Contemplation is like a pump that pulls up water and makes it pass into canals. If contemplation were to entirely cease, hearts would be soon dried up…

Love of neighbour, like the love of God, obliges the contemplative to remain close to the divine source… Contemplation must bear fruit for our neighbour, even if it should oftentimes dispense with exterior works. This fruit is the Savour of God that we come to know in loving every creature with a love of charity, in forgetting ourselves, to remember only God who is in all, who does not despise anything he has made, who suffers patiently our offences, who corrects us only in love. No defence of self. No discouragement above all. No abandoning of prayer.
Raïssa Maritain (1883–1960)