upon her Lover? [Cf. Song 3:6; 8:5].  Humility in its beginning is a desert, although in the end it may be very  fruitful, and the soul that is humble thinks itself as being in a desert  where neither birds nor even savage beasts dwell, and where there is no  fruit tree at all.”

** St. Francis de Sales THE SPIRIT OF PRAYER March 29, 1615

** another bee photo from me.