Genuflections (prayer of the eyes)

Day 4- August 2

Then St. Dominic went to the altar or to the chapter. There, with his gaze fixed on the crucifix, he considered it with incomparable penetration. Before it, he would genuflect many times. Sometimes, too, from compline until the middle of the night, he would rise and then he would kneel... (...) Thus was then formed in our father Saint Dominic a great feeling of confidence in the mercy of God: for himself, for all sinners, and for the preservation of the younger brothers whom he sent out into the world to preach to souls the Gospel (...)

Sometimes he remained in genuflection for a very long time, his soul lost in rapture. And sometimes it seemed that in this kind of look, his intelligence penetrated heaven, and immediately filled with a celestial joy, he wiped the tears that flowed from his eyes. (...) He was so accustomed to bending his knees that, even on journeys, in hostels, after the fatigue of the road and even on the paths, while his companions slept or rested, he returned to his genuflections as a form of his particular art and ministry. And by his example rather than by his words, he taught the brothers this way of praying.