Brother Lawrence in GDS

Practice the Presence: Goudge's love for a classic spiritual guide

The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence had a great influence on Green Dolphin Street by Elizabeth Goudge

“She found that little book by the French barefoot Carmelite that had first started her on the path of spiritual discipline…

‘I always thought that he would reduce you to extremity. He will come in his own time, and when you least expect it… But those who have the gale of the Holy Spirit go forward even in sleep. If the vessel of our soul is still tossed with winds and storms let us week the Lord who repose is in it, and he will quickly calm the sea.’

She put the book back, and smiled. Even in sleep, even through the night, the vessel has been carried forward I know what you have thrown; and God has been with in it all the time.”

🌿 Elizabeth Goudge, quoting from Brother Lawrence’s book in Green Dolphin Street

Goudge’s love for Brother Lawrence

Goudge’s biographer, Christine Rawlins, included a letter that Elizabeth Goudge wrote to her Oxford friend that she has been reading many books lately, including “two books by Clive Lewis of Magdalen” and “also I’ve discovered Brother Lawrence’s Practice of the Presence of God. Isn’t it lovely. I’d like to learn it by heart from the first page to the last.” ¹