CHAPTER XVII.

DISTINCTION BETWEEN EXTERIOR AND INTERIOR ACTIONS — THOSE OF THE SOUL IN THIS CONDITION ARE INTE-RIOR, BUT HABITUAL, CONTINUED, DIRECT, PROFOUND, SIMPLE, AND IMPERCEPTIBLE — BEING A CONTINUAL SINKING IN THE OCEAN OF DIVINITY — SIMILITUDE OF A VESSEL — HOW TO ACT IN THE ABSENCE OF SENSIBLE SUPPORTS.

nPHE actions of men are either exterior or interior. The exterior are those which appear outwardly, and have a sensible object, possessing neither good nor evil qualities, excepting as they receive them from the interior principle in which they originate. It is not of these that I intend to speak, but only of interior actions, which are those actions of the soul by which it applies itse/finwaidly to some object, or turns away from some other.

When, being applied to God, I desire to commit an action of a different nature from those which He