BTW, this book was written in 1881; you wouldn't believe how accurate it is!
In the late nineteenth century, Father Charles Arminjon, a priest from the mountains of southeastern France, assembled his flock in the town cathedral to preach a series of conferences to help them turn their thoughts away from this lifes mean material affairsand toward the next lifes glorious spiritual reward. His wise and uncompromising words deepened in them the spirit of recollection that all Christians must have: the abiding conviction that heavenly aims, not temporal enthusiasms, must guide everything we think, say, and do.
When Father Arminjons conferences were later published in a book, many others were able to reap the same benefitincluding fourteen-year-old Thérèse Martin, then on the cusp of entering the Carmelite convent in Lisieux. Reading it, she says, plunged my soul into a happiness not of this earth. Young Thérèse, filled with a sense of what God reserves for those who love him, and seeing that the eternal rewards had no proportion to the light sacrifices of life, copied out numerous passages and memorized them, repeating unceasingly the words of love burning in my heart.
Now the very book that so inspired the Little Flower is available for the first time in English.
Let the pages of The End of the Present World and the Mysteries of the Future Life fill you with the same burning words of love, with the same ardent desire to know God above all created things, that St. Thérèse gained from them. Let them also enrich your understanding of certain teachings of the Faith that can often seem so mysterious, even frightening:
Jesus commands us to be ever-watchful for his return, and ever-mindful that we have no lasting city on earth. The End of the Present World and the Mysteries of the Future Life is an invaluable aid to inculcating in your spirit that heavenly orientation, without which true human happiness cannot be foundin this world or the next.
Being demanded of the Pharisees when the kingdom of God should come, He answered them, and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation; neither shall they say, Lo here! or, Lo there! for behold, the kingdom of God is within you (Luke 17:20-21)