The Practice of the Presence of God the Best Rule of a Holy Life — Story, Setting & Ideas

A Tree in Winter: The Image That Opens the Work

The first conversation opens with a precise image: Lawrence, at eighteen, sees a tree stripped of leaves in winter and reflects that leaves, flowers, and fruit will return. This single observation, described as giving him “a high view of the Providence and Power of GOD,” is the only conversion narrative in the book. The tree recurs nowhere else, but its starkness sets the tone. Lawrence does not recount visions or ecstasies; he anchors his entire spiritual practice in a natural, almost mundane observation. The image of barrenness followed by renewal becomes a quiet structural motif, echoed later in metaphors of torrents, winds, and storms that give way to calm.

Conversations as Framed Testimony

The four conversations are not dialogues but reported monologues. The interlocutor, likely M. Beaufort, appears only in the opening line of each conversation, then vanishes. Lawrence speaks in long, unbroken paragraphs, describing his method of “practicing the presence of God” through daily tasks. The framing is minimal: dates are given (the first conversation on August 3, 1666), but no setting, interruptions, or reactions are recorded. This structure presents Lawrence’s words as authoritative testimony, unmediated by debate. The reader is positioned as a listener, not a participant, receiving instruction that has already been validated by the editor’s preface.

Letters as Direct Exhortation

The sixteen letters abandon the conversational frame entirely. They open with salutations to named or unnamed correspondents and close with formulaic valedictions. The tone shifts from descriptive to imperative: “Set heartily about this work,” “let us enter into ourselves,” “make immediately a holy and firm resolution.” Lawrence uses metaphors of vessels, torrents, and storms to urge action. The letters are shorter than the conversations, more urgent, and more personal. They assume the reader is already committed but needs continual rekindling. This structural shift from testimony to exhortation gives the book a cumulative force: the reader first learns what Lawrence did, then is told to do likewise.

Movement Between Observation and Urgency

The book’s rhythm alternates between calm description and pressing appeal. In the conversations, Lawrence speaks of “continual conversation with God” as a steady, almost effortless practice. In the letters, he warns that “not to advance in the spiritual life is to go back” and that “death follows us close.” This oscillation creates a tension between the peace Lawrence claims to possess and the urgency with which he urges others to seek it. The reader is never allowed to settle into passive admiration; each section ends with a call to action. The structure itself enacts the book’s central argument: that the presence of God is both a restful state and a constant effort.

Because the excerpts include only a portion of the letters and conversations, the full range of Lawrence’s advice—particularly on specific practices like “little acts of adoration” or handling distractions—is not visible here. Readers should note that the book’s brevity (under 15,000 words) rewards rereading: the same metaphors recur with slight variations, and the shift from conversation to letter may feel abrupt. Pay attention to how Lawrence uses physical objects (a tree, a broken dish) to ground spiritual claims. The structure is simple, but its effect depends on the reader’s willingness to move from observation to application.

What stays with me from Brother Lawrence is that leafless tree—how a pause, not a flourish, can turn a life. I felt the same quiet in Beethoven, the Man and the Artist, as Revealed in His Own Words — Background and Themes, where his fragments read less like confessions and more like someone simply keeping his own company. That winter honesty is rare, and it lingers.