“LIVING on the surface of the soul, we come to live on the surface in everything; for he who knows not how to penetrate within the soul has forgotten how to penetrate into the depths of anything else. He is taken up with externals, and matters of detail become chiefly important to him. Thus in duties and obligations, he sees the letter rather than the spirit, the bark rather than the sap, the body rather than the soul. He knows that such and such details are prescribed, ‘and certain others forbidden. He sees the external side of the law, the material fact of the prescription, and this is the only thing to which he attaches a certain amount of importance. He does not see the inward side, the reason and end of the prescription, the spirit of the law ; and thus he brings an external and mechanical fidelity to the material observance of the letter which he sees and which killeth, without drawing any inspiration from the spirit which quickeneth,! and which he does not see.

We so rarely ask ourselves to what deep needs correspond the observances imposed by the law or introduced by custom! We are no longer acquainted with needs which are deep. Above all we want external agitation and surface sensations; and as these are not to be found in the law, we go on to seek for them in factitious practices which are calculated to produce emotions. In the meantime, so far as what is of obligation is concerned, we are satisfied with keeping a watch upon externals; for this, indeed, costs us less. ‘The mind dwells in the elementary, in the word only, and does not really enter into the region of thought. For want of piety, the mind neither goes from the word to the idea, nor from the idea to the soul, and still less from the soul to God.”? And in this way, a soul whose fidelity to external practices leaves nothing: to be desired does not make any progress, because it does not enter within where it would draw the water of life; it is like an automaton, the movement of which is regulated throughout, but remains ever the same. This is materialism in piety.”

— Fr. Joseph Tissot, The Interior Life

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