De pace cordis et quiete in Deo
The Path to Interior Peace
True peace is found through humility, self-reflection, and turning one's focus away from the world toward God.
His place is established in peace. Who is truly at peace? The one who is gentle and humble in heart. Why do you want to know about the state of others and how things are with them, while you neglect yourself in so many ways? Look: the one who knows better how to humble himself and suffer for God is the one who is better at being at peace. For such a person, every burden becomes light because of the God whom he holds in his heart. Blessed is the one who speaks with God through prayer, meditation, singing, and reading, and who stays silent about the affairs of others in the world. Wherever you are, and wherever you go or flee, your own thoughts go with you.1
Disciplining the Heart and Mind
The quality of our thoughts, speech, and conscience directly determines our ability to remain at peace in God.
Good meditation brings joy, while bad meditation brings sorrow; anger disturbs, envy blinds, and hatred kills. Devout reading instructs, prayer ignites, and action fulfills the word. Holy speech cleanses the heart, while vain speech stains it; idle talk causes scandal, harsh words weigh it down, but pious words soothe it; moral words build it up, historical words confirm faith, and heavenly words lift it to the heavens. Therefore, cleanse your heart from all malice, and you'll be at peace. There is no true peace except in God and with the virtuous person, who does all things well for the sake of the God whom he loves. Remain in silence and endure a little for the sake of God; He will free you from all burdens and anxieties. A blessed life and a good conscience give confidence in God during tribulation and in death; however, a bad conscience is always in fear and in strife. An irritable person quickly falls from one evil into another, worse one.
The Fruit of Patience
Patience and gentleness transform relationships and secure God's favor.
A patient and gentle person turns an enemy into a friend, and will always find God favorable to them because of their mercy toward the sinner.
Read the original Latin
In pace factus est locus eius. Quis est in bona pace? Qui mitis est et humilis corde. Quid vis scire de statu aliorum qualiter sit cum eis; et te ipsum neglegis in multis? Ecce qui melius scit se humiliare et pati propter Deum: hic melius est in pace. Huic omne onus fit leve: propter Deum quem habet in corde. Beatus qui loquitur cum Deo orando meditando cantando legendo: et de alienis tacet quae fiunt in mundo. Vbicumque es et transis vel fugis: cogi" tatio tua tecum transit.
Bona meditatio laetificat, mala contristat; ira perturbat invidia excaecat: odium necat. Devota lectio instruit; oratio accendit: operatio verbum implet. Sermo sanctus corda mundat; vanus maculat: otiosus scandalizat; durus gravat, pius placat: moralis aedificat; historialis fidem confirmat: caelestis ad aethera levat. Munda ergo cor tuum ab omni malitia: et eris in bona pace. Non est pax bona nisi in Deo et cum virtuoso: qui omnia bene agit propter Deum quem diligit. Mane in silentio: et sustine modicum propter Deum: et ipse liberabit te ab omni onere et inquietudine. Beata vita et bona conscientia dant fiduciam ad Deum in tribulatione et in morte: mala autem conscientia semper est in timore et in lite. Iracundus cito cadit de uno malo in aliud peius.
Patiens et mitis de hoste facit amicum: et Deum inveniet sibi semper propitium propter pietatem erga peccantem.
Notes
- 1 ↩The source text contains a typo 'cogi" tatio'. This has been normalized to 'cogitatio'.
The Little Garden of Roses & The Valley of Lilies companion
Fourteen readings down. The other 39 chapters are waiting.
Chosen Portion serves the complete Little Garden and Valley of Lilies — plus the Imitation — as daily portions.
These treatises were composed as brief daily counsels for a community's rhythm of reading, and Chosen Portion delivers them the same way: one short chapter each morning.
- All 53 chapters of both treatises in modern readable English
- A new short reading delivered every morning, no deciding what's next
- Complete both treatises in under two months at one chapter a day