To have patience, to have confidence, we must see an object before us. We can have confidence in obtaining any material object. It is much more difficult to have patience where there is nothing to show - only the satisfaction of the soul; to have patience enough to acquire virtue, to merge in the illumination, to gain the light. It is the same with fire: at first there is smoke mixed with it and, if it had no patience until it would become a flame, there would only be smoke and then it would go out. If it has patience it will become a flame that illumines the whole room so that everything can be seen and known. More than all else this patience is the greatest gift and blessing.