Trial

Use in the book

Life itself is first named as a trial prolonged by God and paternal love. The sheltered religious future is then tested by a small disturbance that seems to exhaust all patience. Guérin reads the scale of his response as a bad omen for his capacity to endure larger demands.

Repeated experience does not reliably strengthen him. Some trials are called barren, and the soul is said to become more sensitive under blows rather than hardened. This challenges an easy theory in which pain automatically produces growth. Yet departure from retreat is also interpreted as a purifying fire through which weak souls may rise toward heaven. Both readings are present: trial may acquire sacrificial meaning, or it may be experienced as exhaustion without gain.

The word also borders on the testing of intellectual abilities. Guérin treats successive attempts as evidence in a case against his own capacity. A reader must distinguish the experiments from the finality he assigns their verdict. The journal’s subsequent changes repeatedly reopen conclusions he had considered decisive.

Places to read

1. 4 August 1832 · ¶1Preservation in life is preservation within an épreuve, joining gratitude to difficulty.
2. 22 April 1833 · ¶1A slight trial appears to disprove future patience and resignation.
3. 17 July 1833 · ¶1Trials are described as barren and miserable rather than inevitably educative.
4. 7 December 1833 · ¶1Tribulation is given a purifying, sacrificial interpretation through the burning wood image.

Translation in this edition

The English appropriately uses “trial” for épreuve in the birthday meditation and “trials” for the barren inward experience. Ordinary éprouver elsewhere becomes “feel” or “experience,” preventing a theological interpretation from being imposed by verbal resemblance alone.