Written for the nuns under her care, this mystical classic offers one of the most beautiful images in all of spiritual literature: the soul as a castle of clear crystal, containing many rooms arranged around an innermost chamber where God himself dwells. Teresa guides the reader inward through seven successive "mansions," each a stage of deepening prayer and self-knowledge, leading from the soul's first stirrings toward divine love to the heights of union with God. Composed in 1577 by one of the great mystics of the Church, it remains a profound and tender map of the inner life.