PREFACE: In a Letter written some fifteen years after the death of St. Francis de Sales, St. Jane Frances de Chantal tells us how, in looking over the long-forgotten contents of an old disused box, many writings of the Saint were found, and among them an explanation of the Canticle of Canticles set out in the form of a meditation. She adds that she had never heard the Holy Founder speak of this treatise, but that the then Superioress of the Community declared that he had often preached on the subject to which it referred, in the early days of the Visitation.

We are thus led to see how at an early period the thoughts which ultimately found expression in the great treatise on the Love of God were already taking shape in the Saint’s mind; and how, in the midst of many labours demanding the full exercise of that practical sense, which was so distinctive a quality of his character, he was living habitually in a higher region of very close union with God. The insight which a perusal of the “Mystical Explanation” gives us into the history of his spiritual development, is at the same time an incentive to all those who have to pass a life of activity in God’s service, to devote themselves without ceasing to loving thought of Divine things; to maintain themselves in the midst of their labour closely united to God; and to cultivate the interior spirit no less, but far more, than the manifestations of external zeal. It is a lesson that we all need at the present day, in the hurry and pressure of so many urgent duties.

The second part of the volume before us gives us the detailed and finished portrait of the Saint’s life, told, in her own simple and transparently truthful words, by her whom God had chosen to be the principal instrument in that which was probably the most enduring work entrusted to St. Francis de Sales, namely, the foundation of the Religious Institute of the Visitation. Almost day by day we are carried in the footsteps of the Saint through every period of his life. We see him as he appeared to the eyes of St. Jane Frances, not in any fancy portraiture such as distance conveys to later biographers, but as he was in the sight of those who lived in close intimacy with him. It is a picture full of consolation and encouragement, destined by Divine Providence to make us understand and love the Saint more than any other account of his life could do, and thereby to draw us to greater thankfulness to God for having given us an example so sweet to contemplate, and so deserving of our imitation.

This new volume of the Library of St. Francis de Sales will bring consolation to many souls, not only on account of the valuable teaching it contains, but because it is a proof that the special work which God raised up the late F.Benedict Mackey to undertake, and to which he gave so much care and devotion, has not ceased with his death. To F.Benedict the Church is indebted for a fuller and more complete knowledge of the life and writings of St. Francis. May that gentle Saint reward him now for all his labours.

Preface by Francis, The Archbishop of Westminster (1908)