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413 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA Theresa

a similar movement for men was begun by Juan de la. Cruz. Another friend, Geronimo Grecian, Carmelite visitator of the older observance of Andalusia and apostolic commissioner, and later provincial of the Theresian reforms, gave her powerful support in founding convents at Segovia (1571), Veas de Segura (1574), Seville (1575), and Caravaca in Murcia (1576), while the deeply mystical Juan, by his power as teacher and preacher promoted the inner life of the movement. In 1576 began a series 05 persecutions on the part of the older observant Carmelite order against Theresa, her friends, and her reforms. Pursuant to a body of resolutions adopted at the general chapter at Piacenza, the " definitors " of the order forbade all further founding of convents. The general condemned her to voluntary retirement to one of her institutions. She obeyed and chose St. Joseph's at Toledo. Her friends and subordinates were subjected to greater trials. Finally, after several years her pleadings by letter with Philip II. secured relief. As a result, in 1579, the processes before the Inquisition against j, her, Grecian, and others were dropped, and the '., extension of the reform was at least negatively permuted. A brief of Gregory XIII. allowed a special provincial for the younger branch of the discalceate nuns, and a royal rescript created a protective board of four assessors for the reform. During the last three years of her life Theresa founded convents at Villanueva de la Xara in northern Andulusia (1580), Palencia (1580), Soria (1581), Burgos, and at Granada (1582). In all seventeen nunneries, all but one founded by her, and as many men's. cloisters were due to her reform activity of twenty years. Her final illness overtook her on one of her journeys from Burgos to Alba de Tormes. Forty years after her death she was canonized, and her church reveres her as the " seraphic virgin." The Cortes exalted her to patroness of Spain in 1814, and the university previously conferred the title Doctor ecclesice with a diploma. The mysticism in her works exerted a formative influence upon many. theologians of the following centuries, such as Francis of Sales, F6nalon, and the Port Royalists.

The kernel of Theresa's mystical thought throughout all her writings is the ascent of the soul in four stages (" Autobiography," chap. x.-xxii.). The first, or " heart's devotion," is that of devout contemplation or concentration, the withdrawal of the soul from without and specially the devout observance of the passion of Christ and penitence.

The second is the " devotion of peace," Her Mysti- in which at least the human will is cism. lost in that of .God by virtue of a char-

ismatic, supernatural state given of God, while the other faculties, as memory, reason, and imagination, are not yet secure from worldly distraction. While a partial distraction is due to outer performances such as repetition of prayers and writing down spiritual things, yet the prevailing state is one of quietude. The " devotion of union " is not only a supernatural but an essentially ecstatic state. Here there is also an absorption of the reason in God, and only the memory and imagination are left to ramble. This state is characterized by a blissful peace, a sweet slumber of at least

the higher soul faculties, a conscious rapture in the love of God. The fourth is the " devotion of ecstasy or rapture" a passive state, in which the consciousness of being in the body disappears (II Cor. xii. 2-3). Sense activity ceases; memory and imagination are also absorbed in God or intoxicated. Body and spirit are in the throes of a sweet, happy pain, alternating between a fearful fiery glow, a complete impotence and unconsciousness, and a spell of strangulation, intermitted sometimes by such an ecstatic flight that the body is literally lifted into space. This after half an hour is followed by a reactionary relaxation of a few hours in a swoon-like weakness, attended by a negation of all the faculties in the union with God. From this the subject awakens in tears; it is the climax of mystical experience, productive of the trance.

Theresa's writings, produced for didactic . pur poses, stand among the most remarkable in the mystical literature of the Roman Catholic Church: the " Autobiography," written. before

Her 1567, under the direction of her conWritings. fessor, . Padro Ibanez (La Vide de la Santa Madre Teresa de Jesus, Madrid, 1882; Eng. transl., The Life of S. Teresa of Jesus, London, 1888); Camino de Perfeeion, written also before 1567, at the direction of her confessor (Sala, manes, 1589; Eng. transl., The Way of Perfection., London, 1852); El Castillo Interior, written in 1577 (Eng. transl., The Interior Castle, London, 1852), comparing the contemplative soul to a castle with seven successive interior courts, or chambers, analogous to the seven heavens; and Relaciones, an extension of the autobiography giving her inner and outer experiences in epistolary form. Two smaller works are Conceptos del Amor and Exdamaciones. Besides, there ,are the Cartas (Saragossa, 1671), or correspondence, of which there are 342 letters and 87 fragments of others. Theresa's prose is marked by an unaffected grace, an ornate neatness, and charming power of expression, together placing her in the front rank of Spanish prose writers; and her rare poems (Todas las poesias, Munster, 1854) are distinguished for tenderness of feeling and rhythm of thought. Of complete editions of Theresa's works should be noted: Obras; nov2sima edition (6 vols., Madrid, 1881), by V. de la Fuente; and for beauty and accuracy of style, the French translation by, Amauld d'Andilly, Les (Euvres de Saints Ther&e. (Paris, 1855, new ed., :1867-69).

BIBLIOGRAPHY: The " Life " by. Theresa's father confessor, F. de Ribera, was first issued, Madrid, 1590, exists in Fr. transls. issued at Paris, 1'832, 1645, 1867, 2 vole.. 1884. Her autobiography, preserved in the monastery of S. Lorenzo in the Escurial, was issued anew, Madrid, 1882, and is in Fr. transl., Paris, 1691, 1857, 1880, Germ. transl., Aachen, 1868, Regensburg, 1868, Eng. tranal., London, 1905'. .A very full collection of early material is in ASB, Oct., vii. 109-790. Later lives are by Diego Yepes, Madrid, 1599; Juan de Jesus Maria, ib. 1605; G. Grecian, ib. 1611; A. de S. Joaquin, 12 vole., ib. 1733-68; F. a S. Antonio, Venice, 1754; M. de Traggia, Madrid. 1807; J. B. A. Boucher, 2 vole., Paris, 1810; F. B. Collombet, Lyons, 1837; J. H. Hennes, 2d ed., Frankfort, 1866; Luis de Leon, Btographieen, aus der Geschachte der sPanischen

Inquisition, p. 356. Halls, 1866; Ids, Countess I3ahn- Hahn, Mainz, 1867; P. lRousselot, Les Mystiques espapnola, pp. 308-378 Paris 1887; E. Hofele, Regensburg, x$82; J. Loth, Rouen, 1883; Mme. Estienne d'Orves,