DIALOGUES ON THE

SUPERSENSUAL LIFE

BY
JACOB BOEHME
EDITED BY BERNARD HOLLAND

1901
 Dialogues on the Supersensual Life by Jacob Boehme.
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Contents
Preface
Preliminary Note
Dialogue I
Dialogue II
Dialogue III
Dialogue IV
 1

Preface
The Works of Jacob Behmen, the "Teutonic Theosopher," translated into English, were
first printed in England in the seventeenth century, between 1644 and 1662. In the
following century a complete edition in four large volumes was produced by some of the
disciples of William Law. This edition, completed in the year 1781, was compiled in part
from the older English edition, and in part from later fragmentary translations by Law
and others. It is not easily accessible to the general reader, and, moreover, the greater
part of Behmen's Works could not be recommended save to those who had the time and
power to plunge into that deep sea in search of the many noble pearls which it contains.
Behmen's language and way of thought are remote and strange, and in reading his
thought one has often to pass it through a process of intellectual translation. This is
chiefly true of his earlier work, the "Aurora" or "Morning Redness." But among those
works which he wrote during the last five years of his life there are some written in a
thought-language less difficult to be understood, yet containing the essential teaching of
this humble Master of Divine Science. From these I have selected some which may, in a
small volume, be useful. It seemed that for this purpose it would be best to take the
"Dialogues of the Supersensual Life," including as one of them the beautiful, really
separate, Dialogue, called in the Complete Works, "The way from darkness to true
illumination." In the case of neither of these works is the translation used that of the
seventeenth century. The first three dialogues are a translation made by William Law,
one of the greatest masters of the English language, and found in MS. after his death.
This translation from the original German is not exactly literal, but rather a liberal
version, or paraphrase, the thought of Behmen being expanded and elucidated, though
in nowise departed from. The dialogue called "The way from darkness to true
illumination" was taken by the eighteenth century editors from a book containing
translations of certain smaller treatises of Behmen then lately printed at Bristol and
made, as they say, "in a style better adapted to the taste and more accommodated to the
apprehension of modern readers." I do not know who was the translator, but the work
seems to be excellently well done.
It will be well to say a few words first as to the life, then as to the leading ideas of Jacob
Behmen. This name is more correctly written Jacob Bœhme, but I prefer to retain the
more easily pronounced spelling of Behmen, adopted by the Editors of both the
complete English editions.
Jacob Behmen's outward life was simplicity itself. He was born in the year 1575 at Alt
Seidenberg, a village among pastoral hills, near Görlitz in Lusatia, a son of poor
peasants. As a boy he watched the herds in the fields, and was then apprenticed to a
shoemaker, being not enough robust for rural work. One day, when the master and his
wife were out, and he was alone in the house, a stranger entered the shop and asked for
a pair of shoes. Jacob had no authority to conclude a bargain and asked a high price for
the shoes in the hope that the stranger would not buy. But the man paid the price, and
when he had gone out into the street, called out "Jacob, come forth." Jacob obeyed the
call, and now the stranger looked at him with a kindly, earnest, deep, soul-piercing gaze,
and said, "Jacob, thou art as yet but little, but the time will come when thou shalt be
great, and become another man, and the world shall marvel at thee. Therefore be pious,
 2

fear God, and reverence his Word; especially read diligently the Holy Scriptures, where
thou hast comfort and instruction; for thou must endure much misery and poverty, and
suffer persecution. But be courageous and persevere, for God loves, and is gracious unto
thee." So saying, the stranger clasped his hand, and disappeared.
After this Jacob became even more pensive and serious, and would admonish the other
journeymen on the work-bench when they spoke lightly of sacred things. His master
disliked this and dismissed him, saying that he would have no "house-prophet" to bring
trouble into his house. Thus Jacob was forced to go forth into the world as a travelling
journeyman, and, as he wandered about in that time of fierce religious discord, the
world appeared to him to be a "Babel." He was himself afflicted by troubles and doubts,
but clave to prayer and to Scripture, and especially to the words in Luke xi.; "How much
more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him." And once,
when he was again engaged for a time by a master, he was lifted into a state of blessed
peace, a Sabbath of the Soul, that lasted for seven days, during which he was, as it were,
inwardly surrounded by a Divine Light. "The triumph that was then in my soul I can
neither tell nor describe. I can only liken it to a resurrection from the dead."
Jacob returned in 1594 to Görlitz, became a master shoemaker in 1599, married a
tradesman's daughter, and had four children. In the year 1600 "sitting one day in his
room, his eye fell upon a burnished pewter dish which reflected the sunshine with such
marvellous splendour that he fell into a deep inward ecstasy and it seemed to him as if
he could now look into the principles and deepest foundations of things. He believed
that it was only a fancy, and in order to banish it from his mind he went out upon the
green. But here he remarked that he gazed into the very heart of things; the very herbs
and grass, and that Nature harmonised with what he had inwardly seen. He said nothing
about this to any one, but praised and thanked God in silence. He continued in the
honest practice of his craft, was attentive to his domestic affairs, and was on terms of
goodwill with all men." 1
At the age of thirty-five, in the year 1610, Jacob Behmen suddenly perceived that all
which he had seen in a fragmentary way was forming itself into a coherent whole, and
felt a "fire-like" impulse, a yearning to write it down, as a "Memorial," not for
publication, but lest he should forget it himself. He wrote it early in the morning before
work, and late in the evening after work. This was his "Morning Redness" or "Aurora."
A nobleman of the country, called Carl von Endern, happened to see the MS. at the
shoemaker's house, was struck by it, and had some copies made. One of these fell into
the hands of the Lutheran Clergyman of Görlitz, Pastor Primarius Gregorius Richter,
who thenceforth became a bitter opponent of Behmen. He assailed him in sermons, in
language of savage invective, as a heretic of the most dangerous kind, until Jacob was
summoned before the Magistrates, and forbidden to write anything in future. He was
told that as a shoemaker he must confine himself to his own trade. But the affair, as is
usually the case, had an effect the reverse of that intended by persecutors. It made him
known to various persons more learned than himself who were interested in the
subject, and from his converse with them he learned a better style, and some Latin
technical terms, which he afterwards found useful for expressing his thoughts.

1From the Danish Bishop Martensen's book "Jacob Boehme"; an excellent study well translated from Danish into
English by Mr T. Rhys Evans, (Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1885). An account of Behmen's life is given in the
preface to the first volume of the last century English edition of the Works.
 3

Jacob obeyed for some years the magisterial command to write nothing, but it was very
grievous to him, and he often reflected with dismay on the parable of the talents and
how "that one talent which 'tis death to hide" was lodged with him useless. At length he
would keep silence no more. He says himself: "I had resolved to do nothing in future, but
to be quiet before God in obedience, and to let the devil, with all his host, sweep over
me. But it was with me as when a seed is hidden in the earth. It grows up in storm and
rough weather against all reason. For in winter time all is dead, and reason says: 'It is all
over with it.' But the precious seed within me sprouted and grew green, oblivious of all
storms, and, amid disgrace and ridicule, it has blossomed forth into a lily."
Between the year 1619 and his death in 1624, at the age of forty-nine, he poured forth
his stored up thoughts, writing a number of Works, including those in the present
volume, which were among his very latest. He had the more time to write because his
shoemaking business had fallen off, by reason, perhaps, of the question as to his
orthodoxy, but some friends supplied him with the necessaries of life. He was
now exposed to fresh attacks from Gregorius Richter and was forced this time to go into
exile. At this period he went to the Electoral Court at Dresden where the Prince was
curious about him, and a conference took place between him and John Gerhard and
other eminent theologians. At the close of this Dr Gerhard said: "I would not take the
whole world and help to condemn this man." And his colleague Meissner said, "My good
brother, neither would I. Who knows what stands behind this man? How can we judge
what we have not understood? May God convert this man if he is in error. He is a man of
marvellously high mental gifts who at present can neither be condemned nor
approved."
Soon afterwards, while Jacob was staying at the house of one of his noble friends in
Silesia he fell into a fever. At his own request he was carried back to Görlitz, and there
awaited his end. On Sunday, November 21st 1624, in the early hours he called his son
Tobias and asked him if he did not hear that sweet melodious music. As Tobias heard
nothing, Jacob asked him to set wide the door so that he might the better hear it; then he
asked what was the hour, and when he was told that it had just struck two he said, "My
time is not yet; three hours hence is my time." After some silence he exclaimed, "Oh thou
strong God of Sabaoth, deliver me according to thy Will," and immediately afterwards
"Thou Crucified Lord Jesus Christ have mercy upon me and take me to thyself into thy
Kingdom." At six in the morning he suddenly bade them farewell with a smile, and said,
"Now I go hence into Paradise," and yielded up his Spirit.
Frankenberg writes of him: "His bodily appearance was somewhat mean; he was small
of stature, had a low forehead but prominent temples, a rather aquiline nose, a scanty
beard, grey eyes, sparkling into heavenly blue, a feeble but genial voice. He was modest
in his bearing, unassuming in conversation, lowly in conduct, patient in suffering, and
gentle-hearted."
As the shoemaker of Görlitz had in his life-time some disciples among highly educated
men, so has he always had a few since his departure from this life. Men so diversely
situated as the non-juror William Law in England; St Martin, the "philosophe inconnu"
of the French Revolution; the sincere Catholic, Franz Baader, in Germany; Martensen,
the Protestant Bishop in Denmark, have found in him their Teacher.
The selections contained in the present book belong rather to the practical or ethical
side of Jacob Behmen's teaching than to his Cosmogony, or Vision, as one may best call it,
of the nature of all things. I think that any old cottager, who had read nothing but his
 4

Bible, but had lived his life, would well understand the general teaching of most that is
contained in these Dialogues, and would find all Behmen's words most beautiful and
comforting. It is not, therefore, necessary for the present purpose to attempt fully to set
forth the whole Vision of Behmen, nor, in any case would it be within my power to do
so. But it may be of service to those readers who are not acquainted with the writings of
Behmen or of his disciples, if I here say something as to his general teaching with regard
to the nature of the soul of man and its relation to that which is not itself, but like to
itself.
The Soul, in the doctrine of Behmen, is a Being which has a will or desire, and is aided by
a mirror of understanding or imagination. Will or Desire is of the very essence of the
Soul, inseparable from its existence. He says: "Where Desire is there is also Essence or
Being." The Soul is subject to the diverse attractions of the Centre of Divine Life and
Light, and of the Spirit of the World. Enlightened by its understanding it has the free
power to turn its will towards, and unite itself to, this or that. "Choose well, thy choice is
brief and yet endless."
The Soul is a magic Fire derived out of, or from, God the Father's Essence, lumen de
lumine, and imprisoned in darkness. It is an intense and incessant Desire after the Light;
it longs to return to the Light-centre, whence it originally came, that is, to the "heart of
God." Thus longing, it is a "Fire of Anguish," until it becomes a "Fire of Love." It is a fire
of anguish, so long as it is shut up in its dark self. It is a fire of love when it pierces
through and escapes from its dark self-prison and burns freely and softly in union with
the Divine Love. God then comes as a Light, a soft purifying Fire into the Soul, and
changes all the wanting, hungering, empty, restless, self-tormenting properties of the
Natural Life into a sweetness of rest and peace. This is called in Scripture the "new
birth." Thus the same thing—the same Fire,—is a cause of torment or of joy according to
the conditions under which it is. Man, who is a microcosm of the whole Universe, is a
mingling of light and darkness. His anguish comes from his Soul's imprisonment in
darkness (as a mere raging fire) and continues until it can break forth and unite itself
with that whence it came and to which it belongs.
Behmen says "The Eternal Darkness of the Soul is Hell, viz.: an aching source of anguish,
which is called the Anger of God, but the Eternal Light in the Soul is the Kingdom
of Heaven, where the fiery anguish of darkness is turned into joy. For the same nature of
anguish, which, in the Darkness, is a cause of sadness, is, in the Light, a cause of the
outward and stirring joy.... The Fire is painful and consuming, but the Light is yielding,
friendly, powerful and delightful, a sweet and amiable Joy."
Pure delight, with no trace of doubt or fear, hope or regret, is the sign of the presence of
Love or Light. So again Behmen says: "The Fire in the Light is a fire of Love, but the Fire
in the Darkness is a fire of Anguish, and is painful, irksome, and full of contrariety." The
end to which all things tend is the final separation of light from darkness; the "last day"
means this; but the present world is a perpetual mixture of light and darkness, good and
evil, joy and anguish. So, the Cross of Jesus is at once the highest embodiment of Love
and Hate.
It is remarkable that in this doctrine of light and darkness Behmen was nearly followed
by one who had not, I suppose, ever heard of him, reading as he did little of anything but
the Bible, who worked on the Scriptures with his own powerful and earnest insight, the
Christian hero, Charles Gordon. In his little book called "Reflections in Palestine" written
in that one year, 1883, of unbroken repose from action spent in the Holy Land, just
 5

before his final service at Khartoom, Gordon dwells upon the repetition, as he calls
it, both in the individual soul, and in the world's history of four processes constantly
recurring,—a state of darkness, a light breaking forth through darkness, a division of
light from darkness or gathering together of light, a re-dispersion of light into darkness,
and then a renewal of the four processes, ever upon an ascending level of good, directed
towards the final elimination of all light from the darkness.
Fire must have fuel, something on which to feed. It must feed or perish. But the magic
Fire-spirit, the Soul, cannot perish because it is an eternal Essence. Therefore it must
either feed; or hunger. It desires spiritual essence or "virtue" to allay its raging hunger.
But, during the space that it is embodied in this nature, it can feed either on the Divine
Spirit, or upon the Spirit of this World. "Hence," says Behmen, "we may understand the
cause of that infinite variety which is in the Wills and Actions of Men." For of
whatsoever the Soul eateth, and wherewith its Fire-life becometh kindled; "according to
that the Soul's life is led and governed." You become like to that which you eat. If the
Soul breaks forth out of its Nature-self and enters into "God's Love-fire," it eats of the
Divine Essence (the substance or flesh of Christ) and it is to this that Jesus Christ
referred when he spoke of feeding upon his body, and when he spoke of the true bread
from heaven "which giveth life to the World" (John vi. 33), of which he that eateth shall
"live for ever" (John vi. 58), or the "living water," whereof whosoever drinketh "shall
never thirst," but it shall be to him "a well of water springing up into everlasting life"
(John iv. 13, 14). This feeding is in no way metaphorical but as real and actual as
physical feeding.
Behmen says, "The Essence of that Life eateth the Flesh of Christ and drinketh His
Blood.... Now if the Soul eat of this sweet, holy and heavenly food, then it kindleth itself
with the great Love in the name and power of Jesus, whence its fire of anguish becometh
a great triumph of joy and glory." 2
Behmen held that man lives at once in three worlds, firstly in the outward visible
elementary world of space and time (where man "is the Time and in the Time;")
secondly, the "Eternal Dark World, Hell, the centre of Eternal Nature, whence
is generated the Soul-fire, that source of anguish, and thirdly, in the Eternal Light World,
Heaven—the Divine habitation." The same processes of feeding and life take place in the
three Worlds, so that physical feeding is a kind of outside sheath of spiritual feeding.
If the Soul accustoms itself to feed in this life upon the heavenly food (that panem de
coelo omne delectamentum in se habentem) it gradually itself becomes of quite heavenly
substance, purged from darkness, and, when the natural life falls off at death, stands in
heaven, where indeed it already is. But, if the Soul feeds upon the Spirit and Things of
this World, then, when by reason of death, it can no longer feed upon them, it is left in
the condition of mere "aching Desire," or eternal unsatisfied Hunger, working in a void,
in perpetual anguish. Thus Heaven and Hell are not places, but conditions of the Soul. So

2 It should be noted that Jacob Behmen held strongly to the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the actual bread and wine
as a "permissive medium" of the real feeding, in order that there may be "a visible sign of what is done in the inward
ground." But he says "We should not depend on this means or medium alone, and think that Christ's Flesh and Blood
is only and alone participated in this use of bread and wine, as Reason in this present time miserably erreth therein.
No, that is not so. Faith, when it hungereth after God's love and grace, always eateth and drinketh of Christ's Flesh and
Blood. Christ hath not bound himself to bread and wine alone, but hath bound himself to the faith, that he will be in
men." Works, vol. iv. p. 208. Charles Gordon took the same view of the visible "eating," as being a great assistance to
the spiritual feeding, but not indispensable to it. (Gordon's "Letters to his Sister.")
 6

Milton, who had no doubt studied the translation of Behmen made in his own time,
writes:
"The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven."
They are in this life everywhere commingled, but when this life falls away, the Soul
remains in that of the two states into which it has in this life brought itself. The Soul,
after death, remains either as a satisfied Desire, that is, a Desire no longer but a Joy, or as
an aching Desire. The Persian says:—
Heaven is the vision of fulfilled Desire
And Hell the shadow of a Soul on fire.
Behmen says, Heaven is fulfilled desire; Hell is a Soul on fire, no mere vision or shadow.
Heaven and Hell are within us, since our souls are portions of the universe of things, in
every part of which Heaven and Hell are commingled. The gates of Heaven within us
were shut in Adam, but the Power of God, Christ in Jesus, broke open by his passion "the
closed gates of Paradise," that is, the gates of our "inward heavenly humanity," and now
the wayfarer can, if he will, pass through. We do not spiritually live by a reasoning
process, or acceptance of doctrines by the understanding, but by the action of the Desire
in feeding upon the Spirit of Love, a process of laying hold, drawing in, and assimilating.
True prayer is like feeding, or still more, perhaps, like the unconscious drawing in of the
air: it should be as constant. By it is introduced the heavenly life from without to
nourish the like heavenly life contained in the seed within. If a man thus rightly feeds,
then, in him, the hellish life and passions, portions of the powers of darkness, "our
creatures" as Behmen says, will be killed by starvation, wanting their appropriate food.
On the other hand, a man can feed these also from without with their appropriate food
by misdirected desire, thereby starving the heavenly life in the Soul.
Thus the essence of Behmen's teaching as to the Soul incarnate in Man and revealed by
his body, is that it is an eternal Being, and that it is a source of joy or anguish according
as it is, or is not, purified or tranquillised by communion with the Centre of Light, or the
Fountain of Life. He does not contemplate, as some Eastern teachers perhaps do, the
annihilation of the Will of the Soul by a kind of higher spiritual suicide; its existence is to
him the very condition of good no less than of evil; he contemplates its liberation from
the dark, contracted, self-prison, its purification, and entrance into the full heaven-life.
This magical soul-fire, like visible fire, can rage and destroy, or it can serve as the means
and ground of all good. Here is the foundation both of good and evil, in man as in all
things.
To understand this better, one must consider the cosmic teaching lying behind the rich
profusion of images, often inconsistent and clashing, in which Jacob Behmen embodies
his Vision.
Man has fallen into Nature. But Nature itself, apart from and unfilled by the Divine Light,
is a self-torment, a mere Want, a Desire, a Hunger. The true distinction between God and
Nature is that God is an Universal All, while Nature is an Universal Want, viz: to be filled
by God. Physical attraction is nothing but the outer sheath of this universal desire.
Nature filled by God is Heaven or fulfilled Desire. 3 Without God it is Hell, mere Desire.

3 Dante's "ricchezza senza brama."

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Heaven is the Presence of God: Hell his Absence. It is as true to say that Heaven is in
God, as to say that God is in Heaven.
Apart from the existence of God there could be neither Presence nor Absence, neither
Heaven nor Hell. If the Soul of Man were wholly divided and separated from the Divine
Life, it would, as a part of Nature, be a mere hungering, restless, conscious Desire. In so
far as it is so separated it partakes of this pain. For "through all the Universe of Things
nothing is uneasy, unsatisfied, or restless, but because it is not governed by Love, or
because its Nature has not reached or attained the full birth of the Spirit of Love. For
when that is done, every hunger is satisfied, and all complaining, murmuring, accusing,
resenting, revenging and striving are as totally suppressed and overcome as coldness,
thickness and horror of darkness are suppressed and overcome by the breaking forth of
the light. If you ask why the Spirit of Love cannot be displeased, cannot be disappointed,
cannot complain, accuse, resent or murmur, it is because the Spirit of Love desires
nothing but itself, it is its own Good, for Love is God, and he that dwelleth in God
dwelleth in Love." 4
Behmen's idea of the "fallen Angels" is that they are entirely and hopelessly divided
from the Life of God. They are mere embodied, hopeless, self-tormenting Desires. They
have fallen into the hell within themselves, they cannot but be hating, bitter, envious,
proud, wrathful, restless; and therefore tormentors of others. They have lost that which
man, however far astray, always possesses, the faculty of return or regeneration
through submission to and union with God. The spark of the Life and Spirit of God which
is in Men is not in the fallen Angels. Let us hope that Beings so utterly lost do not exist.
God is outside of Nature and yet in a sense inside also, because there is a divine life or
virtue in Nature which, longing to re-unite itself with its source, is a cause of anguish
while divided, and of joy when united. So, in the outer world, the seed buried in earth
contains a power kindred to the virtue of the sun. It is this which breaks forth from the
seed, forces itself up through the dark, imprisoning, and yet nourishing and necessary
earth, and at last, if it can win its way through obstacles, cheerfully expands in the light
of the sun and feeds upon his warmth. That, in man's inner nature, which answers to
this power or life in the seed, is called by Behmen the Life or Spirit of Jesus Christ.
Egoism or Ihood, the old contracting, narrowing cell, is destroyed as this expansive and
expanding force grows and breaks forth. Behmen says: "As the Sun in the visible world
ruleth over Evil and Good, and, with its light and power, and all whatsoever itself is, is
present everywhere, and penetrates into every Being, and wholly giveth itself to every
Being, and yet ever remaineth whole, and nothing of its being goeth away therewith.
Thus also it is to be understood concerning Christ's person and office which ruleth in
the inward spiritual world, and penetrateth into the faithful man's soul, spirit and heart.
As the Sun worketh through a herb, so that the herb becometh filled with the virtue of
the Sun, and, as it were, so converted by the Sun that it becometh wholly of the nature of
the Sun, so Christ ruleth in the resigned will or Soul and Body, over all evil inclinations
and generateth the man to be a new heavenly creature." The same teaching is finely set
forth in a passage of William Law. 5 He says:
"Man has a spark of the Light and Spirit of God, as a supernatural gift of God given into
the birth of his Soul to bring forth by degrees a new birth of that life which was lost in

4 Law's Works, vol. viii., p. 177.

5 Works, vol. vii., p. 65, ed. 1765.
 8

Paradise. This holy spark of the Divine Nature within him has a natural, strong, and
almost infinite tendency or reaching after that eternal Light and Spirit of God, from
whence it came forth. It came forth from God, it came out of God, it partaketh of the
Divine Nature, and therefore it is always in a state of tendency and return to God. All
this is called the breathing, the moving, the quickening of the Holy Spirit within us,
which are so many operations of this spark of life tending towards God. On the other
hand the Deity as considered in itself, and without the Soul of man, has an infinite
unchangeable tendency of love and desire towards the Soul of man, to unite and
communicate its own riches and glories to it, just as the Spirit of the air without Man
unites and communicates its riches and virtues to the Spirit of the air that is within Man.
This love or desire of God toward the soul of Man is so great that he gave his only-
begotten Son, the brightness of his glory, to take the human nature upon him, in its
fallen state, that by this mysterious union of God and Man, all the enemies of the Soul of
Man might be overcome, and every human creature might have a power of being born
again according to that Image of God in which he was first created. The gospel is the
history of this Love of God to Man. Inwardly he has a seed of the Divine Life given into
the birth of his Soul, a seed that has all the riches of eternity in it, and is always wanting
to come to the birth in him, and be alive in God. Outwardly he has Jesus Christ, who as a
Sun of Righteousness, is always casting forth his enlivening beams on this inward seed,
to kindle and call it forth to the birth, doing that to this Seed of Heaven in Man, which
the sun in the firmament is always doing to the vegetable seeds in the earth.
"Consider this matter in the following similitude. A grain of wheat has the air and light
of this world enclosed or incorporated in it. This is the mystery of its life, this is its
power of growing, by this it has a strong continual tendency of uniting again with that
ocean of light and air from whence it came forth. On the other hand that great ocean of
light and air, having its own offspring hidden in the heart of the grain has a perpetual
strong tendency to unite and communicate with it again. From this desire of union on
both sides, the vegetable life arises and all the virtues and powers contained in it. But let
it be well observed that this desire on both sides cannot have its effect till the husk and
gross part of the grain falls into a state of corruption and death; till this begins, the
mystery of life hidden in it cannot come forth."
The sun only acts by stirring up in each thing, and calling into activity, its own
imprisoned, dormant, heat or life. Save by the same nature-process, working in an inner
sphere, there cannot come to pass the flower and fruit of the Soul. The Sun, true emblem
of the Redeeming Spirit, helps each vital force to break forth from its state of death—
even though, like the grains of wheat found in Egyptian graves and then new-planted, it
has been immured there thousands of years—and to enter into its highest possible state
of life. Indeed, in this school of wisdom, the natural visible light, of which the Sun is the
dispensing medium to our solar system, and other suns to other circles of planets, is
actually an outer manifestation of the inner supernatural light, and warmth, not a mere
emblem at all. We speak more truly than we know, when we speak of a "heavenly day."
All Nature is a series of "out-births" of the Deity. "The outward world," says Behmen, "is
sprung out of the inward spiritual world, viz., out of Light and Darkness." And his
English interpreter says: "Whatever is delightful and ravishing, sublime and glorious in
spirits, minds, or bodies, either in heaven, or on earth, is from the power of the
Supernatural Light opening its endless wonders in them. Hell has no misery, horror or
distraction, but because it has no communication with the supernatural Light. And did
not the supernatural Light stream forth its blessings into this world, through the
 9

materiality of the Sun, all outward Nature would be full of the horror of Hell." And
elsewhere, "There is no meekness, benevolence or goodness in Angel, Man, or any other
Creature, but where Light is the Lord of its life. Life itself begins no sooner, rises no
higher, has no other glory, than as the Light begins it, and leads it on. Sounds have no
softness, flowers and germs no sweetness, plants and fruits have no growth, but as the
Mystery of Light opens itself in them." 6 And so Behmen himself says: "There is nothing
that is created or born in Nature but it also manifests its internal form externally; for the
internal continually labours or works itself forth to manifestation. We know in the
power and form of this World, how the only Essence has manifested itself with the
external birth in the desire of the similitude; how it has manifested itself in so many
forms and shapes, which we see and know in the stars and elements, likewise in the
living creatures, and also in the trees and herbs." Thus there is a real communion
between all beauty, sweetness, and glory, within and without the Soul of man.
It is this truth, not of the analogy between the essential life of Man and Nature, but of the
unity in all things, that is now opening itself out in many ways. Wordsworth, a true seer,
has given to it its highest expression in English Poetry. Modern science all tends to
confirmation of this unity.
God, then, must become Man, there must be a birth of the Life of God in the Soul, in
order that the Soul may live its highest life. Only in this way can the wild properties of
Nature be subordinated and turned to their proper use, their restless hunger pacified.
Goodness and happiness can be expected from nothing else but from the Divine Life
united to and dwelling in the Nature Life. It is the "ingrafted Word" of St James' Epistle.
The plant cannot but grow towards the sun. If it is too deep in earth, or prevented by a
strong soil, or withered by dryness, so that it cannot attain to its end, the fault is not
with it. But, in the spiritual inner world (in which the plant dwells not) the Soul of man
has this freedom—that it can consciously turn towards God, whose Spirit and Life will
then come forth to meet it, or can turn towards the Things of this World. Upon this
freedom of choice is founded Behmen's moral teaching. The Soul is like a woman (and
all nations have testified in their languages and parables to their sense of this) who can
freely choose to submit and surrender her body to this Lover, or to that. When she has
chosen her free power ends. As she has chosen, so her life-faculty will be fertilised by
good or evil; so will be the new life that arises within her, and so will be her future joy
or sorrow.
In a deep sense, the desire of the spark of Life in the Soul to return to its Original
Source is part of the longing desire of the universal Life for its own heart or centre. Of
this longing the universal attraction, striving against resistance, towards an universal
centre, proved to govern the phenomenal or physical world, is but the outer sheath and
visible working. It has been said that Sir Isaac Newton (who was a diligent reader of
Behmen's Works) "ploughed with Jacob Behmen's heifer." There is in truth but one
Religion, that founded upon the eternal, immutable, universal processes of the actual
Nature of things, and of this Christianity, rightly apprehended, is the supreme
Revelation. This will be seen better by all as the Religion unfolds itself. Rightly speaking
there is no such thing as supernatural religion; there is but one Religion, that of Nature.
It is the work of visible religion to teach by signs and parables, embodying the mystery
in symbols, and clothing it with adoration.

6 Law's Works, vol. viii., p. 189.

 10

Jacob Behmen's mode of expression is all his own, and there is much in the fabric of his
thought which men of our time, if they take a superficial view, would not find it easy to
accept. The doctrine of Evolution now profoundly influences every corner of the field of
thought. We now incline to think rather of the rise of Man out of Nature than of his fall
into it, though, perhaps, there can no more be a rise without a precedent fall, than there
can be a return without a precedent out-going. Evolution may be the time-form of
Attraction. But all this affects the outside form, not the essence of the doctrine. Behmen
is concerned with the real nature of things, apart from time and space, with their
apparent, but so misleading, facts. He appeals to each Soul's knowledge of itself, and, on
the principle that all is in everything, draws from the nature of Man, that little Universe
(and we can no otherwise learn things as they are in themselves), his teaching as to
Universal Nature. "In Man (he says) lies all whatsoever the Sun shines upon, or Heaven
contains, as also Hell and all the Deeps." His Iliad is the struggle between light and
darkness, life and death, expansion and contraction, the centripetal and centrifugal
force, heat and cold, love and hatred, peace and wrath, humility and pride, self-sacrifice
and self-seeking, joy and anguish, repose and restlessness, in the whole of Nature and in
the Soul of Man. Does not every man, who has lived his full life, know the truth and
reality of all this? It is known more especially and actually by those ardent and
adventurous spirits who have sailed in far seas of thought or action, not merely coasting
along the shores of tradition, authority and established rule. Sinners know some things
more vividly than those who ever and easily have been good. Only the man who has
been sick knows the difference between sickness and health. The prodigal who had
wandered in a far country and had lived as he would, understood the meaning of peace
and love better than the brother who had always stayed at home.
These wanderers, if they return in time, know best, taught by the heart-rending lessons
of experience, the difference between the Heaven and Hell within them; the Hell of
wrath, self-torment, fear, anxiety, envy, malice, evil-will, pride, cruelty, sensual passion,
longing to domineer, and the Heaven of love, benevolence, meekness, humility,
compassion, peace, joy, long-suffering.
They know that Heaven and Hell can alike be revealed in the Soul. From youth they have
felt something in them striving, often feebly enough, against passionate desires for
wealth, honour, success, and for mastery over the minds, affections, and bodies of
others. Behind all this turmoil and ever unsatisfied anguish of seeking that which
satisfies not, they have been aware of a diviner life slowly growing towards heaven, ever
and again thwarted and driven back by the renewed assaults of the Spirit of the World,
yet never quite destroyed. At the moments of fiercest fight against rebel passions they
have felt the divine assisting strength flow into them, if only they powerfully invoked it,
turning towards its source as a babe towards its mother's breast. They have heard the
"Peace be still" amid the wildest spiritual storms. They know that if they have been
saved, it is not by their own strength nor by reasoning, but by this power from without.
They know the impotence, in action, of the merely reflective or spectator faculty. In this
sense of the word "reason," they would agree with him who wrote "Your Heart is the
best and greatest gift of God to you; it is the highest, greatest, strongest, and noblest
Power of your Nature; it forms your whole Life, be it what it will; all Evil and all Good
comes from it; your Heart alone has the key of Life and Death; it does all that it will;
Reason is but its plaything; and whether in Time or Eternity, can only be a mere
 11

Beholder of the wonders of happiness, or forms of misery, which the right or wrong
working of the Heart is entered into." 7
William Law remarks that Jesus Christ, though he had all wisdom, yet gives but a small
number of doctrines to mankind "whilst every moral teacher writes volumes upon
every single virtue." It is, he adds, because our Lord "knew what they know not, that our
whole malady lies in this, that the Will of our Mind is turned into this World, and that
nothing can relieve us, or set us right, but the turning of the Will of our Mind and the
Desire of our Hearts to God. And hence it is that he calls us to nothing but a total denial
of ourselves and the Life of this World and to faith in him as the Worker of a new birth
and life in us." On this one root of the whole matter Jacob Behmen insisted, expressing
one truth in a thousand ways and through images, which to him are not images but the
same process working in other spheres. His whole practical, moral teaching enforces the
right direction of Desire. Mali mores sunt mali amores, said one who also truly saw; the
profound Augustine. The hunger of the Soul must be turned to the source of eternal joy.
All that is good and beautiful in nature or in the heart of man flows from that fountain.
Desire is everything in Nature; does everything. Heaven is Nature filled with divine Life
attracted by Desire.

7 Law's Works, vol. vii., p. 162.

 12

Preliminary Note
Before entering upon the Dialogues I have thought it well to insert some sentences
taken from a treatise of Behmen's called "Regeneration," together with some taken from
another treatise of his on "Christ's Testament" because they show well the spirit in
which he thought and wrote. The freedom of thought and expression which he claims is,
happily, far more readily accorded now than it was in his own day.
I have only one thing to add. In the eighteenth century English translation of Behmen's
Works, all the substantives, as was then the frequent custom, are printed with capital
letters. There is a philosophic basis for this practice, because a substantive is an attempt
to denote a "thing in itself" and is therefore of greater weight than an adjective, which
only expresses qualities which we attribute to it. To Behmen's Works this mode of
printing seems especially appropriate. In our now too literary language, many words
have become so trite and carelessly used that they have almost ceased to have reference
to real existing things. But Behmen never uses words in this merely literary way, being
indeed in nowise a man of letters. It might have been said of him, as indeed his enemies
did at the time say, that which was said by the Jews of our Lord, "How knoweth this man
letters having never learned?" When he speaks of the "glory" of God, he means
something as real as if he spoke of the "leaves on that tree," and so with all his words. I
was therefore somewhat inclined, in order to mark this, to adhere altogether to the old
custom in this case, and though I have not done so, fearing it might annoy the eye of the
unaccustomed reader, I have preserved the capital letters in many cases, where it is
especially desirable to dwell on the expression of real existences by the words. It is of
course an illogical compromise between two customs.
The title "Supersensual Life" is not altogether a good one, but it is that which is used in
former editions of Behmen. The idea is rather of Life behind, than above, the life of
sense.
Sentences Selected from Jacob Behmen's Treatises "Regeneration" and "Christ's
Testaments"
1
A true Christian, who is born anew of the Spirit of Christ, is in the simplicity of Christ,
and hath no strife or contention with any man about religion.
2
The Christendom that is in Babel striveth about the manner how men ought to serve
God and glorify him; also, how they are to know him, and what he is in his Essence and
Will. And they preach positively that whosoever is not one and the same with them in
every particular of knowledge and opinion, is no Christian, but a heretic.
3
But a Christian is of no sect. He can dwell in the midst of sects, and appear in their
services, without being attached or bound to any. He hath but one knowledge, and that
is, Christ in him. He seeketh but one way, which is the desire always to do and teach that
which is right; and he putteth all his knowing and willing into the Life of Christ. He
sigheth and wisheth continually that the Will of God might be done in him, and that his
 13

Kingdom might be manifested in him. His faith is a desire after God and Goodness,
which he wrappeth up in a sure hope, trusting to the words of the promise, and liveth
and dieth therein; though as to the true man, he never dieth.
4
For Christ saith: Whosoever believeth in me shall never die, but hath pierced through from
death to life; and, Rivers of living water shall flow from him, viz. good doctrine and works.
5
Therefore I say that whosoever fighteth and contendeth about the Letter, is all Babel.
The Letters of the Word proceed from, and stand all in, one Root, which is the Spirit of
God; as the various flowers stand all in the earth, and grow about one another. They
fight not with each other about their difference of colour, smell, and taste, but suffer the
earth, the sun, the rain, the wind, the heat, and cold, to do with them as they please; and
yet every one of them groweth in its own peculiar essence and property.
6
Even so it is with the Children of God; they have various gifts and degrees of knowledge,
yet all form one Spirit. They all rejoice at the great Wonders of God, and give thanks to
the Most High in his Wisdom. Why then should they contend about him in Whom they
live and have their being, and of whose substance they themselves are?
7
It is the greatest folly that is in Babel for people to strive about religion, so that they
contend vehemently about opinions of their own forging, viz. about the Letter. When the
Kingdom of God consisteth of no Opinion, but in Power and Love.
8
As Christ said to his disciples, and left it with them at the last, saying: Love one another
as I have loved you: for thereby men shall know that ye are My disciples. If men would as
fervently seek after love and righteousness as they do after opinions, there would be no
strife on earth, and we should be as children of one father, and should need no law or
ordinance. For God is not served by any law, but only by obedience. Laws are for the
wicked, who will not enhance love and righteousness; they are, and must be, compelled
by laws.
9
We all have but one Order, Law, or Ordinance, which is to stand still to the Lord of all
Beings, and resign our wills up to him, and suffer his Spirit to play what music he will.
And thus we give to him again as his own fruits that which he worketh and manifesteth
in us.
10
Now if we did not contend about our different fruits, gifts, kinds, and degrees of
knowledge, but did acknowledge them in one another, like Children of the Spirit of God,
what could condemn us? For the Kingdom of God consisteth not in our knowing and
supposing, but in Power.
11
 14

If we did not know half so much, and were more like children, and had but a brotherly
mind and goodwill towards one another, and lived like children of one mother, and as
branches of one tree, taking our Sap all from one Root, we should be far more holy than
we are.
12
Knowledge serves only to this end, viz., to know that we have lost the Divine Power in
Adam, and are now become inclined to sin; that we have evil properties in us, and that
doing evil pleaseth not God; so that with our knowledge we learn to do right. Now if we
have the Power of God in us, and desire with all our hearts to act and to live aright, then
our knowledge is but our sport, or matter of pleasure, wherein we rejoice.
13
For true knowledge is the manifestation of the Spirit of God through the Eternal
Wisdom. He knoweth what he will in his children; he sheweth his wisdom and wonders
by his children, as the earth putteth forth her various flowers.
14
Now if we dwell with one another, like humble children, in the Spirit of Christ, are
rejoicing at the gift or knowledge of another, who would judge or condemn us? Who
judgeth or condemneth the birds in the woods that praise the Lord of all Beings with
various voices, every one in its own essence? Doth the Spirit of God reprove them for
not bringing their voices into one harmony? Doth not the melody of them all proceed
from his Power, and do they not sport before him?
15
Those men therefore that strive and wrangle about the knowledge and will of God, and
despise one another on that account, are more foolish than the birds in the woods, and
the wild beasts that have no true understanding. They are more unprofitable in the sight
of the holy God than the flowers of the field, which stand still in quiet submission to the
Spirit of God, and suffer him to manifest the Divine Wisdom and Power through them.
16
All Christian Religion consisteth wholly on this, to learn to know ourselves; whence we
came, and what we are; how we are gone forth from the Unity into dissension,
wickedness, and unrighteousness; how we have awakened and stirred up these evils in
us; and how we may be delivered from them again, and recover our original
blessedness.
17
First; How we were in the Unity, when we were the Children of God in Adam before he
fell. Secondly; How we are now in dissension and disunion, in strife and
contrariety. Thirdly; Whither we go when we pass out of this corruptible condition;
whither with the unnatural, and whither with the natural part. And lastly; How we came
forth from disunion and vanity, and enter into that one Tree, Christ in us, out of which
we all sprung in Adam. In these four points all the necessary knowledge of a Christian
consisteth.
18
 15

So that we need not strive about any thing; we have no cause of contention with each
other. Let every one only exercise himself in learning how he may enter again into the
Love of God and his Brother.
19
The written Word is but an instrument whereby the Spirit leadeth us to itself within us.
That Word which will teach must be living in the literal Word. The Spirit of God must be
in the literal sound, or else none is a Teacher of God, but a mere Teacher of the Letter,
a knower of the history, and not of the Spirit of God in Christ.
20
All that men will serve God with must be done in Faith, viz. in the Spirit. It is the Spirit
that maketh the work perfect, and acceptable in the sight of God. All that a man
undertaketh and doeth in Faith, he doth in the Spirit of God, which Spirit of God doth co-
operate in the work, and then it is acceptable to God. For he hath done it himself, and his
Power and Virtue is in it. It is holy.
21
Strife and misunderstanding concerning Christ's Person, Office, and Being, or Substance,
as also concerning his Testaments which he left behind him, wherein he worketh at
present, ariseth from the deflected creaturely Reason, which runneth on only in an
Image-like opinion, and reacheth not the ground of this mystery, and yet will be a
mistress of all things or beings, and will judge all things. It doth but lose itself in such
Image-likeness, and breaketh itself off from its Centre, and disperseth the thoughts, and
runneth on in the multiplicity, whereby its ground is confused and the mind is
disquieted, and knoweth not itself.
22
No Life can stand in certainty, except it continue in its Centre, out of which it is sprung.
23
When the Soul that is sprung from God's Word and Will is entered into its own desire to
will of itself, it will run in mere uncertainty till it return to its Original again.
24
Seeing that human life is an outflowing of the Divine Power, Understanding and Skill,
the same ought to continue in its Original, or else it loseth the Divine Knowledge, Power
and Skill, and with self-speculation bringeth itself into centres of its own, and strange
imaging, wherewith its Original becometh darkened and strange.
Therefore say I, that this is the only cause that men dispute about God, his Word,
Essence or Being, and Will, that the understanding of man hath broken itself off from its
Original, and now runneth on in mere self-will, thoughts and images in its own lust to
selfishness, wherein there is no true knowledge, nor can be, till the Life returneth to its
Original, viz. into the Divine Outflowing and Will.
25
If this be done, then God's Will speaketh forth the Divine Power and Wonders again
through the human willing. In which Divine Speaking, the Life may know and
comprehend God's Will, and frame itself therein. Then there is true Divine Knowledge
 16

and Understanding in man's skill, when his skill is continually renewed with Divine
Power.
26
As Christ hath taught us when he said, Unless ye be converted and become as a Child, ye
shall not come into the Kingdom of God. That is, that the Life turn itself again unto God
out of whom it is proceeded, and forsake all its own imaging and lust, and so come to the
Divine Vision again.
27
All disputation concerning God's Being or Essence or Will is performed in the images of
the senses or thoughts without God. For if any liveth in God, and willeth with God, what
needeth he dispute about God, who, or what God is? That he disputeth about it is a
sign that he hath never felt it at all in his mind or senses, and it is not given to him that
God is in him, and willeth in him what he will. It is a certain sign that he exalts his own
meaning and image above others, and desireth dominion.
28
Men should friendly confer together, and offer one another their gifts and knowledge in
love, and try things one with another, and hold that which is best, and not so stand in
their own opinion as if they could not err. It lyeth in no man's person that men should
suppose that the Divine Understanding must come only from such and such. For the
Scripture says, Try all things and hold that which is good, 1 Thess. v. 21.
29
The touchstone to true knowledge is first, the Corner-stone, Christ; that men should see
whether a thing enter out of love into love, or whether alone purely the love of God be
sought and desired; whether it be done out of humility or pride; Secondly, whether it be
according to the Holy Scripture; Thirdly, is it according to the human heart and soul,
wherein the Book of the Life of God is incorporated, and may very well be read by the
Children of God? Here the true mind hath its touchstone in itself, and can distinguish all
things. If it be so that the Holy Ghost dwell in the ground of the mind, that man hath
touchstone enough; that will lead him into all truth.
30
All strife concerning Christ's testaments cometh hence that men do not understand that
Heaven wherein Christ sitteth at the right hand of God. They understand not that he is in
this World, and that the World standeth in Heaven, and Heaven in the World, and are in
one another, as Day and Night.
1 Cor. ii. 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15.
We speak the hidden mystical wisdom of God; which God ordained before the world into
our glory; which none of the Princes of this World knew. For had they known it, they would
not have crucified the Lord of Glory. But, as it is written, Eye hath not seen nor ear heard,
neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive the things which God hath
prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit. For the
Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God. Now we have received, not the Spirit
of the World, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely
given us of God. Which things also we speak, not in the words which men's wisdom
teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But
 17

the Natural Man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto
him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is
spiritual judgeth, or discerneth all things.
 18

Dialogue I
The Disciple said to his Master: Sir, how may I come to the Supersensual Life, so that I
may see God, and may hear God speak?
The Master answered and said: Son, when thou canst throw thyself into THAT, where no
Creature dwelleth, though it be but for a moment, then thou hearest what God
speaketh?
Disciple
Is that where no Creature dwelleth near at hand, or is it afar off?
Master
It is in thee. And if thou canst, my Son, for a while but cease from all thy thinking and
willing, then thou shalt hear the unspeakable words of God.
Disciple
How can I hear him speak, when I stand still from thinking and willing?
Master
When thou standest still from the thinking of Self, and the willing of Self. When both thy
intellect and will are quiet, and passive to the expressions of the Eternal Word and
Spirit; and when thy soul is winged up and above that which is temporal, the outward
senses and the imagination being locked up by holy abstraction, then the Eternal
Hearing, Seeing and Speaking will be revealed in thee, and so God heareth and seeth
through thee, being now the organ of his Spirit, and so God speaketh in thee, and
whispereth to thy Spirit, and thy Spirit heareth his voice. Blessed art thou therefore if
thou canst stand still from self-thinking and self-willing, and canst stop the wheel of thy
imagination and senses; forasmuch as hereby thou mayest arrive at length to see the
great Salvation of God, being made capable of all manner of divine sensations and
heavenly communications. Since it is nought indeed but thine own hearing and willing
that do hinder thee, so that thou dost not see and hear God.
Disciple
But wherewith shall I hear and see God, forasmuch as he is above Nature and Creature?
Master
Son, when thou art quiet and silent, then art thou as God was before Nature and
Creature; thou art that which God then was; thou art that whereof he made thy nature
and creature. Then thou hearest and seest even that wherewith God himself saw and
heard in thee, before ever thine own willing or thine own seeing began.
Disciple
What now hinders or keeps me back, so that I cannot come to that, wherewith God is to
be seen and heard?
Master
 19

Nothing truly but thine own willing, hearing, and seeing do keep thee back from it, and
do hinder thee from coming to this supersensual state. And it is because thou strivest so
against that, out of which thou thyself art descended and derived, that thou thus
breakest thyself off, with thine own willing, from God's willing, and with thine own
seeing from God's seeing. In as much as in thine own seeing thou dost see in thine own
willing only, and with thine own understanding thou dost understand but in and
according to thine own willing, as the same stands divided from the Divine Will. This thy
willing, moreover, stops thy hearing, and maketh thee deaf towards God, through thy
own thinking upon terrestrial things, and thy attending to that which is without thee,
and so it brings thee to a ground where thou art laid hold on and captivated in Nature.
And having brought thee hither, it overshadows thee with that which thou willest, it
binds thee with thine own chains, and it keeps thee in thine own dark prison which thou
makest for thyself, so that thou canst not go out thence, or come to that state which is
Supernatural and Supersensual.
Disciple
But being I am in Nature, and thus bound as with my own chains, and by my own
natural will, pray be so kind, Sir, as to tell me, how I may come through Nature into the
Supersensual and Supernatural Ground, without the destroying of Nature?
Master
Three things are requisite in order to this. The first is, Thou must resign up thy Will to
God, and must sink thyself down to the dust in his mercy. The second is, Thou must hate
thy own Will, and forbear from doing that to which thy own Will doth drive thee. The
third is, Thou must bow thy soul under the Cross, heartily submitting thyself to it, that
thou mayst be able to bear the temptations of Nature and Creature. And if thou dost this,
know that God will speak unto thee, and will bring thy resigned Will into Himself, in the
supernatural ground, and then thou shalt hear, my son, what the Lord speaketh in thee.
Disciple
This is a hard saying, Master, for I must forsake the World and my life too, if I should do
thus.
Master
Be not discouraged hereat. If thou forsakest the World, then thou comest unto that out
of which the World is made, and if thou losest thy life, then thy life is in that for whose
sake thou forsakest it. Thy life is in God, from whence it came into the body, and as thou
comest to have thine own power faint and weak and dying, the power of God will then
work in thee and through thee.
Disciple
Nevertheless, as God hath created man in and for the natural life, to rule over all
creatures on earth, and to be a lord over all things in this world, it seems not to be at all
unreasonable that God should therefore possess this world and the things therein for
his own.
Master
If thou rulest over all creatures but outwardly there cannot be much in that. But if thou
hast a mind to possess all things, and to be a lord indeed over all things in this world,
there is quite another method to be taken by thee.
 20

Disciple
Pray, how is that? And what method must I take, whereby to arrive at this sovereignty?
Master
Thou must learn to distinguish between the Thing, and that which is only an image
thereof; between that sovereignty which is substantial and in the inward ground of
Nature, and that which is imaginary and in outward form of semblance; between that
which is properly angelical and that which is no more than bestial. If thou rulest over
the creatures externally only and not from the right internal ground of thy inward
nature, then thy will and ruling is in a bestial kind or matter, and thine at best is but a
sort of imaginary and transitory government, being void of that which is substantial and
permanent, that which only thou art to desire and press after. Thus by thy outward
lording it over the creatures it is most easy for thee to lose the substance and the reality,
whilst thou hast naught remaining but the image and shadow only of thy first and
original lordship wherein thou art made capable to be again invested, if thou art but
wise, and takest thy investiture from the Supreme Lord in the right course and matter.
Whereas by thy willing and ruling them in a bestial manner, thou bringest also thy
desire into a bestial essence, by which means thou becomest infected and captivated
therein, and gettest therewith a bestial nature and condition of life. But if thou shalt
have put off the bestial nature, and left the imaginary life, and quitted the low-imaged
condition of it, then art thou come into the super-imaginariness and into the intellectual
life, which is a state of living above images, figures and shadows. And so thou rulest over
all creatures, being re-united with thy Original, in that very ground or source, out of
which they were and are created, and thenceforth nothing on earth can hurt thee. For
thou art like All Things, and nothing is unlike thee.
Disciple
O loving Master, pray teach me how I may come the shortest way to be like unto All
Things.
Master
With all my heart. Do but think on the words of our Lord Jesus Christ when he said:
"Except ye be converted and become as little children ye shall not enter into the
kingdom of heaven." There is no shorter way than this, nor can a better way be found.
Verily, Jesus saith unto thee, Unless thou turn and become as a child, hanging upon him
for all things, thou shalt not see the Kingdom of God. This do and nothing shall hurt thee;
for thou shalt be at friendship with all the things that are, as thou dependest upon the
author and fountain of them, and becomest like him, by such dependence, and by the
Union of thy Will with his Will. But mark what I have further to say, and be not thou
startled at it, though it may seem hard for thee at first to conceive. If thou wilt be like All
Things thou must forsake all things; thou must not extend thy will to possess that for
thine own, or as thine own, which is Something, whatever that Something be. For as
soon as ever thou takest Something into thy desire, and receivest it into thee for thine
own, or in propriety, then this very Something (of what nature soever it is) is
the same with thyself; and this worketh with thee in thy will, and thou art thence bound
to protect it, and take care of it, even as of thy own being. But if thou dost receive no
thing into thy desire then thou art free from all things, and rulest over all things at once,
as a Prince of God. For thou hast received nothing for thine own, and art nothing to all
things, and all things are as nothing unto thee. Thou art as a child, which understands
 21

not what a thing is; and though thou dost perhaps understand it, yet thou understandest
it without mixing with it, and without it sensibly affecting or touching thy perception,
even in that matter wherein God doth rule and see all things, he comprehending All, and
yet nothing comprehending him.
Disciple
Ah! how shall I arrive at this heavenly understanding, at this pure and naked knowledge,
which is abstracted from the senses, at this light above Nature and Creature, and at this
participation of the Divine Wisdom which oversees all things, and governs through all
intellectual beings? For, alas, I am touched every moment by the things which are about
me, and overshadowed by the clouds and perfumes which rise up out of the earth. I
desire, therefore, to be taught, if possible, how I may attain such a state and condition as
that no creature may be able to touch me to hurt me; and how my mind, being purged
from sensible objects and things, may be prepared for the entrance and habitation of the
Divine Wisdom in me.
Master
Thou desirest that I would teach thee how thou art to attain it; and I will direct thee to
our Master, from whom I have been taught it, that thou mayest learn it thyself from him,
who alone teacheth the heart. Hear thou him. Wouldst thou arrive at this; wouldst thou
remain untouched by sensibles; wouldst thou behold light in the very Light of God, and
see all things thereby; then consider the words of Christ, who is the Light and who is the
Truth. O consider now his words, who said, Without me ye can do nothing (John xix. 5)
and defer not to apply thyself unto him, who is the strength of thy salvation, and
the power of thy life; and with whom thou canst do all things, by the faith which he
waketh in thee. But unless thou wholly givest thyself up to the life of our Lord Jesus
Christ, and resignest thy Will wholly to him, and desirest nothing and willest nothing
without him, thou shalt never come to such a rest as no creature can disturb. Think
what thou pleasest, and be never so much delighted in the activity of thine own reason,
thou shalt find that, in thine own power and without such a total surrender to God and
to the life of God, thou canst never arrive at such a rest as this, or the true Quiet of the
Soul, wherein no creature can molest thee, or even so much as touch thee. Which when
thou shalt, with Grace, have attained to, then with thy Body thou art in the World, as in
the properties of outward Nature; and, with thy Reason, under the Cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ; but with thy Will thou walkest in heaven, and art at the end from whence
all creatures are proceeded forth, and to which they return again. And then thou canst in
this End, which is the same with the Beginning, behold all things outwardly
with reason and liberally with the mind; and so mayest thou rule in all things and over
all things, with Christ; unto whom all power is given both in heaven and on earth.
Disciple
O, Master, the creatures which live in me do withhold me, so that I cannot so wholly
yield and give up myself as I willingly would. What am I to do in this case?
Master
Let not this trouble thee. Doth thy Will go forth from the creatures? Then the creatures
are forsaken in thee. They are in the world, and thy body, which is in the world, is with
the creatures. But spiritually thou walkest with God, and conversest in heaven; being in
thy mind redeemed from earth, and separated from creatures, to live the life of God. And
if thy Will thus leaveth the creatures, and goeth forth from them, even as the spirit goeth
 22

forth from the body at death; then are the creatures dead in it, and do live only in the
body in the world. Since if thy Will do not bring itself into them, they cannot bring
themselves into it, neither can they by any means touch the soul. And hence St Paul
saith, Our conversation is in heaven; and also, Ye are the temple of God, and the Spirit of
God dwelleth in you. So, then, true Christians are the very temples of the Holy Ghost, who
dwelleth in them; that is, the Holy Ghost dwelleth in the Will, and the Creature dwelleth
in the Body.
Disciple
If now the Holy Spirit doth dwell in the Will of the Mind, how ought I to keep myself so
that he depart not from me again.
Master
Mark, my son, the words of our Lord Jesus Christ: If ye abide in my words, then my words
abide in you. If thou abidest with thy Will in the Words of Christ; then his Word and
Spirit abideth in thee, and all shall be done for thee that thou canst ask of him. But if thy
Will goeth into the creature, then thou hast broken off thyself thereby from him. And
then thou canst not any otherwise keep thyself but by abiding continually with that
resigned humility, and by entering into a constant course of penitence, wherein thou
wilt always be grieved at thine own creaturely Will, and that creatures do still live in
thee, that is, in thy bodily appetite. If thou dost thus, thou standest in a daily dying from
the creatures, and in a daily ascending into heaven in thy will, which will is also the Will
of thy Heavenly Father.
Disciple
O my loving Master, pray teach me how I may come to such a constant course of holy
penitence, and to such a daily dying from all creaturely objects, for how can I abide
continually in repentance?
Master
When thou leavest that which loveth thee, and lovest that which hateth thee; then thou
mayest continually abide in repentance.
Disciple
What is it that I must thus leave?
Master
All things that love and entertain thee, because thy Will loves and entertains them. All
things that please and feed thee, because thy Will feeds and cherishes them. All
creatures in flesh and blood; in a word, all visibles and sensibles, by which either the
imaginative or sensitive appetite in men are delighted and refreshed. These the Will of
thy mind, or thy supreme part, must leave and forsake, and must even account them all
its enemies. This is the leaving of what loves thee. And the loving of what hates thee is
the embracing the reproach of the World. Thou must learn then to love the Cross of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and for his sake to be pleased with the reproach of the World which
hates thee and derides thee; and let this be thy daily exercise of penitence to be
crucified to the World, and the World to thee. And so thou shalt have continual cause to
hate thyself in the Creature, and to seek the eternal rest which is in Christ. To which rest
thou having thus attained, thy Will may therein safely rest and repose itself, according
 23

as thy Lord Christ hath said: In me ye may have rest, but in the World ye shall have
anxiety: In me ye may have peace, but in the World ye shall have tribulation.
Disciple
How now shall I be able to subsist in this anxiety and tribulation arising from the World
so as not to lose the eternal peace, or not to enter into this rest? And how may I recover
myself in such a temptation as this is, by not sinking under the World, but rising above it
by a life which is truly heavenly and supersensual?
Master
If thou dost once every hour throw thyself by faith beyond all creatures, beyond and
above all sensual perception and apprehension, yea, above discourse and reasoning into
the abyssal mercy of God, into the sufferings of our Lord, and into the fellowship of his
interceding, and yieldest thyself fully and absolutely thereinto; then thou shalt receive
power from above to rule over Death and the Devil and to subdue Hell and the World
unto thee. And then thou mayest subsist in all temptations, and be the brighter for them.
Disciple
Blessed is the man that arriveth to such a state as this. But, alas, poor man that I am,
how is this possible as to me? And what, O my Master, would become of me, if I should
ever attain with my mind to that where no creature is? Must I not cry out, I am undone?
Master
Son, why art thou so dispirited? Be of good heart still; for thou mayest certainly yet
attain to it. Do but believe, and all things are made possible to thee. If it were that thy
Will, O thou of so little courage, could break off itself for an hour, or even but for a half
hour, from all creatures, and plunge itself into that where no creature is, or can be;
presently it would be penetrated and clothed upon with the supreme splendour of the
Divine Glory, would taste in itself the most sweet Love of Jesus, the sweetness whereof
no tongue can express, and would find in itself the unspeakable words of our Lord
concerning his great mercy. Thy spirit would then feel in itself the Cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ to be very pleasing to it; and would thereupon love the Cross more than the
honours and goods of the World.
Disciple
This for the Soul would be exceeding well indeed. But what would then become of the
Body, seeing that it must of necessity live in Creature?
Master
The body would by this means be put into the imitation of our Lord Jesus Christ and of
his body. It would stand in the communion of that most blessed Body, which is the true
temple of the Deity, and in the participation of all its gracious effects, virtues, and
influences. It would live in the Creature, not of choice, but only as it is made subject to
vanity, and in the World, as it is placed therein by the ordination of the Creator, for its
cultivation and higher advancement, and as groaning to be delivered out of it in God's
time and manner, for its perfection and resuscitation in eternal liberty and glory, like
unto the glorified body of our Lord and his risen Saints.
Disciple
 24

But the body, being in its present constitution, so made subject to vanity, and living in a
vain image and creaturely shadows according to the life of the undergraduated
creatures or brutes, whose breath goeth downward to the earth; I am still very much
afraid thereof, lest it should continue to depress the mind which is lifted up to God, by
hanging as a dead weight thereto; and go on to abuse and perplex the same, as formerly,
with dreams and trifles, by letting in the objects from without, in order to draw me
down into the World and the hurry thereof; whereas I would fain maintain by
conversation in Heaven even while I am living in the World. What, therefore, must I do
with this body, that I may be able to keep up so desirable a conversation, and not to be
under subjection to it any longer?
Master
There is no other way for thee that I know but to present the body whereof thou
complainest (which is the beast to be sacrificed) a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable
unto God. And this shall be thy rational service whereby this thy body will be put, as
thou desirest, into the imitation of Jesus Christ, who said his Kingdom was not of this
World. Be not thou then conformed to it, but be transformed by the renewing of thy
mind; which renewed mind is to have dominion over the body, that so thou mayest
prove, both in body and mind, what is the perfect Will of God, and accordingly perform
the same with and by his grace operating in thee. Whereupon the body, or the animal
life would, being thus offered up, begin to die, both from without and from within.
From without, that is, from the vanity and evil customs and fashions of the World; it
would be an utter change to all the parts thereof, and to all the pageantry, pride,
ambition, and haughtiness therein. From within it would die as to all the lusts and
appetites of the flesh, and would get a mind and will wholly new for its government and
management; being now made subject to the Spirit, which would continually be directed
to God. And thus thy very body is become the temple of God and of his Spirit, in
imitation of thy Lord's Body.
Disciple
But the World would hate it and despise it for so doing, seeing it must hereby contradict
the World, and must live and act quite otherwise than the World doth. This is most
certain. And how can this be taken?
Master
It would not take that as any harm done to it, but would rather rejoice that it is become
worthy to be like unto the image of our Lord Jesus Christ, being transformed from that
of the World. And it would be most willing to bear that cross after our Lord, merely that
our Lord might bestow upon it the influence of his sweet and precious love.
Disciple
I do not doubt but in some this may be even so. Nevertheless, for my own part, I am in a
strait between two, not feeling yet enough of that blessed influence upon me. Oh how
willingly should my body bear that, could this be safely depended upon by me!
Wherefore pardon me, loving Sir, in this one thing, if my impatience doth still further
demand, "What would become of it, if the anger of God from within, and the wicked
World also from without, should at once assault it, as the same really happened to our
Lord Christ?"
Master
 25

Be that unto it, even as unto our Lord Christ, when he was reproached, reviled and
crucified by the World, and when the anger of God so fiercely assaulted him for our
sake. Now what did he under this most terrible assault both from without and within?
Why; he commended his soul into the hands of his Father, and so departed from the
anguish of this World into the eternal joy. Do thou likewise, and his death shall be thy
life.
Disciple
Be it unto me as unto the Lord Christ, and unto my body as unto his, which into his
hands I have commended, and for the sake of his name do offer up, according to his
revealed Will. Nevertheless I am desirous to know what would become of my body in its
pressing forth from the anguish of this miserable World into the power of the Heavenly
Kingdom.
Master
It would get forth from the reproach and contradiction of the World by a conformity to
the passion of Jesus Christ; and from the sorrows and pains in the flesh, which are only
the effects of some sensible impression of things without, by a quiet introversion of the
spirit and secret communion with the Deity manifesting itself for that end. It would
penetrate into itself; it would sink into the great love of God; it would be sustained and
refreshed by the most sweet name Jesus, and it would see and find within itself a new
world springing forth, as through the anger of God, into the joy and love eternal. And
then should a man wrap his soul in this, even in the great Love of God, and clothe
himself therewith as with a garment; and should account thence all things alike; because
in the Creature he finds nothing that can give him, without God, the least satisfaction,
and because also nothing of harm can touch him more while he remains in this Love. For
this Love is indeed stronger than all things, and makes a man invulnerable both from
within and without, by taking out the sting and poison of the Creature, and destroying
the power of death. And whether the body be in hell or on earth, all is alike to him; for
whether it be there or here, his mind is still in the greatest Love of God; which is no less
than to say that he is in heaven.
Disciple
But how would a man's body be maintained in the World; or how would he be able to
maintain those who are his, if he should by such a conversation incur the displeasure of
all the World?
Master
Such a man gets greater favours than the world is able to bestow upon him: he hath God
for his friend; he hath all the Angels for his friends. In all dangers and necessities these
protect and relieve him; so that he need fear no manner of evil; no creature can hurt
him. God is his helper, and that is sufficient. Also God is his blessing in everything. And
though sometimes it may seem as if God would not bless him, yet is this but for a trial to
him, and for the attraction of the Divine Love, to the end he may more fervently pray to
God, and commit all his ways unto him.
Disciple
He loses, however, by this all his good friends, and there will be none to help him in his
necessity.
 26

Master
Nay, but he gets the hearts of all his good friends into his possession, and loses none but
his enemies, who before loved his vanity and wickedness.
Disciple
How is it that he can get his good friends into his possession?
Master
He gets the very hearts and souls of all those that belong to our Lord Jesus to be his
brethren, and the members of his own very life. For all the children of God are but one in
Christ, which one is Christ in All. And therefore he gets them all to be his fellow-
members in the Body of Christ, whence they have all the same heavenly goods in
common and all live in one and the same Love of God, as the branches of a tree in one
and the same root, and spring all from one and the same source of life in them. So that
he can have no want of spiritual friends and relations, who are all rooted with him
together in the Love which is from above, who are all of the same blood and kindred in
Christ Jesus; and who are cherished all by the same quickening sap and spirit diffusing
itself through them universally from the one true Vine, which is the tree of life and love.
These are friends worth having; and though here they may be unknown to him, will
abide his friends beyond doubt to all eternity. But neither can he want even outward
natural friends, as our Lord Christ, when on earth, did not want such also. For though,
indeed, the High-Priests and Potentates of the World could not have a love to him,
because they belonged not to him, neither stood in any kind of relation to him, as being
not of this world, yet those loved him who were capable of his love, and receptive of his
words. So, in like manner, those who love truth and righteousness will love that man,
and will associate themselves unto him, yea, though they may perhaps be outwardly at
some distance or seeming disagreement, from the situation of their worldly affairs, or
from other reasons, yet in their hearts they cannot but cleave to him. For though they be
not actually incorporated into one body with him, yet they cannot resist being of one
mind with him, and being united in affliction, for the great regard they bear to the truth,
which shines forth in his words and in his life. By this they are made either his declared
or his secret friends; and he doth so get their hearts that they will be delighted above all
things in his company, for the sake thereof, and will court his friendship and will come
unto him by stealth, if openly they dare not, for the benefit of his conversation and
advice; even as Nicodemus did to Christ, who came to him by night, and in his heart
loved Jesus for the truth's sake, though outwardly he feared the World. And thus thou
shalt have many friends that are not known to thee; and some known to thee, who may
not appear so before the World.
Disciple
Nevertheless it is very grievous to be generally despised of the World, and to be
trampled upon by men as the very offscouring thereof.
Master
That which now seems so hard and heavy to thee, thou wilt yet hereafter be most in
love with.
Disciple
How can it ever be that I should love that which hates me?
 27

Master
Though thou lovest the Earthly Wisdom now, yet when thou shalt be clothed upon with
the Heavenly Wisdom, then wilt thou see that all the wisdom of the World is folly; and
wilt see also that the World hates not so much thee, as thine enemy, which is this mortal
life. And when thou thyself shalt come to hate the will thereof, by means of a habitual
separation of thy mind from the World, then thou also wilt begin to love that despising
of the mortal life, and the reproach of the World for Christ's sake. And so shalt thou be
able to stand under every temptation, and to hold out to the end by the means hereof in
a course of life above the World and above sense.
In this course thou wilt hate thyself, and thou wilt also love thyself, I say, love thyself,
and that even more than thou ever didst yet.
Disciple
But how can these two subsist together, that a person should
both love and hate himself?
Master
In loving thyself, thou lovest not thyself as thine own, but thou lovest the divine ground
in thee, as given thee from the Love of God. By which, and in which, thou lovest the
Divine Wisdom, the Divine Goodness, the Divine Beauty; thou lovest also by it God's
works of wonders; and in this ground thou lovest also thy brethren. But in hating thyself,
thou hatest only that which is thine own, and wherein the Evil sticks close to thee. And
this thou dost, that so thou mayest wholly destroy that which thou callest thine, as when
thou sayest I or MYSELF do this, or do that. All which is wrong and a downright mistake
in thee; for nothing canst thou properly call thine but the evil Self, neither canst thou do
anything of thyself that is to be accounted of. This Self therefore thou must labour
wholly to destroy in thee, that so thou mayest become a ground wholly divine. There
can be no selfishness in love; they are opposite to each other. Love, that is, Divine Love
(of which only we are now discoursing), hates all Egoity, hates all that which we call I, or
IHOOD, hates all such restrictions and confinements, even all that springs from a
contracted spirit, or this evil Self-hood, because it is an hateful and deadly thing. And it is
impossible that these two should stand together, or subsist in one person; the one
driving out the other by a necessity of nature. For Love possesses Heaven, and dwells in
itself, which is dwelling in Heaven; but that which is called I, this vile self-hood,
possesses the world and worldly things; and dwells also in itself, which is dwelling in
Hell, because this is the very root of Hell itself. And, therefore, as Heaven rules the
World, and as Eternity rules Time, even so ought Love to rule the natural temporal Life;
for no other method is there, neither can there be of attaining to that Life which is
supernatural and eternal, and which thou so much desirest to be led into.
Disciple
Loving Master, I am well content that this Love should rule in me over the natural Life,
that so I may attain to that which is supernatural and supersensual; but, pray tell me
now, why must Love and Hatred, friend and foe, thus be together? Would not Love alone
be better? Wherefore, I say, are Love and Trouble thus joined?
Master
If Love dwelt not in Trouble, it could have nothing to love. But its substance which
it loves, namely the poor soul, being in trouble and pain, it hath thence cause to love this
 28

its own substance and to deliver it from pain, that so itself may by it be again beloved.
Neither could any one know what Love is, if there were no Hatred; or what friendship is,
if there were no foe to contend with. Or, in one word, if Love had not something which it
might love, and manifest the virtue and power of love in working out deliverance to the
Beloved from all pain and trouble.
Disciple
Pray what is the virtue, the power, the height, and the greatness of Love?
Master
The virtue of Love is nothing and all, or that Nothing visible out of which All Things
proceed. Its power is through All Things; its height is as high as God; its greatness is as
great as God. Its virtue is the principle of all principles; its power supports the Heavens
and upholds the Earth; its height is higher than the highest Heavens, and its greatness is
even greater than the very Manifestation of the Godhead in the glorious light of the
Divine Essence, as being infinitely capable of greater and greater manifestations in all
Eternity. What can I say more? Love is higher than the Highest. Love is greater than the
Greatest. Yea, it is in a certain sense greater than God; while yet, in the highest sense of
all, God is Love, and Love is God. Love being the highest principle is the virtue of all
virtues; from whence they flow forth. Love, being the greatest Majesty, is the Power of
all Powers, from whence they severally operate. And it is the Holy Magical Root, a
Ghostly Power from whence all the wonders of God have been wrought by the hands of
his elect servants, in all their generations successively, Whosoever finds it, finds Nothing
and All Things.
Disciple
Dear Master, pray tell me how I may understand this?
Master
First, then, in that I said, its virtue is Nothing, or that Nothing which is the beginning of
All Things, thou must understand it thus; When thou art gone forth wholly from the
Creature, and from that which is visible; and art become Nothing to all that is Nature
and Creature, then thou art in that Eternal One, which is God himself; and then thou
shalt perceive and feel within thee the highest virtue of Love. But in that I said, Its
power is through All Things, this is that which thou perceivest and findest in thy own
soul and body experimentally, whenever this great Love is enkindled within thee; seeing
that it will burn more than the fire can do, as it did in the Prophets of old, and
afterwards in the Apostles, when God conversed with them bodily, and when his Spirit
descended upon them in the Oratory of Zion. Thou shalt then see also in all the works of
God, how Love hath poured forth itself into all things, and penetrated all things, and is
the most inward and most outward ground in all things. Inwardly in the virtue and
power of every thing, and outwardly in the figure and form thereof.
And in that I said, Its height is as high as God; thou mayest understand this in thyself:
forasmuch as it brings thee to be as high as God himself is, by being united to God; as
may be seen by our beloved Lord Jesus Christ in our humanity. Which humanity Love
hath brought up into the highest throne, above all angelical principalities and powers,
into the very Power of the Deity itself.
But in that I also said, Its greatness is as great as God, thou art hereby to understand that
there is a certain greatness and latitude of heart in Love, which is unexpressible, for it
 29

enlarges the soul as wide as the whole Creation of God. And this shall be truly
experienced by thee, beyond all words, when the throne of Love shall be set up in thy
heart.
Moreover in that I said, Its virtue is the principle of all principles; hereby it is given thee
to understand that Love is the principal cause of all created beings, both spiritual and
corporeal, by virtue whereof the second causes do move and act occasionally, according
to certain Eternal Laws, from the beginning implanted in the very constitution of things
thus originated. This virtue which is in Love is the very life and energy of all the
principles of Nature, superior and inferior. It reaches to all Worlds, and to all manner of
beings in them contained, they being the workmanship of Divine Love, and is the first
mover and first moveable, both in heaven above, and in the earth beneath, and in the
water under the earth. And hence there is given to it the name of the Lucid
Aleph or Alpha; by which is expressed the beginning of the Alphabet of Nature, and of the
Book of Creation and Providence or the Divine Archetypal Book, in which is the Light of
Wisdom and the source of all lights and forms.
And in that I said, Its power supports the Heavens; by this thou wilt come to understand
that as the Heavens, visible and invisible, are originated from this great principle, so are
they likewise necessarily sustained by it; and that therefore if this should be but never
so little withdrawn, all the lights, glories, beauties and forms of the heavenly worlds
would presently sink into darkness and chaos.
And whereas I further said that it upholds the Earth; this will appear to thee no less
evident than the former, and thou shalt perceive it in thyself by daily and hourly
experience; forasmuch as the Earth without it, even thy own earth also (that is, thy
body) would certainly be without form and void. By the power thereof the Earth hath
been thus long upheld, notwithstanding a foreign usurped power introduced by the folly
of sin. And should this but once fail or recede there could be no longer either vegetation
or animation upon it; yea, the very pillars of it being overthrown quite, and the band of
union, which is that of attraction or magnetism, called the centripetal power, being
broken and dissolved, all must thence run into the utmost disorder, and falling away as
into shivers, would be dispersed as loose dust before the wind.
But in that I said, Its height is higher than the highest Heavens; this thou mayest also
understand within thyself. For shouldest thou ascend in spirit through all the orders of
Angels and heavenly Powers, yet the Power of Love still is undeniably superior to them
all. And as the Throne of God, who sits upon the Heaven of Heavens, is higher than the
highest of them, even so must Love also be, which fills them all, and comprehends them
all.
And whereas I said of the Greatness of Love that it is greater than the very Manifestation
of Godhead in the light of the Divine Essence; that is also true. For Love enters even into
that where the Godhead is not manifested in this glorious light, and where God may be
said not to dwell. And entering thereinto, Love begins to manifest to the soul the light of
the Godhead; and thus is the darkness broken through, and the wonders of the new
creation successively manifested.
Thus shalt thou be brought to understand really and fundamentally what is the virtue
and the power of Love, and what the height and greatness thereof is; how that is indeed
the virtue of all virtues, though it be invisible, and as a Nothing in appearance, inasmuch
as it is the worker of all things, and a powerful vital energy passing through all virtues
and powers natural and supernatural, and the power of all powers, nothing being able to
 30

let or obstruct the Omnipotence of Love, or to resist its invincible penetrating might,
which passes through the whole Creation of God, inspecting and governing all things.
And in that I said; It is higher than the highest and greater than the greatest; thou mayst
hereby perceive as in a glimpse the supreme height and greatness of Omnipotent
Love which infinitely transcends all that human sense and reason can reach to. The
highest Archangel and greatest Powers of Heaven, are in comparison of it, but as dwarfs.
Nothing can be conceived higher and greater in God himself, by the very highest and
greatest of his creatures. There is such infinity in it as comprehends and surpasses all
the divine attributes.
But in that it was also said, Its greatness is greater than God; that likewise is very true in
the sense wherein it was spoken. For Love can there enter where God dwelleth not,
since the most high God dwelleth not in darkness, but in the Light, the hellish darkness
being put under his feet. Thus, for instance, when our beloved Lord Jesus Christ was in
Hell, Hell was not the mansion of God or of Christ, Hell sees not God, neither was it with
God, nor could it be at all with him; Hell stood in the darkness and anxiety of Nature,
and no light of the Divine Majesty did there enter; God was not there, for he is not in the
darkness nor in the anguish; but Love was there; and Love destroyed Death and
conquered Hell. So also when thou art in anguish or trouble, which is hell within, God is
not the anguish or trouble, neither is he in the anguish or trouble; but his Love is there,
and brings thee out of the anguish and trouble into God, leading thee into the light and
joy of his presence. When God hides himself in thee, Love is still there, and makes him
manifest in thee. Such is the inconceivable greatness and largeness of Love, which will
hence appear to thee as great as God above Nature and greater than God in Nature, or as
considered in his manifestative glory.
Lastly, whereas I said, Whosoever finds it finds Nothing and all Things; that is also certain
and true. But how finds he Nothing? Why, I will tell thee how. He that findeth it findeth a
supernatural, supersensual Abyss, which hath no ground or Byss to stand on, and where
there is no place to dwell in; and he findeth also nothing is like unto it and therefore it
may fitly be compared to Nothing, for it is deeper than any Thing, and is as Nothing with
respect to All Things, forasmuch as it is not comprehensible by any of them. And
because it is Nothing respectively, it is therefore free from All Things, and is that only
Good, which a man cannot express or utter what it is, there being Nothing to which it
may be compared, to express it by.
But in that I lastly said; Whosoever finds it finds All Things; there is nothing can be more
true than this assertion. It hath been the Beginning of All Things; and it ruleth All
Things. It is also the End of All Things; and will thence comprehend All Things within its
circle. All Things are from it, and in it, and by it. If thou findest it thou comest into that
ground from whence All Things are proceeded, and wherein they subsist; and thou art
in it a King over all the works of God.
Here the Disciple was exceedingly ravished with what his Master had so wonderfully
and surprisingly declared, and returned his most hearty and humble thanks for that
light which he had been an instrument of conveying to him. But being desirous to hear
further concerning these high matters, and to know somewhat more particularly, he
requested him that he would give him leave to wait on him the next day again; and that
he would then be pleased to show him how and where he might find this which was so
much beyond all price and value, and whereabout the seat and abode of it might be in
human nature, with the entire process of the discovery and bringing it forth to light.
 31

The Master said to him: This then we will discourse about at our next conference, as
God shall reveal the same to us by his Spirit, which is a searcher of All Things. And if
thou dost remember well what I answered thee in the beginning, thou shalt soon come
thereby to understand that hidden mystical wisdom of God; which none of the wise men
of the world know; and where the Mine thereof is to be found in thee shall be given thee
from above to discern. Be silent therefore in thy spirit, and watch unto prayer; that,
when we meet again to-morrow in the love of Christ, thy mind may be disposed for
finding that noble Pearl, which to the World appears Nothing, but to the Children of
Wisdom is All Things.
 32

Dialogue II
The Disciple being very earnest to be more fully instructed how he might arrive at the
supersensual life, and how, having found all things, he might come to be a king over all
God's works, came again to his Master next morning, having watched the night in
prayer, that he might be disposed to receive and apprehend the instructions that should
be given him by a divine irradiation upon his mind. And the Disciple, after a little space
of silence, bowed himself, and thus brake forth.
Disciple
O my Master, my Master! I have now endeavoured to recollect my soul in the presence
of God, and to cast myself into the Deep where no creature doth nor can dwell; that I
might hear the voice of my Lord speaking in me, and be initiated into that high life
whereof I heard yesterday such great and amazing things. But alas I neither hear nor see
as I should. There is still such a partition wall in me which beats back the heavenly
sounds in their passage, and obstructs the entrance of that light whereby alone divine
objects are discoverable, as till this be gone I can have but small hopes, yea, even none
at all, of arriving at those glorious attainments which you pressed me to, or of entering
into that where no creature dwells, and which you call Nothing and All Things. Wherefore
be so kind as to inform me what is required on my part, that this partition which
hinders may be broken or removed.
Master
This partition is the creaturely will in thee, and this can be broken by nothing but the
Grace of self-denial, which is the entrance into the true following of Christ, and totally
removed by nothing but a perfect conformity with the Divine Will.
Disciple
But how shall I be able to break this creaturely will which is in me, and is at enmity with
the Divine Will? Or what shall I do to follow Christ in so difficult a path, and not to faint
in a continual course of self-denial or resignation to the Will of God.
Master
This is not to be done by thyself; but by the light and grace of God received into thy soul,
which will, if thou gainsay not, break the darkness that is in thee, and melt down thy old
will, which worketh in the darkness and corruption of Nature, and bring it into the
obedience of Christ, whereby the partition of the creaturely self is removed from
betwixt God and thee.
Disciple
I know that I cannot do it of myself. But I would fain learn how I must receive this Divine
Light and Grace into me, which is to do it for me, if I hinder it not my own self. What is
then required of me in order to admit this Breaker of the partition, and to promote the
attainment of the ends of such admission?
Master
 33

There is nothing more required of thee at first than not to resist this grace, which is
manifested in thee; and nothing in the whole process of the work, but to be obedient
and passive to the Light of God shining through the darkness of thy creaturely being,
which comprehendeth it not, as reaching no higher than the Light of Nature.
Disciple
But is it not for me to attain, if I can, both the Light of God, and the Light of the outward
Nature too, and to make use of them both for the ordering of my life wisely and
prudently?
Master
It is right so to do. And it is indeed a treasure above all earthly treasures to be possessed
of the Light of God and Nature operating in their spheres, and to have both the Eye of
Time and Eternity at once open together, and yet not to interfere with each other.
Disciple
This is a great satisfaction to me to hear; having been very uneasy about it for some
time. But how this can be without interfering with each other, there is the difficulty.
Wherefore fain would I know, if it were lawful, the boundaries of the one and the other,
and how both the Divine and the Natural Light may in their several spheres respectively
act and operate for the Manifestation of the Mysteries of God and Nature, and for the
conduct of my outward and inward life?
Master
That each of these may be preserved distinctly in their several spheres, without
confounding Things Heavenly and Things Earthly, or breaking the golden Chain of
Wisdom, it will be necessary, my child, in the first place to wait for and attend the
Supernatural and Divine Light, as this superior Light appointed to govern the day, rising
in the true East, which is the Centre of Paradise, and the great Light breaking forth as
out of the darkness within thee, through a pillar of fire and thunder-clouds, and thereby
reflecting also upon the inferior Light of Nature a sort of image of itself, whereby only it
can be kept in its due subordination; that which is below being made subservient to that
which is above, and that which is without to that which is within. Thus there will be no
danger of interfering, but all will go right, and everything abide in its proper sphere.
Disciple
Therefore without Reason or the Light of Nature be sanctified in my soul, and
illuminated by this superior Light, as from the central East of the holy Light-World, by
the Eternal and Intellectual Sun, I perceive there will always be some confusion, and I
shall never be able to manage aright either what concerneth Time or Eternity. But I
must always be at a loss, or break the links of Wisdom's Chain.
Master
It is even so as thou hast said. All is confusion if thou hast no more than the dim Light of
Nature, or unsanctified and unregenerated Reason to guide thee by, and if only the Eye
of Time be opened in thee, which cannot pierce beyond its own limit. Wherefore seek
the Fountain of Light, waiting in the deep ground of thy soul for the rising there of the
Sun of Righteousness, whereby the Light of Nature in thee, with the properties thereof,
will be made to shine seven times brighter than ordinary. For it shall receive the stamp,
 34

image and impression of the Supersensual and Supernatural, so that the sensual and
rational life will hence be brought into the most perfect order and harmony.
Disciple
But how am I to wait for the rising of this glorious Sun, and how am I to seek in the
Centre this Fountain of Light, which may enlighten me throughout and bring my
properties into perfect harmony? I am in Nature, as I said before, and which way shall I
pass through Nature, and the light thereof, so that I may come into the Supernatural and
Supersensual ground whence this true light, which is the Light of Minds, doth arise; and
this without the destruction of my nature, or quenching the Light of it, which is my
reason?
Master
Cease but from thine own activity, steadfastly fixing thine Eye upon one Point, and with
a strong purpose relying upon the promised Grace of God in Christ, to bring thee out of
thy Darkness into his marvellous Light. For this end gather in all thy thoughts, and by
faith press into the Centre, laying hold upon the Word of God, which is infallible, and
which hath called thee. Be thou then obedient to this call, and be silent before the Lord,
sitting alone with him in thy inmost and most hidden cell, thy mind being centrally
united in itself, and attending his Will in the patience of hope. So shall thy Light break
forth as the Morning, and after the redness thereof is passed, the Sun himself which
thou waitest for, shall arise unto thee, and under his most healing wings thou shalt
greatly rejoice; ascending and descending in his bright and salutiferous beams. Behold
this is the true Supersensual Ground of Life.
Disciple
I believe it indeed to be even so. But will not this destroy Nature? Will not the Light of
Nature in me be extinguished by this greater Light? Or, must not the outward Life hence
perish, with the earthly body which I carry?
Master
By no means at all. It is true, the evil Nature will be destroyed by it; but by the
destruction thereof you can be no loser, but very much a gainer. The Eternal Bond of
Nature is the same afterward as before; and the properties are the same. So that Nature
hereby is only advanced and meliorated, and the Light thereof, or human Reason, by
being kept within its due bounds, and regulated by a superior Light, is only made useful.
Disciple
Pray, therefore, let me know how this inferior Light ought to be used by me; how it is to
be kept within its due bounds; and after what manner the superior Light doth regulate it
and ennoble it.
Master
Know then, my beloved son, that if thou wilt keep the Light of Nature within its own
proper bounds, and make use thereof in just subordination to the Light of God, thou
must consider that there are in thy soul two Wills, an inferior Will, which is for driving
thee to Things without and below; and a superior Will, which is for drawing thee to
Things within and above. These two Wills are now set together, as it were back to back,
and in a direct contrariety to each other; but in the beginning it was not so. For this
contraposition of the soul in these two is no more than the effect of the Fallen State;
 35

since before that they were placed one under the other, that is, the superior Will above,
as the Lord, and the inferior below, as the subject. And thus it ought to have continued.
Thou must also further consider that, answering to these two Wills, there are likewise
two Eyes in the soul, whereby they are severally directed, forasmuch as these Eyes are
not united in one single view, but look quite contrary ways at once. They are in a like
manner set one against the other, without a common medium to join them. And hence,
so long as this double-sightedness doth remain, it is impossible there should be any
agreement in the determination of this or that Will. This is very plain. And it showeth
the necessity that this malady, arising from the disunion of the rays of vision, be some
way remedied and redressed, in order to a true discernment in the mind. Both these
eyes therefore must be made to unite by a concentration of rays, there being nothing
more dangerous than for the mind to abide thus in the Duplicity and not to seek to
arrive at the Unity. Thou perceivest, I know, that thou hast two Wills in thee, one set
against the other, the superior and the inferior, and that thou hast always two Eyes
within, one against the other, whereof the one Eye may be called the Right Eye, and the
other the Left Eye. Thou perceivest too, doubtless, that it is according to the Right Eye
that the wheel of the superior Will is moved; and that it is according to the motion of the
Left Eye that the contrary wheel in the lower is turned about.
Disciple
I perceive this, Sir, to be very true; and this it is which causeth a continual combat in me,
and createth in me greater anxiety than I am able to express. Nor am I unacquainted
with the disease of my own soul, which you have so clearly declared. Alas! I perceive
and lament this malady, which so miserably disturbeth my sight; whence I feel such
irregular and convulsive motions drawing me on this side and that side. The Spirit seeth
not as the Flesh seeth, neither doth, nor can, the Flesh see as the Spirit seeth. Hence the
Spirit willeth against the Flesh; and the Flesh willeth against the Spirit in me. This hath
been my hard case. And how shall it be remedied? O how may I arrive at the Unity of
Will, and how come into the Unity of Vision?
Master
Mark now what I say. The Right Eye looketh forward in thee into Eternity. The Left Eye
looketh backward in thee into Time. If thou now sufferest thyself to be always looking
into Nature, and the Things of Time, it will be impossible for thee ever to arrive at the
Unity, which thou wishest for. Remember this, and be upon thy watch. Give not thy
mind leave to enter into nor to fill itself with that which is without thee; neither look
thou backward upon thyself; but quit thyself, and look forward to Christ. Let not thy Left
Eye deceive thee by making continually one representation after another, and stirring
up thereby an earnest longing in the self-propriety; but let thy right eye command this
left, and attract it to thee. Yea it is better to pluck it quite out and to cast it from thee,
than to suffer it to proceed forth without restraint into Nature, and to follow its own
lusts. However there is for this no necessity, since both eyes may become very useful, if
ordered aright, and both the Divine and Natural Light may in the soul subsist together,
and be of mutual service to each other. But never shalt thou arrive at the Unity of Vision
or Uniformity of Will, but by entering fully into the Will of our Saviour Christ, and
therein bringing the Eye of Time into the Eye of Eternity, and then descending by means
of these united through the Light of God into the Light of Nature.
Disciple
 36

So then if I can but enter into the Will of my Lord, and abide therein, I am safe, and may
both attain to the Light of God in the Spirit of my soul and see with the Eye of God, that
is, the Eye of Eternity in the Eternal Ground of my Will; and may also at the same time
enjoy the Light of this World nevertheless, not degrading but adorning the Light of
Nature, and beholding as with the Eye of Eternity things Eternal, so with the Eye of
Nature, things Natural, and both contemplating therein the Wonders of God, and
sustaining also thereby the life of my outward vehicle or body.
Master
It is very right. Thou hast well understood, and thou desirest now to enter into the Will
of God, and to abide therein as in the Supersensual Ground of Light and Life, where thou
mayst in his Light behold both Time and Eternity, and bring all the wonders created of
God for the exterior into the interior life, and so eternally rejoice in them to the glory of
Christ; the partition of thy Creaturely Will being broken down and the Eye of thy Spirit
simplified in and through the Eye of God manifesting itself in the Centre of thy Life. Let
this be so now, for it is God's Will.
Disciple
But it is very hard to be always looking forwards into Eternity, and consequently to
attain to the single eye, and simplicity of Divine Vision. The entrance of a soul naked into
the Will of God, shutting out all imaginations and desires, and breaking down the strong
partition which you mention, is indeed somehow very terrible and shocking to human
nature in its present state. O what shall I do, that I may reach this which I so much long
for?
Master
My Son, let not the Eye of Nature with the Will of the Wonders depart from that Eye
which is introverted into the Divine Liberty, and into the Eternal Light of the Holy
Majesty. But let it draw to thee by union with that heavenly internal Eye those wonders
which are externally wrought out and manifested in visible Nature. For while thou art in
the world, and hast an honest employment, thou art certainly by the Order of
Providence obliged to labour in it, and to finish the work given thee, according to thy
best ability, without repining in the least; seeking out and manifesting for God's glory
the Wonders of Nature and Art. Since let the Nature be what it will it is all the Work and
Art of God. And let the Art also be what it will, it is still God's Work and his Art, rather
than any art or cunning of man. And all both in Art and Nature serveth but abundantly
to manifest the wonderful Works of God, that he for all and in all may be glorified. Yea,
all serveth, if thou knowest rightly how to use them, only to recollect thee more
inwards, and to draw thy Spirit into that majestic Light wherein the original patterns
and forms of things visible are to be seen. Keep, therefore, in the Centre, and stir not
from the Presence of God revealed within thy Soul; let the world and the devil make
never so great a noise and bustle to draw thee out, mind them not; they cannot hurt
thee. It is permitted to the Eye of thy Reason to seek food, and to thy hands by their
labour to get food for the terrestrial body. But then this Eye ought not with its desire to
enter into the food prepared, which would be covetousness; but must in resignation
simply bring it before the Eye of God in thy Spirit, and then thou must seek to place it
close to this very Eye, without letting it go. Mark this lesson well.
Let the hands or the head be at labour, thy Heart ought nevertheless to rest in God. God
is a Spirit; dwell in the Spirit; work in the Spirit; pray in the Spirit; and do every thing in
 37

the Spirit; for remember thou also art a Spirit, and thereby created in the Image of God.
Therefore see thou attract not in thy desire Matter unto thee, but as much as possible
abstract thyself from all Matter whatever; and so, standing in the Centre, present thyself
as a naked Spirit before God, in simplicity and purity; and be sure thy Spirit draw in
nothing but Spirit.
Thou wilt yet be greatly enticed to draw Matter, and to gather that which the World
calls substance; thereby to have somewhat visible to trust to. But by no means consent
to the Tempter, nor yield to the lustings of thy Flesh against the Spirit. For in so doing
thou wilt infallibly obscure the Divine Light in thee; thy Spirit will stick in the dark
Covetous Root, and from the fiery Source of thy soul will it blaze out in pride and anger;
thy Will shall be chained in Earthliness, and shall sink through the Anguish into
Darkness and Materiality; and never shalt thou be able to reach the still Liberty, or to
stand before the Majesty of God. It will be all darkness to thee, as much Matter as is
drawn in by the Desire of thy Will. It will darken God's Majesty to thee, and will close the
seeing Eye, by hiding from thee the light of his beloved countenance. This the Serpent
longeth to do, but in vain, except thou permittest thy Imagination, upon his suggestion,
to receive in the alluring Matter; else he can never get in. Behold then, if thou desirest to
see God's Light in thy Soul, and be divinely illuminated and conducted, this is the short
way that thou art to take; not to let the Eye of thy Spirit enter into Matter, or fill itself
with any Thing whatever, either in Heaven or Earth, but to let it enter by a naked
faith into the Light of the Majesty; and so receive by pure love the Light of God, and
attract the Divine Power into itself, putting on the Divine Body, and growing up in it to
the full maturity of the Humanity of Christ.
Disciple
As I said before, so I say again, this is very hard. I conceive indeed well enough that my
Spirit ought to be free from the contagion of Matter, and wholly empty, that it may
admit into it the Spirit of God. Also, that this Spirit will not enter, but where the Will
entereth into Nothing, and resigneth itself up in the nakedness of faith, and in the purity
of love, to its conduct, feeding magically upon the Word of God, and clothing itself
thereby with a Divine Substantiality. But, alas, how hard it is for the Will to sink into
nothing, to attract nothing, to imagine nothing.
Master
Let it be granted that it is so. Is it not surely worth thy while, and all that thou canst ever
do?
Disciple
It is so, I must needs confess.
Master
But perhaps it may not be so hard as at first it appeareth to be; make but the trial and be
in earnest. What is there required of thee but to stand still and see the salvation of thy
God? And couldst thou desire anything less? Where is the hardship in this? Thou hast
nothing to care for, nothing to desire in this life, nothing to imagine or attract. Thou
needest only cast thy care upon God, who careth for thee, and leave him to dispose of
thee according to his good will and pleasure, even as if thou hadst no will at all in thee.
For he knoweth what is best; and if thou canst but trust him, he will most certainly do
better for thee, than if thou wert left to thine own choice.
 38

Disciple
This I most firmly believe.
Master
If thou believest, then go and do accordingly. All is in the Will, as I have shown thee.
When the Will imagineth after Somewhat, then entereth it into that somewhat, and this
somewhat taketh the Will into itself, and overcloudeth it, so as it can have no Light, but
must dwell in Darkness, unless it return back out of that somewhat into Nothing. But
when the Will imagineth or hasteth after nothing, then it entereth into Nothing, where it
receiveth the Will of God into itself, and so dwelleth in Light, and worketh all its works
in it.
Disciple
I am now satisfied that the main cause of any one's spiritual blindness, is his letting his
Will into Somewhat, or into that which he hath wrought, of what nature soever it be,
good or evil, and his setting his heart or affections upon the work of his own hand or
brain, and that when the earthly body perisheth, then the Soul must be imprisoned in
that very thing which it shall have received and let in; and if the Light of God be not in it,
being deprived of the Light of this World, it cannot but be found in a dark prison.
Master
This is a very precious Gate of Knowledge; I am glad thou takest it into such
consideration. The understanding of the whole Scripture is contained in it; and all that
hath been written from the beginning of the World to this day may be found therein, by
him that having entered with his Will into Nothing, hath there found All Things, by
finding God, from Whom, and to Whom, and in Whom are All Things. By this means thou
shalt come to hear and see God; and after this earthly life is ended to see with the Eye of
Eternity all the Wonders of God and of Nature, and more particularly those which shall
be wrought by thee in the flesh, or all that the Spirit of God shall have given thee to
labour out for thyself and thy neighbour, or all that the Eye of Reason enlightened from
above, may at any time have manifested to thee. Delay not therefore to enter in by this
Gate, which if thou seest in the Spirit, as some highly favoured souls have seen it, thou
seest in the Supersensual Ground all that God is and can do; thou seest also therewith, as
one hath said who was taken thereinto, through Heaven, Hell, and Earth; and through the
Essence of all Essences. Whosoever findeth it, hath found all that he can desire. Here is
the Virtue and Power of the Love of God displayed. Here is the Height and Depth, here is
the Breadth and Length thereof manifested, as ever the capacity of thy soul can contain.
By this thou shalt come into that Ground out of which all Things are originated, and in
which they subsist; and in it thou shalt reign over all God's Works, as a Prince of God.
Disciple
Pray tell me, dear Master, where dwelleth it in Man?
Master
Where Man dwelleth not: there hath it its seat in Man.
Disciple
Where is that in a Man, when Man dwelleth not in himself?
Master
 39

It is the resigned Ground of a Soul to which nothing cleaveth.

Disciple
Where is the Ground in any Soul, to which there will nothing stick? Or where is that
which abideth and dwelleth not in something?
Master
It is the Centre of Rest and Motion in the resigned Will of a truly contrite Spirit, which is
Crucified to the World. This Centre of the Will is impenetrable consequently to the
World, the Devil, and Hell. Nothing in all the World can enter into it, or adhere to it,
because the Will is dead with Christ unto the World, but quickened with him in the
Centre thereof, after his blessed Image. Here it is where Man dwelleth not, and where no
Self abideth or can abide.
Disciple
O where is this naked Ground of the Soul void of all Self? And how shall I come at the
hidden Centre, where God dwelleth, and not Man? Tell me plainly, loving Sir, where it is,
and how it is to be found of me, and entered into?
Master
There where the Soul hath slain its own Will, and willeth no more any Thing as from
itself, but only as God willeth, and as his Spirit moveth upon the Soul shall this appear.
Where the Love of Self is banished there dwelleth the Love of God. For so much of the
Soul's own Will as is dead unto itself even so much room hath the Will of God, which is
his Love, taken up in that Soul. The reason whereof is this: Where its own Will did
before sit, there is now nothing; and where nothing is, there it is that the Love of God
worketh alone.
Disciple
But how shall I comprehend it?
Master
If thou goest about to comprehend it, then it will fly away from thee; but if thou dost
surrender thyself wholly up to it, then it will abide with thee, and become the Life of thy
Life, and be natural to thee.
Disciple
And how can this be without dying, or the whole destruction of my Will?
Master
Upon this entire surrender and yielding up of thy Will, the Love of God in thee becometh
the Life of thy Nature; it killeth thee not, but quickeneth thee, who art now dead to
thyself in thine own Will, according to its proper Life, even the Life of God. And then
thou livest, yet not to thy own Will, but thou livest to its Will; for as much as thy Will is
henceforth become its Will. So then it is no longer thy Will, but the Will of God; no
longer the Love of thyself, but the Love of God, which moveth and operateth in thee; and
then, thou being thus comprehended in it, thou art dead indeed as to thyself, but art
alive unto God. So being dead thou livest, or rather God liveth in thee by his Spirit; and
his Love is made to thee Life from the Dead. Never couldst thou with all thy seeking
have apprehended it, but it hath apprehended thee. Much less couldst thou have
 40

comprehended it, but it hath comprehended thee; and so the Treasure of Treasures is
found.
Disciple
How is it that so few Souls do find it, when yet all would be glad enough to have it?
Master
They all seek it in somewhat, and so they find it not. For where there is Somewhat for
the Soul to adhere to, there the Soul findeth that somewhat only, and taketh up its rest
therein, until she seeth that it is to be found in Nothing, and goeth out of the Somewhat
into Nothing, even into that Nothing out of which all Things may be made. The Soul here
saith "I have nothing, for I am utterly stripped and naked of every Thing; I can do
nothing, for I have no manner of power, but am as water poured out; I am nothing, for all
that I am is no more than an Image of Being, and only God is to me I AM; and so, sitting
down in my own Nothingness, I give glory to the Eternal Being, and will nothing of
myself, that so God may will all in me, being unto me my God and All Things." Herein
now it is that so very few find this most precious treasure in the Soul, though every one
would so fain have it; and might also have it, were it not for this Somewhat in every one
that letteth.
Disciple
But if the Love should proffer itself to a Soul, could not that Soul find it, nor lay hold of it,
without going for it into Nothing?
Master
No verily. Men seek and find not, because they seek it not in the naked Ground where it
lieth; but in something or other where it never will be, nor can be. They seek it in
their own Will, and they find it not. They seek it in their Self-Desire, and they meet not
with it. They look for it in an Image, or in an Opinion, or in Affection, or a
natural Devotion and Fervour, and they lose the substance by thus hunting after a
shadow. They search for it in something sensible or imaginary, in somewhat which they
may have a more peculiar natural inclination for, and adhesion to; and so they miss of
what they seek, for want of diving into the Supernatural and Supersensual Ground,
where the Treasure is hid. Now, should the Love graciously condescend to proffer itself
to such as these, and even to present itself evidently before the Eye of their Spirit, yet
could it find no place at all in them, neither could it be held by them, or remain with
them.
Disciple
Why not, if the Love should be willing and ready to offer itself, and to stay with them?
Master
Because the Imaginariness which is in their own Will hath set itself up in the place
thereof. And so this Imaginariness would have the Love in it, but the Love fleeth away,
for it is its prison. The Love may offer itself; but it cannot abide where the Self-
Desire attracteth or imagineth. That Will which attracteth Nothing, and to which
Nothing adhereth, is only capable of receiving it; for it dwelleth only in Nothing, as I
said, and therefore they find it not.
Disciple
 41

If it dwell only in Nothing, what is now the office of it in Nothing?

Master
The office of the Love here is to penetrate incessantly into Something; and if it penetrate
into, and find a place in Something which is standing still and at rest, then its business is
to take possession thereof. And when it hath there taken possession, then it rejoiceth
therein with its flaming Love-fire, even as the sun doth in the visible world. And then the
office of it is without intermission to enkindle a fire in this Something which may burn it
up; and then with the flames thereof exceedingly to enflame itself, and raise the heat of
the Love-fire by it, even seven degrees higher.
Disciple
O, loving Master, how shall I understand this?
Master
If it but once kindle a fire within thee, my son, thou shalt then certainly feel how it
consumeth all that which it toucheth, thou shalt feel it in the burning up thyself, and
swiftly devouring all Egoity or that which thou callest I and Me, as standing in a separate
Root, and divided from the Deity, the Fountain of thy Being. And when this enkindling is
made in thee, then the Love doth so exceedingly rejoice in thy fire, as thou wouldest not
for all the world be out of it; yea, wouldst rather suffer thyself to be killed, than to enter
into thy something again. This fire must now grow hotter and hotter, till it shall have
perfected its office with respect to thee. Its flame also will be so very great that it will
never leave thee, though it should even cost thee thy temporal life, but it would go with
thee with its sweet loving fire into death; and if thou wentest also into Hell, it would
break Hell in pieces also for thy sake. Nothing is more certain than this, for it is stronger
than Death and Hell.
Disciple
Enough, my dearest Master, I can no longer endure that any Thing should divert me
from it. But how shall I find the nearest way to it?
Master
Where the way is hardest, there go thou; and what the World casteth away, that take
thou up. What the World doth, that do thou not; but in all things walk thou contrary to
the World. So thou comest the nearest way to that which thou art seeking.
Disciple
If I should in all things walk contrary to other people, I must needs be in a very unquiet
and sad state, and the World would not fail to account me for a madman.
Master
I bid thee not, Child, to do harm to anyone, thereby to create to thyself any misery or
unquietness. This is not what I mean by walking contrary in everything to the World.
But because the World, as the World, loveth all deceit and vanity, and walketh in false
and treacherous ways, thence, if thou hast a mind to act a clean contrary part to the
ways thereof, without any exception or reserve whatsoever, walk thou only in the right
way, which is called the Way of Light, as that of the World is properly the Way of
Darkness. For the right way, even the Path of Light, is contrary to all the ways of the
World.
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But whereas thou art afraid of creating to thyself hereby trouble and inquietude, that
indeed will be so according to the flesh. In the world thou must have trouble, and thy
flesh will not fail to be unquiet, and to give thee occasion of continual repentance.
Nevertheless in this very anxiety of soul arising from the world or the flesh, the Love
doth most willingly enkindle itself, and its cheering and conquering fire is but made to
blaze forth with greater strength for the destruction of that evil. And whereas thou dost
also say, that the World will for this esteem thee mad; it is true the World will be apt
enough to censure thee for a madman in walking contrary to it, and thou art not to be
surprised if the children thereof laugh at thee, calling thee silly Fool. For the Way to the
Love of God is Folly to the World, but is Wisdom to the Children of God. Hence,
whenever the World perceiveth this holy Fire of Love in God's Children, it concludeth
immediately that they are turned fools, and are beside themselves. But to the Children
of God that which is despised of the World is the greatest Treasure, yea, so great a
Treasure is it as no life can express, nor tongue so much as name what this enflaming,
all-conquering Love of God is. It is brighter than the Sun; it is sweeter than anything that
is called sweet; it is stronger than all strength; it is more nutrimental than food; more
cheering to the heart than wine, and more pleasant than all the joy and pleasantness of
this world. Whosoever obtaineth it is richer than any Monarch on earth; and he who
getteth it, is nobler than any Emperor can be, and more potent and absolute than all
Power and Authority.
 43

Dialogue III
BETWEEN JUNIUS, A SCHOLAR, AND THEOPHORUS, HIS MASTER, CONCERNING
HEAVEN AND HELL
The Scholar asked his Master "Whither goeth the Soul when the Body dieth?"
His Master answered him: There is no necessity for it to go any whither.
How not, said the inquisitive Junius, must not the Soul leave the body at death and go
either to Heaven or Hell?
It needs no going forth, replied the venerable Theophorus. Only the outward Mortal Life
with the body shall separate themselves from the Soul. The Soul hath Heaven and Hell
within itself before, according as it is written. The Kingdom of God cometh not with
observation, neither shall they say Lo here! or Lo there! For behold the Kingdom of God is
within you. And which soever of the two, that is, either Heaven or Hell, is manifested in
it, in that the Soul standeth.
Here Junius said to his Master: This is hard to understand. Doth it not enter into
Heaven or Hell, as a man entereth into a house; or as one goeth through a hole or
casement into an unknown place; so goeth it not into another world?
The Master spoke and said: No, there is verily no such kind of entering in; forasmuch as
Heaven and Hell are every where, being universally co-extended.
How is that possible? said the Scholar. What, can Heaven and Hell be here present,
where we are now sitting? And if one of them might, can you ever make me believe that
ever both should be here together?
Then spoke the Master in this manner: I have said that Heaven is everywhere present
and it is true. For God is in Heaven; and God is everywhere. I have said also that Hell
must be in like manner everywhere. For the Wicked One, who is the Devil, is in Hell, and
the whole World, as the Apostle hath taught us, lyeth in the Wicked One, or the Evil One;
which is as much as to say, not only that the Devil is in the World, but that the World is
in the Devil; and if in the Devil, then in Hell too, because he is there. So Hell therefore is
everywhere, as well as Heaven; which is the thing that was to be proved.
The Scholar, startled hereat, said: Pray make me to understand this.
To whom the Master: Understand then what Heaven is. It is but the turning in of the Will
to the Love of God. Wheresoever thou findest God manifesting himself in Love, there
thou findest Heaven, without travelling for it so much as one foot. And by this
understand also what Hell is and where it is. I say unto thee it is but the turning in of the
Will into the wrath of God. Wheresoever the Anger of God doth more or less manifest
itself, there certainly is more or less of Hell, in whatsoever place it be. So that it is but
the turning in of thy will either into his Love, or into his Anger; and thou art accordingly
either in Heaven or in Hell. Mark it well. And this now cometh to pass in this present life,
whereof St Paul speaking saith, Our conversation is in Heaven. And the Lord Christ saith
also, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me, and I give them the
Eternal Life, and none shall pluck them out of my hand. Observe, he saith not, I will
give them, after this life is ended, but I give them, that is, now in the time of this life. And
 44

what else is this gift of Christ to his followers, but an Eternity of Life, which for certain
can be no where but in Heaven. Yea, moreover, none shall be able to pluck them out of
Heaven, because it is he who holdeth them there, and they are in his hand which nothing
can resist. All therefore doth consist in the turning in, or entering of the Will into
Heaven, by hearing the voice of Christ, and both knowing him, and following him. And so
on the contrary it is also. Understandest thou this?
His Scholar said to him: I think, in part, I do. But how cometh this entering of the Will
into Heaven to pass?
The Master answered him: This then will I endeavour to satisfy thee in; but thou must
be very attentive to what I shall say unto thee. Know then, my son, that when the
Ground of the Will yieldeth itself up to God, then it sinketh out of its own Self, and out of
and beyond all ground and place, that is or can be imagined, into a certain unknown
Deep, where God only is manifest, and where he only worketh and willeth. And then it
becometh nothing to itself, as to its own working and willing, and so God worketh and
willeth in it. And God dwells in this designed Will, by which the Soul is sanctified, and so
fitted to come into Divine Rest. Now, in this case, when the body breaketh, the Soul is so
thoroughly penetrated all over with the Divine Light, even as a glowing hot iron is by
the fire, by which being penetrated throughout, it loseth its darkness, and becomes
bright and shining. Now this is the hand of Christ, where God's Love thoroughly inhabits
the Soul, and is in it a shining Light, and a new glorious Life. And then the Soul is in
Heaven, and is a Temple of the Holy Ghost, and is itself the very Heaven of God, wherein
he dwelleth. Lo, this is the entering of the Will into Heaven; and thus it cometh to pass.
Be pleased, Sir, to proceed, said the Scholar, and let me know how it fareth on the other
side.
The Master said: The godly Soul, you see, is in the hand of Christ, that is in Heaven, as he
himself hath told us, and in what manner this cometh to be so, you have also heard. But
the ungodly Soul is not willing in this life-time to come into the Divine Resignation of its
Will, or to enter into the Will of God; but goeth on still in its own lust and desire, in
vanity and falsehood, and so entereth into the Will of the Devil. It receiveth, thereupon,
into itself nothing but wickedness; nothing but lying, pride, covetousness, envy and
wrath; and thereunto it giveth up its Will and whole Desire. This is the Vanity of the
Will; and this same Vanity or vain shadow must also in like manner be manifested in the
Soul, which hath yielded itself up also to be its servant; and must work therein even as
the Love of God worketh in the regenerated Will; and penetrate it all over, as fire doth
iron.
And it is not possible for this Soul to come into the Rest of God, because God's Anger is
manifested in it, and worketh in it. Now when a body is parted from the Soul, then
beginneth the Eternal Melancholy and Despair, because it now findeth that it is become
altogether Vanity, even a Vanity most vexatious to itself, and a distracting Fury, and a
self-tormenting Abomination. Now it perceiveth itself disappointed of every Thing
which it had before fancied, and blind, and naked, and wounded, and hungry, and
thirsty, without the least prospect of ever being relieved, or obtaining so much as one
drop of the water of Eternal Life. And it feeleth itself to be its own vile executioner and
tormentor; and is affrighted at its own ugly dark form, and fain would flee from itself if
it could, but it cannot, being fast bound with the chains of the Dark Nature, whereinto it
had sunk itself when in the flesh. And so, not having learned or accustomed itself to sink
down into the Divine Grace, and being also strongly possessed with the Idea of God, as
 45

an angry and jealous God, the poor Soul is both afraid and ashamed to bring its Will into
God, by which deliverance might possibly come to it. The Soul is afraid to do it, as
fearing to be consumed by so doing, under the apprehension of the Deity as a mere
devouring Fire. The Soul is also ashamed to do it, as being confounded at its own
nakedness and monstrosity, and therefore would, if it were possible, hide itself from the
Majesty of God, and cover its abominable form from his most holy eye, though by
casting itself still deeper into the Darkness. Therefore it will not enter into God, nay,
it cannot enter with its false Will; yea, though it should strive to enter, yet can it not
enter into the Love, because of the Will which hath reigned in it. For such a Soul is
thereby captivated in the Wrath, yea, is itself but mere Wrath, having by its false Desire,
which it had awakened in itself, comprehended and shut itself up therewith, and so
transformed itself into the nature and property thereof.
And since also the Light of God doth not shine in it, nor the Love of God enclose it, the
Soul is moreover a great Darkness, and is withal an anxious Fire-source, carrying about
an Hell in itself, and not being able to discern the least glimpse of the Light of God, or to
feel the least spark of his Love. Thus it dwelleth in itself as in Hell, and needeth no
entering into Hell at all, or being carried thither, for in what place soever it may be, so
long as it is in itself, it is in the Hell. And though it should travel far and cast itself many
hundred thousand leagues from its present place, to be out of Hell; yet still would it
remain in its hellish source and darkness.
If this be so, how then cometh it, said the Scholar to Theophorus, that an Heavenly Soul
doth not in the time of this life perfectly perceive the Heavenly Light and Joy, and the
Soul which is without God in the World, doth not also here feel Hell, as well as
hereafter? Why should they not both be perceived and felt as well in this life as in the
next, seeing that both of them are in Man, and one of them as you have shewed, worketh
in every man?
To whom Theophorus presently returned this answer: The Kingdom of Heaven is in the
Saints operative and manifestative of itself by Faith. They who carry God within them,
and live by his Spirit, find the Kingdom of God in their Faith, and they feel the Love of
God in their Faith, by which the Will hath given up itself unto God, and is made Godlike.
All is transacted within them by Faith, which is to them the evidence of the Eternal
Invisibles, and a great manifestation in their Spirit of this Divine Kingdom, which is
within them. But their natural life is nevertheless encompassed with flesh and blood;
and this standing in a contrariety thereto, and being placed through the Fall in the
principle of God's Anger, and environed about with the World, which by no means can
be reconciled to Faith, these faithful Souls cannot but be very much exposed to attacks
from this World, wherein they are sojourners; neither can they be insensible of their
being thus encompassed about with flesh and blood, and with the World's vain lust,
which ceaseth not continually to penetrate the outward mortal life, and to tempt them
manifold ways, even as it did Christ. Whence the World on one side and the Devil on the
other, not without the curse of God's Anger in flesh and blood, do thoroughly sift and
penetrate the Life, whereby it cometh to pass that the Soul is often in anxiety when
these three are all set upon it together, and when Hell thus assaulteth the Life, and
would manifest itself in the Soul. But the Soul hereupon sinketh down into the hope of
the Grace of God, and standeth like a beautiful Rose in the midst of Thorns, until the
Kingdom of this World shall fall from it in the death of the body. And then the Soul first
becometh truly manifest in the Love of God, and of his Kingdom, which is the Kingdom
of Love; having henceforth nothing more to hinder it. But during this life she must walk
 46

with Christ in this world, and then Christ delivereth her out of her own Hell, by
penetrating her with his Love throughout, and standing by her in Hell, and even
changing her Hell into Heaven.
But in that thou sayest, Why do not the Souls which are without God feel Hell in this
World? I answer; They bear it about with them in their wicked consciences, but they
know it not; because the World hath put out their eyes, and its deadly cup hath cast
them likewise into a sleep, a most fatal sleep. Notwithstanding which it must be owned
that the Wicked do frequently feel Hell within them during the time of this mortal life,
though they may not apprehend that it is Hell, because of the earthly vanity which
cleaveth to them from without, and the sensible pleasures and amusements wherewith
they are intoxicated. And moreover it is to be noted that the outward Life in every such
one hath yet the Light of the outward Nature, which ruleth in this Life, and so the Pain of
Hell cannot, so long as that hath the rule, be revealed. But when the body dyeth or
breaketh away, so as the Soul cannot any longer enjoy such temporal pleasure and
delight, nor the Light of this outward World, which is wholly thereupon extinguished as
to it, then the Soul stands in an eternal hunger and thirst after such vanities as it was
here in love withal, but yet can reach nothing but that false Will, which it had impressed
in itself while in the body; and wherein it had abounded to its great loss. And now
whereas it had too much of its Will in this life, and yet was not contented therewith, it
hath, after the separation by death, as little of it; which createth in it an everlasting
thirst after that which it can henceforth never obtain more, and causeth it to be in a
perpetual anxious lust after Vanity, according to its former impression, and in a
continual rage of hunger after those sorts of wickedness and lewdness whereinto it was
immersed, being in the flesh. Fain would it do more evil still, but that it hath not either
wherein or wherewith to effect the same, and therefore it doth perform this only in
itself. All is not literally transacted, as if it were outward; and so the ungodly is
tormented by those Furies which are in his own mind, and begotten upon himself by
himself. For he is verily become his own Devil and Tormentor; and that by which he
sinned here, when the Shadow of this World is passed away, abideth still with him in the
impression, and is made his prison and his Hell. But this hellish hunger and thirst
cannot be fully manifested in the Soul, till the Body, which ministered to the Soul that it
lusted after, and with which the Soul was so bewitched, as to doat thereupon, and
pursue all its cravings, be stripped off from it.
I perceive then, said Junius to his Master, that the Soul, having played the wanton with
the Body in all voluptuousness, and served the lusts thereof during this life, retaineth
still the very same inclinations and affections which it had before, then when it hath no
opportunity or capacity to satisfy them longer; and that when this cannot be, there is
then Hell opened in that Soul, which had been shut up in it before by means of the
outward Life in the Body, and of the Light of this World. Do I rightly understand?
Theophorus said: It is very rightly understood by you. Go on.
On the other hand (said he) I clearly perceive by what I have heard, that Heaven cannot
but be in a loving Soul which is possessed of God, and hath subdued thereby the Body to
the obedience of the Spirit in all things, and perfectly immersed itself into the Will and
Love of God. And when the Body dyeth, and the Soul is hence redeemed from the Earth,
it is now evident to me that the Life of God, which was hidden in it, will display itself
gloriously, and Heaven consequently be then manifested. But, notwithstanding, if there
be not a local Heaven besides and a local Hell, I am still at a loss where to place no small
 47

part of the Creation, if not the greatest. For where must all the intellectual inhabitants of
it abide?
In their own Principle, answered the Master, whether it be of Light or of Darkness. For
every created intellectual Being remaineth in its deeds and essences, in its wonders and
properties, in its life and image; and therein it beholdeth and feeleth God, as who is
everywhere, whether it be in the Love or in the Wrath.
If it be in the Love of God, then beholdeth it God accordingly, and feeleth him as he is,
Love. But if it hath captivated itself in the Wrath of God, then it cannot behold God
otherwise than in the Wrathful Nature, nor perceive him otherwise than as an incensed
and vindictive Spirit. All places are alike to it, if it be in God's Love; and, if it be not there,
every place is Hell alike. What Place can bound a Thought? Or what needeth any
understanding Spirit to be kept here or there, in order to its happiness or misery?
Verily, wheresoever it is, it is in the Abyssal World, where there is neither end nor limit.
And whither, I pray, should it go? since though it should go a thousand miles off, or a
thousand times ten thousand miles, and this ten thousand times over beyond the
bounds of the Universe, and into the imagining spaces above the stars, yet it were then
still in the very same point from whence it went out. For God is the Place of Spirit, if it
may be lawful to attribute to him such a name to the which Body hath a relation. And in
God there is no limit; both near and far off is here all one; and be it in his Love, or be it in
his Anger, the abyssal Will of the Spirit is altogether unconfined. It is swift as thought,
passing through all things; it is magical, and nothing corporeal or from without can let
it; it dwelleth in its wonders, and they are its house.
Thus it is with every Intellectual, whether of the Order of Angels or of human Souls, and
you need not fear but there will be room enough for them all, be they ever so many; and
such also as shall best suit them, even according to their election and determination,
and which may thence very well be called the "own place" of each.
At which said the Scholar, I remember, indeed, that it is written concerning the great
traitor, that he went after death to his own place.
The Master said: The same is true of every Soul, when it departeth this mortal life. And it
is true in like manner of every Angel and Spirit whatsoever, which is necessarily
determined by its own choice. As God is everywhere, so also the Angels are everywhere;
but each one in its own Principle, and in its own Property or (if you had rather) in
its own Place. The same Essence of God, which is as a Place to Spirits, is confessed to be
everywhere, but the appropriation or participation hereof is different to everyone,
according as each hath attracted it magically in the earnestness of Will. The same Divine
Essence which is with the Angels of God above, is with us also below. And the same
Divine Nature which is with us is likewise with them; but after different manners and in
different degrees communicated and participated.
And what I have said here of the Divine, is no less to be considered by you in the
participation of the Diabolical Essence and Nature, which is the Power of Darkness, as to
the manifold modes, degrees, and appropriations thereof in the false Will. In this World
there is strife between them, but when this World hath reached in anyone the Limit,
then the Principle catcheth that which is its own, and so the Soul receiveth companions
accordingly, that is, either Angels or Devils.
To whom the Scholar again: Heaven and Hell then being in us at strife in the time of this
life, and God himself being also thus near to us, where can Angels and Devils dwell?
 48

And the Master answered him thus: Where thou dost not dwell as to thy Self-hood and
to thine own Will, there the holy Angels dwell with thee, and every where all over
round about thee. Remember this well. On the contrary, where thou dwellest as to
thyself, or in Self-seeking, and Self-will, there to be sure the Devils will be with thee, and
will take up their abode with thee, and dwell all over thee, and round about thee
everywhere, which God in his mercy prevent.
I understand not this, said the Scholar, so perfectly well as I could wish. Be pleased to
make it a little more plain to me.
The Master then spake: Mark well what I am going to say. Where the Will of God in
anything willeth, there is God manifested. And in this very manifestation of God the
Angels do dwell. But where God in any Creature willeth not with the Will of that
Creature, there God is not manifested to it, neither can he be; but dwelleth in himself,
without the co-operation thereof, and subjection to him in humility. There God is an
unmanifested God to the Creature. So the Angels dwell not with such an one; for
wherever they dwell, there is the Glory of God; and they make his Glory. What then
dwelleth in such a Creature as this? God dwelleth not therein; the Angels dwell not
therein; God willeth not therein; the Angels also will not therein. The case is evidently
this; in that Soul or Creature its own will is without God's Will; and there the Devil
dwelleth; and with him all that is without God, and without Christ. This is the truth; lay
it to heart.
The Scholar said: It is possible I may ask several impertinent questions; but I beseech
you, good Sir, to have patience with me, and to pity my ignorance, if I ask what may
appear to you perhaps ridiculous, or may not be at all fit for me to expect an answer to.
For I have several questions still to propound to you; but I am ashamed of my own
thoughts in this matter.
The Master said: Be plain with me, and propose whatever is upon your mind; yea, be not
ashamed even to appear ridiculous, so that by querying you may but become wiser.
The Scholar thanked his Master for this liberty and said: How far then are Heaven and
Hell asunder?
To whom he answered thus: As far as Day and Night; or as far as Something and
Nothing. They are in one another and yet they are at the greater distance one from the
other. Nay, the one of them is as nothing to the other; and yet notwithstanding they
cause joy and grief to one another. Heaven is throughout the whole World, and it is also
without the World over all, even everywhere that is, or that can be even so much as
imagined. It filleth all, it is within all, it is without all, it encompasseth all; without
division, without place; working by a Divine Manifestation, and flowing forth
universally, but not going in the least out of itself. For only in itself it worketh and is
revealed, being one and undivided in all. It appeareth only through the Manifestation of
God; and never but in itself only. And in that Being which cometh into it, or in that
wherein it is manifested; there also it is that God is manifested. Because Heaven is
nothing else but a Manifestation or Revelation of the Eternal One, wherein all the
working and willing is in quiet love.
So in like manner Hell also is through the whole World, and dwelleth and worketh but in
itself, and in that wherein the Foundation of Hell is manifested, namely, in Self-hood and
in the False Will. The visible World hath both in it; and there is no place but Heaven and
Hell may be found or revealed in it. Now Man as to his temporal life is only of the visible
 49

World; and therefore during the time of his life he seeth not the spiritual World. For the
Outward World with its substance is a cover to the Spiritual World, even as the Body is
to the Soul. But when the outward Man dyeth, then the Spiritual World is manifested to
the Soul, which hath now its covering taken away. And it is manifested either in the
Eternal Light with the holy Angels, or in the Eternal Darkness, with the Devils.
The Scholar further queried: What is an Angel, or an human Soul, that they can be thus
manifested either in God's Love or Anger, either in Light or Darkness?
To whom Theophorus answered: They come from one and the self-same Original. They
are little branches of the Divine Wisdom, of the Divine Will, sprung from the Divine
Word, and made objects of the Divine Love. They are out of the Ground of Eternity;
whence Light and Darkness do spring; Darkness which consisteth in the receiving of
Self-Desire; and Light which consisteth in willing the same thing with God. For the
conformity of the Will with God's Will is Heaven; and wheresoever there is this willing
with God, there the Love of God is undoubtedly in the working, and his Light will not fail
to manifest itself. But in the Self-attraction of the Soul's desire, or in the reception of Self
into the willing of any Spirit, angelical or human, the Will of God worketh with difficulty,
and is to that Soul and Spirit nought but Darkness; out of which, notwithstanding, the
Light may be manifested. And this Darkness is the Hell of that Spirit wherein it is.
For Heaven and Hell are nought else but a Manifestation of the Divine Will either in Light
or Darkness, according to the Properties of the Spiritual World.
Scholar
What then is the Body of Man?
Master
It is the visible World, an Image and Quintessence, or Compound of all that the World is;
and the visible World is a manifestation of the inward spiritual World, come out of the
Eternal Light, and out of the Eternal Darkness, out of the spiritual compaction or
connection; and it is also an Image or Figure of Eternity, whereby Eternity hath made
itself visible; where Self-Will and resigned Will, viz., Evil and Good, work one with the
other.
Such a substance is the outward Man. For God created Man out of the outward World,
and breathed into him the inward spiritual World for a Soul and an intelligent Life, and
therefore in the things of the outward World, Man can receive and work Evil and Good.
Scholar
What shall be after this World, when all things perish and come to an end?
Master
The material substance only ceaseth; viz., the four Elements, the Sun, Moon and Stars.
And then the inward world will be wholly visible and manifest. But whatsoever hath
been wrought by the Will or Spirit of Man in this World's time, whether evil or good
shall there separate itself in a spiritual matter, either into the Eternal Light or into the
Eternal Darkness. For that which is born from each Will penetrateth and passeth again
into that which is like itself. And there the Darkness is called Hell, and is an eternal
forgetting of all Good, and the Light is called the Kingdom of God, and is an eternal joy in
and to the Saints, who continually glorify and praise God, for having delivered them
from the torment of evil.
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The last Judgment is a kindling of the Fire both of God's Love and Anger, in which the
matter of every substance perisheth, and each Fire shall attract into itself its own, that
is, the substance which is like itself. Thus God's Fire of Love will draw into itself what is
wrought in the Anger of God in Darkness, and consume the false substance; and then
there will remain only the painful, aching Will in its own proper nature, image, and
figure.
Scholar
With what matter and form shall the human Body rise?
Master
It is sown a natural gross and elementary Body; yet in this gross Body there is a subtle
Power and Virtue. As in the Earth also there is a subtle good Virtue, which is like the
Sun, and is one and the same with the Sun, which also did in the beginning of time
spring and proceed out of the Divine Power and Virtue, whence all the good Virtue of
the Body is likewise derived. This good Virtue of the mortal Body shall come again and
live for ever in a kind of transparent crystalline material property, in spiritual flesh and
blood; as shall return also the good Virtue of the Earth, for the Earth, likewise shall
become crystalline, and the Divine Light shine in everything that hath a being, essence,
or substance. And as the gross Earth shall perish and never return, so also the gross
flesh of Man shall perish and not live for ever. But all Things must appear before the
Judgment, and in the Judgment be separated by the Fire; yea, both the Earth, and also
the ashes of the human Body. For when God shall once move the spiritual World, every
Spirit shall attract its spiritual substance to itself. A good Spirit and Soul shall draw to
itself its own substance, and an evil one its evil substance.
Scholar
Shall we not rise again with our visible bodies, and live in them for ever?
Master
When the visible world perisheth, then all that hath come out of it, and hath been
external, shall perish with it. There shall remain of the World only the crystalline Nature
and Form, and of Man also only the spiritual Earth, for Man shall be then wholly like the
crystalline World, which as yet is hidden.
Scholar
Shall all then have eternal joy and glorification alike?
Master
St Paul saith: In the Resurrection one shall differ from another in glory, as do the Sun,
Moon and Stars. Therefore know that the Blessed shall indeed all enjoy the divine
working in and upon them, but their virtue and illumination or glory shall be very
different according as they have endured in this life with different measures and
degrees of power and virtue in their painful workings.
Scholar
How shall all people and nations be brought to judgment?
Master
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The Eternal Word of God, out of which every creaturely spiritual Life hath proceeded
will move itself at that hour, according to Love and Anger, in every Life which is come
out of the Eternity, and will draw every Creature before the Judgment of Christ, to be
sentenced by this motion of the Word. The Life will then be manifested in all its works,
and every Soul shall see and feel its judgment and sentence in itself. For the Judgment is,
indeed, immediately at the departure of the Body manifested in and to every Soul. And
the last Judgment is but a return of the spiritual Body, and a separation of the World,
when the Evil shall be separated from the Good, in the substance of the World, and of
the human Body, and everything enter into its eternal receptacle. And thus it is a
manifestation of the Mystery of God in every substance and life.
Scholar
How will the sentence be pronounced?
Master
Here consider the words of Christ. He will say to those on his right hand; Come, ye
blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the
world. For I was hungry and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty and ye gave me drink; I was a
stranger and ye took me in; naked and ye clothed me. I was sick and ye visited me, in
prison and ye came unto me.
Then shall they answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee hungry, thirsty, a stranger,
naked, sick, or in prison, and ministered thus unto thee?
Then shall the King answer and say unto them; Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of
the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
And unto the wicked on his left hand he will say; Depart from me, ye Cursed, into
everlasting fire, prepared for the Devil and his Angels. For I was hungry, thirsty, a stranger,
naked, and in prison, and ye ministered not unto me.
And they shall also answer him and say; When did we see thee thus and ministered not
unto thee?
And he will answer them, Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have not done it unto one
of the least of these, ye did it not to me.
And these shall depart into everlasting punishment, but the Righteous into Life Eternal.
Scholar
Loving Master, pray tell me why Christ saith, What you have done to the least of these you
have done to me; and what you have not done to them, neither have you done it to me?
And how doth a Man this so, as that he doth it to Christ himself?
Master
Christ dwelleth really and essentially in the faith of those that wholly yield up
themselves to him, and giveth them his Flesh for food and his Blood for drink; and thus
possesseth the ground of their faith, according to the interior or inward Man. And a
Christian is called a Branch of the Vine Christ, and a Christian, because Christ dwelleth
spiritually in him; therefore, whatsoever good any shall do to such a Christian in his
bodily necessities, it is done to Christ himself, who dwelleth in him. For such a Christian
is not his own, but is wholly resigned to Christ, and become his peculiar possession, and
consequently the good deed is done to Christ himself. Therefore also whosoever shall
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withhold their help from such a needy Christian, and forbear to serve him in his
necessity, they thrust Christ away from themselves, and despise him in his members.
When a poor person that belongeth thus to Christ asketh anything of thee, and thou
deniest it him in his necessity, thou deniest it to Christ himself. And whatsoever hurt
any shall do to such a Christian, they do it to Christ himself. When any mock, scorn,
revile, reject, or thrust away such an one they do all that to Christ, but he that receiveth
him, giveth him meat, and drink, or apparel, and assisteth him in his necessities, doth it
likewise to Christ, and to a fellow-member of his own Body. Nay he doth it to himself if it
be a Christian; for we are all one in Christ, as a tree and its branches are.
Scholar
How then will those subsist in the day of the last Judgment, who afflict and vex the poor
and distressed, and deprive them of their very sweat, necessitating and constraining
them by force to submit to their wills, and trampling upon them as their footstools, only
that they themselves may live in pomp and power, and spend the fruits of this poor
people's sweat and labour in voluptuousness, pride, and vanity?
Master
Christ suffereth in the persecution of his members. Therefore all the wrong that such
hard executors do to the poor wretches under their control is done to Christ himself;
and falleth under his severe sentence and judgment. And besides that by such
oppression of the Poor they draw them off from Christ, and make them seek unlawful
ways to fill their bellies. Nay, they work for and with the Devil himself, doing the very
same thing which he doth: who, without intermission opposeth the Kingdom of Christ,
which consisteth only in Love. All these oppressors, if they do not turn with their whole
hearts unto Christ, and minister to or serve him, must go into Hell-fire, which is fed and
kept alive by nothing else but such mere Self, which they have exercised over the Poor
here.
Scholar
But how will it fare with those who in this time do so fiercely contend about the
kingdom of Christ, and slander, revile and persecute one another for their religion?
Master
All such have not yet known Christ; and they are but as a type or figure of Heaven and
Hell, striving for each other for the victory.
All rising, swelling pride, which contendeth about opinions, is an image of Self. And
whosoever hath not faith and humility, nor liveth in the Spirit of Christ, which is Love, is
only armed with the Anger of God, and helpeth forward the victory of the imaginary Self,
that is, the Kingdom of Darkness, and the Anger of God. For at the day of Judgment all
Self shall be given to the Darkness as shall also all the unprofitable contentions of men;
in which they seek not after Love, but merely after their imaginary Self. All such things
belong to the Judgment, which will separate the false from the true; and then all images
or opinions shall cease, and all the Children of God shall dwell for ever in the Love of
Christ, and that in them. For in Heaven all serve God their Creator in humble love.
Scholar
Wherefore then doth God suffer such strife and contention to be in this time?
Master
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The Life itself standeth in strife, that it may be made manifest, sensible, and palpable,
and that the wisdom may be made separable and known.
The Strife also constituteth the Eternal Joy of the victory. For there will arise great
praise and thanksgiving in the Saints from the experimental sense and knowledge that
Christ in them hath overcome Darkness, and all the Self of Nature, and that they are at
length totally delivered from the Strife, at which they shall rejoice eternally. And
therefore God suffereth all Souls to stand in a free-will, that the Eternal Dominion both
of Love and Anger, of Light and of Darkness, may be made manifest and known; and that
every Life might cause and find its own sentence in itself. For that which is now a strife
and pain to the Saints in their wretched warfare here, shall in the end be turned into
great joy to them; and that which hath been a joy and pleasure to ungodly persons in
this world, shall afterwards be turned into eternal torment and shame to them.
Therefore the joy of the Saints must arise to them out of death, as the light ariseth out of
a candle by the destruction and consumption of it in its fire, that so the Life may be freed
from the painfulness of Nature, and possess another World.
And as the Light hath quite another property than the Fire has, for it giveth and yieldeth
itself forth; whereas the Fire draweth in and consumeth itself, so the holy Life of
Meekness springeth forth through the Death of Self-will, and then God's Will of Love
only ruleth, and doth all in all. For thus the Eternal One hath attained Feeling and
Separability, and brought itself forth again with the feeling, through Death, in great
Joyfulness, that there might be an Eternal Delight in the Infinite Unity, and an Eternal
Cause of Joy; and therefore that which was before Painfulness, must now be the Ground
and Cause of this motion or stirring to the Manifestation of all Things. And herein lyeth
the Mystery of the hidden Wisdom of God.
Every one that asketh receiveth, every one that seeketh findeth, and to every one that
knocketh it shall be opened. The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Love of God, and
the Communion of the Holy Ghost, be with us all. Amen.
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Dialogue IV
THE WAY FROM DARKNESS TO TRUE ILLUMINATION
There was a poor Soul that had wandered out of Paradise, and come into the kingdom of
this World; where the Devil met it, and said to it: Whither dost thou go, thou Soul that
art half blind?
The Soul said
I would see and speculate into the Creatures of the World, which their Creator hath
made.
The Devil said
How wilt thou see and speculate into them, when thou canst not know their essence and
property? Thou wilt look upon their outside only, as upon a graven image, and canst not
know them thoroughly.
The Soul said
How may I come to know their essence and property?
The Devil said
Thine eyes would be opened to see them thoroughly, if thou didst but eat of that, from
whence the Creatures themselves are come to be good and evil. Thou wouldst then be as
God himself is, and know what the Creature is.
The Soul said
I am now a noble and holy Creature: but if I should do so, the Creator hath said that I
should die.
The Devil said
No, thou shouldst not die at all; but thy eyes would be opened, and thou wouldst be as
God himself, and be Master of Good and Evil. Also, thou wouldst be mighty, powerful
and very great, as I am; all the subtlety that is in the Creatures would be made known to
thee.
The Soul said
If I had the knowledge of Nature and of the Creatures, I would then rule the whole
World as I listed.
The Devil said
The whole ground of their knowledge lieth in thee. Do but turn thy Will and Desire
from God or Goodness into Nature and the Creatures, and then there will arise in thee a
lust to taste; and so thou mayest eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and by
that means come to know all things.
The Soul said
Well then, I will eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, that I may rule all things
by my own power, and be of myself a Lord on Earth, and do what I will, even as God
himself doth.
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The Devil said

I am the Prince of this World; and if thou wouldst rule on earth thou must turn thy lust
towards my Image, and desire to be like me, that thou mayst get the cunning, wit,
reason, and subtlety that my Image hath.
Thus did the Devil present to the Soul the Power that is in the fiery root of the Creature,
that is the fiery Wheel of Essence in the form of a Serpent. Upon which,
The Soul said
Behold this is the Power which can do all things. What must I do to get it?
The Devil said
If thou dost break thy Will off from God, and bring it into this power and skill, then thy
hidden Ground will be manifested in thee, and thou mayest work in the same manner.
But thou must eat of that Fruit, wherein each of the four elements in itself ruleth over
the other, and is in strife. And then thou wilt be instantly as the fiery Wheel is, and so
bring all things into thine own power, and possess them as thine own.
The Soul did so and what happened thereupon
Now when the Soul broke its will off thus from God, and brought it into the fiery Will
(which is the Root of Life and Power), there presently arose in it a lust to eat of the Tree
of Knowledge of Good and Evil; and the Soul did eat thereof. Which as soon as it had
done, instantly was kindled the fiery Wheel of its Essence, and thereupon all the
properties of Nature awoke in the Soul, and exercised each its own desire.
First arose the lust of Pride; a desire to be great, mighty, and powerful; to bring all
things in subjection to it, and to be Lord itself without control, despising all humility and
equality, as esteeming itself the only prudent, witty and cunning one, and accounting
everything folly that is not according to its own humour and liking.
Secondly, arose the lust of Covetousness, a desire of getting, which would draw all
things to itself, into its own possession. For when the lust of Pride had turned away the
Will from God, then the Life of the Soul would not trust God any further, but would take
care for itself; and therefore brought its desire into the Creatures, viz., into the earth,
metals, trees, and other Creatures. Thus the kindled fiery Life became hungry and
covetous, when it had broken itself off from the Unity, Love, and Meekness of God, and
attracted to itself the four Elements and New Essence, and brought itself into the
Condition of the beasts, and so the Life became dark, empty, and wrathful; and the
heavenly Virtues and Colours went out, like a candle extinguished.
Thirdly, there awoke in this fiery Life the stinging thorny lust of Envy: a hellish poison,
and a torment which makes the Life a mere enmity to God and to all Creatures. Which
Envy raged furiously in the sting of Covetousness, as a venomous sting doth in the body.
Envy cannot endure, but hateth and would hurt or destroy that which Covetousness
cannot draw to itself by which hellish passion the Noble Love of the Soul is smothered.
Fourthly, there awoke in this fiery Life a torment like fire, viz., Anger; which would
murder and remove out of the way all who would not be subject to Pride. Thus the
Ground and Foundation of Hell, which is called the Anger of God, was wholly manifested
in this Soul. Whereby it lost the fair Paradise of God and the Kingdom of Heaven, and
became such a worm as the fiery Serpent was, which the Devil presented to it in his own
image and likeness. And so the Soul began to rule on earth in a bestial manner, and did
 56

all things according to the Will of the Devil, living in mere Pride, Covetousness, Envy,
and Anger, having no longer any true love towards God. But there arose in the stead
thereof an evil bestial love of Wantonness and Vanity, and there was no purity left in the
heart, for the Soul had forsaken Paradise, and taken the Earth into its possession. Its
mind was wholly bent upon cunning knowledge, subtility, and getting together a
multitude of earthly things. No righteousness nor virtue remained in it at all; but
whatsoever evil and wrong it committed, it covered all cunningly under the cloak of its
power and authority by law, and called it by the name of Right and Justice, and
accounted it good.
The Devil came to the Soul
Upon this the Devil drew near the Soul, and brought it on from one vice to another, for
he had taken it captive in his Essence, and set joy and pleasure before it, therein, saying
thus to it: Behold now thou art powerful, mighty, and noble, endeavour to be greater,
richer, and more powerful still. Display thy knowledge, wit and subtlety, that every one
may fear thee, and stand in awe of thee, and that thou mayst be respected, and get a
great name in the World.
The Soul did so
The Soul did as the Devil counselled it, and yet knew not that its counsellor was the
Devil; but thought it was guided by its own knowledge, wit, and understanding, and that
it did very well and right all the while.
Jesus Christ met with the Soul
The Soul going on in this course of life, our dear and loving Lord Jesus Christ, Who was
come into this World with the Love and Wrath of God, to destroy the works of the Devil,
and to execute judgment upon all ungodly deeds, on a time met with it, and spake by a
strong power, viz., by his passion and death into it, and destroyed the works of the Devil
in it, and discovered to it the way to his Grace, and shone upon it with his mercy, calling
it to return and repent, and promising that he would then deliver it from that monstrous
deformed shape and image which it had gotten, and bring it into Paradise again.
How Christ brought in the Soul
Now when the Spark of the Love of God, or the Divine Light, was accordingly manifested
in the Soul, it presently saw itself with its will and works to be in Hell, in the Wrath of
God, and found it was an ugly, misshapen monster in the Divine Presence and the
Kingdom of Heaven: at which it was so affrighted, that it fell into the greatest anguish
possible, for the Judgment of God was manifested in it.
What Christ said
Upon this the Lord Christ spake unto it with the Voice of his Grace, and said: Repent and
forsake Vanity, and thou shalt attain My Grace.
What the Soul said
Then the Soul with its ugly misshapen image went before God and entreated for Grace
and the pardon of its sins, and came to be strongly persuaded in itself that the
satisfaction and atonement of our Lord Jesus Christ did belong to it. But the evil
properties of the Serpent, formed in the Astral Spirit, or Reason, of the outward Man,
would not suffer the Will of the Soul to come before God, but brought their lusts and
inclinations thereinto.
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But the poor Soul turned its countenance towards God, and desired Grace from him,
even that he would bestow his Love upon it.
The Devil came to it again
But when the Devil saw that the Soul thus prayed to God, and would enter into
repentance, he drew near to it, and thrust the inclinations of the earthly properties into
its prayers, and disturbed its good thoughts and desires which pressed forwards
towards God, and drew them back again to earthly things that they might have no access
to him.
The Soul sighed
The central Will of the Soul indeed sighed after God, but the thoughts arising in the mind
that it should penetrate into him, were distracted, scattered and destroyed, so that they
could not reach the Power of God. At which the poor Soul was still more affrighted and
began to pray more earnestly. But the Devil with his desire took hold of the kindled,
fiery Wheel of Life, and awakened the evil properties, so that evil or false inclinations
arose in the Soul, and went into that thing wherein they had taken most pleasure and
delight before.
The poor Soul would very fain go forward to God with its Will, and therefore used all its
endeavours; but its thoughts continually fled away from God into earthly things, and
would not go to him.
Upon this the Soul sighed and bewailed itself to God; but was as if it were quite forsaken
by him, and cast out from its Presence. It could not get so much as one look of Grace, but
was in mere anguish, fear and terror, and dreaded every moment that the Wrath and
severe Judgment of God would be manifested in it, and that the Devil would take hold of
it and have it. And thereupon fell into such great heaviness and sorrow, that it became
weary of all the temporal things, which were before its chief joy and happiness.
The earthly natural Will indeed desired those things still, but the Soul would willingly
leave them altogether, and desired to die to all temporal lust and joy whatsoever, and
longed only after its first native country, from whence it originally came. But it found
itself to be far from thence in great distress and want, and knew not what to do, yet
resolved to enter into itself, and try to pray more earnestly.
The Devil's Opposition
But the Devil opposed it, and withheld it so that it could not bring itself into any greater
fervency of repentance.
He awakened the earthly lusts in its heart, that they might still keep their evil nature
and false right therein, and set them at variance with the new-born Will and Desire of
the Soul. For they would not die to their own Will and Light, but would still maintain
their temporal pleasures, and so kept the poor Soul captive in their evil desires, that it
could not stir, though it sighed and longed never so much after the Grace of God. For
whensoever it prayed, or offered to press forward towards God, then the lusts of the
flesh swallowed up the rays and ejaculations that went forth from it, and brought them
away from God into earthly thoughts, that it might not partake of Divine Strength.
Which caused the poor Soul to think itself forsaken of God, not knowing that he was so
near it, and did thus attract it. Also the Devil tempted the poor Soul, saying to it in the
earthly thoughts:
 58

"Why dost thou pray? Dost thou think that God knoweth thee or regardeth thee?
Consider but what thoughts thou hast in his presence; are they not altogether evil? Thou
hast no faith or belief in God at all; how then should he hear thee? He heareth thee not,
leave off; why wilt thou needlessly torment and vex thyself! Thou hast time enough to
repent at leisure. Wilt thou be mad? Do but look upon the world I pray thee a little; doth
it not live in jollity and mirth, yet it will be saved well enough for all that. Hath not Christ
paid the ransom and satisfied for all men? Thou needest only persuade and comfort
thyself that it is done for thee, and then thou shalt be saved. Thou canst not possibly in
this world come to any feeling of God, therefore leave off, and take care for thy body,
and look after temporal glory. What dost thou suppose will become of thee, if thou turn
to be so stupid and melancholy? Thou wilt be the scorn of everybody, and they will
laugh at thy folly; and so thou wilt pass thy days in mere sorrow and heaviness, which is
pleasing neither to God nor Nature. I pray thee, look upon the beauty of the World, for
God hath so erected and placed thee in it, to be a Lord over all Creatures and to rule
them. Gather store of temporal goods beforehand, that thou mayest not be beholden to
the World, or stand in need hereafter. And when old age cometh, or that thou growest
near thy end, then prepare thyself for repentance. God will save thee, and receive thee
into the heavenly mansions there. There is no need of such ado in vexing, bewailing, and
stirring up thyself, as thou makest."
The Condition of the Soul
In these and the like thoughts the Soul was ensnared by the Devil, and brought into the
lust of the flesh, and earthly desires; and so bound as it were with fetters and strong
chains that it did not know what to do. It looked back a little into the World and the
pleasures thereof, but still felt in itself a hunger after Divine Grace, and would rather
enter into repentance and favour with God. For the Hand of God had touched and
bruised it, and therefore it could rest nowhere; but always sighed in itself after sorrow
for the sins it had committed, and would fain be rid of them. Yet could not get true
repentance, or even the knowledge of sin, though it had a mighty hunger and longing
desire after such penitential sorrow.
The Soul being thus heavy and sad, and finding no remedy or rest, began to cast about
where it might find a fit place to perform true repentance in, where it might be free from
business, cares, and the hinderances of the World; and also by what means it might win
the favour of God. And at length purposed to betake itself to some private solitary
place, and give over all worldly employments and temporal things, and hoped that by
being bountiful and pitiful to the Poor, it should obtain God's mercy. Thus did it devise
all kinds of ways to get rest, and to gain the love, favour, and grace of God again. But all
would not do; for its worldly business still followed it in the lusts of the flesh, and it was
ensnared in the net of the Devil now, as well as before, and could not attain rest. And
though for a little while it was somewhat cheered with earthly things, yet presently it
fell to be as sad and heavy again as it was before. The truth was it felt the awakened
Wrath of God in itself, but knew not how that came to pass, nor what ailed it. For many
times great trouble and terror fell upon it, which made it comfortless, sick, and faint
with very fear; so mightily did the first bruising it with the ray or influence of the
stirring of Grace work upon it. And yet it knew not that Christ was in the Wrath and
severe Justice of God and fought therein with that Spirit of Error incorporated in Soul
and Body, nor understood that the hunger and desire to turn and repent came from
Christ Himself, neither did it know what hindered it that it could not yet attain to Divine
Feeling. It knew not that itself was a monster, and did bear the Image of the Serpent.
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An enlightened and regenerate Soul met the distressed Soul

By the Providence of God, an enlightened and regenerate Soul met the distressed Soul,
and said: What ailest thou, thou distressed Soul, that thou art so restless and troubled!
The distressed Soul answered
The Creator hath hid his Countenance from me, so that I cannot come to his Rest;
therefore I am thus troubled, and know not what I shall do to get his Loving-kindness
again. For great cliffs and rocks lie in my way to his Grace, so that I cannot come to him.
Though I sigh and long after him never so much, yet I am kept back, so that I cannot
partake of his Power, Virtue, and Strength.
The enlightened Soul said
Thou bearest the monstrous shape of the Devil, and art clothed therewith; in which,
being his own Property or Principle, he hath access or power of entrance into thee, and
thereby keepeth thy Will from penetrating into God. For if thy Will might penetrate into
God, it would be anointed with the highest Power and Strength of God, in the
Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ; and that unction would break in pieces the
monster which thou carriest about thee; and thy first Image of Paradise would revive in
the Centre; which would destroy the Devil's Power therein, and thou wouldst become
an Angel again. And because the Devil envieth thee this happiness, he holdeth thee
captive in his Desire in the lusts of the flesh, from which if thou art not delivered, thou
wilt be separated from God, and canst never enter into our Society.
The distressed Soul terrified
At this speech the poor distressed Soul was so terrified and amazed, that it could not
speak one word more. When it found that it stood in the form and condition of the
Serpent which separated it from God, and that the Devil was so nigh it in that condition,
who injected evil thoughts into the Will of the Soul, and had so much power over it
thereby that it was near damnation and sticking fast in the Abyss or bottomless pit of
Hell in the Anger of God, it would have even despaired of Divine Mercy; but that the
Power, Virtue and Strength of the first stirring of the Grace of God, which had before
bruised the Soul, upheld and preserved it from total despair. But still it wrestled in itself
between Hope and Doubt; whatsoever Hope built up, that Doubt threw down again. And
thus was it agitated with such continued disquiet, that at last the World and all the glory
thereof became loathsome to it, neither would it enjoy worldly pleasures any more; and
yet for all this could it not come to Rest.
The enlightened Soul came again, and spoke to the troubled Soul
On a time the enlightened Soul came again to this Soul, and finding it still in so great
trouble, anguish, and grief, said to it.
What dost thou? Wilt thou destroy thyself in thy anguish and sorrow? Why dost thou
torment thyself in thy own Power and Will, seeing thy torment increaseth thereby more
and more? Yea, if thou shouldst sink thyself down to the bottom of the sea, or fly to the
uttermost coasts of the morning, or raise thyself above the stars, yet thou wouldst not
be released. For the more thou grievest, tormentest, and troublest thyself, the more
painful thy nature will be; and yet thou wilt not be able to come to Rest. For thy Power
is quite lost, and as a dry stick burnt to a coal cannot grow green and spring afresh by its
own power, nor get sap to flourish again with other trees and plants; so neither canst
thou reach the Place of God by thy own power and strength, and transform thyself into
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that Angelical Image which thou hadst at first. For in respect to God thou art withered
and dry, like a dead plant that hath lost its sap and strength, and so art become a dry
tormenting Hunger. Thy Properties are like Heat and Cold which continually strive one
against the other, and can never unite.
The distressed Soul said
What then shall I do to bud forth again, and recover the first Life, wherein I was at rest
before I became an Image?
The enlightened Soul said
Thou shalt do nothing at all but forsake thy own Will, viz., that which thou callest I,
or thyself. By which means all thy evil properties will grow weak, faint, and ready to die;
and then thou wilt sink down again into that One Thing from which thou art originally
sprung. For now thou liest captive in the Creatures; but if thy Will forsaketh them, they
will die in thee, with their evil inclinations, which at present stay and hinder thee that
thou canst not come to God. But if thou takest this course, thy God will meet thee with
his infinite Love, which he hath manifested in Christ Jesus in the Humanity, or human
Nature. And that will impart sap, life and vigour to thee, whereby thou mayst bud,
spring, flourish again, and rejoice in the Living God, as a branch growing on his true
Vine. And so thou wilt at length recover the Image of God, and be delivered from that of
the Serpent. Then shalt thou come to be my brother and have fellowship with the
Angels.
The poor Soul said
How can I forsake my Will, so that the Creatures which lodge therein may die, seeing I
must be in the World, and also have need of it as long as I live?
The enlightened Soul said
Now thou hast worldly power and riches, which thou possesses! as thy own, to do what
thou wilt with, and regardest not how thou gettest or invest the same, employing them
in the service or indulgence of thy carnal and vain desires. Nay though thou seest the
poor and needy wretch who wanteth thy help, and is thy brother, yet thou helpest him
not, but layest heavy burdens upon him, by requiring more of him than his abilities will
bear, or his necessities afford, and oppressest him, by forcing him to spend his labour
and sweat for thee and the gratification of thy voluptuous Will. Thou art moreover
proud and exultest over him, and behavest roughly and sternly to him, exalting thyself
above him, and making small account of him in respect of thyself. Then that poor
oppressed brother of thine cometh, and complaineth with sighs towards God, that he
cannot reap the benefit of his labours and pains, but is forced by thee to live in misery.
By which sighings and groanings of his he raiseth up the wrath of God in thee, which
maketh thy flame and unquietness still the greater.
These are the Creatures which thou art in love with, and hast broken thyself off from
God for their sakes, and brought thy Love into them or them into thy Love, so that they
live therein. Thou nourishest and keepest them by continually receiving them into thy
desire, for they live in and by thy receiving them into thy mind, because thou thereby
bringest the lust of thy Life into them. They are but unclean and evil births and issues of
the Bestial Nature, which yet by thy receiving them in thy Desire, have gotten an Image
and formed themselves in thee. And that Image is a beast with four heads. First, Pride.
Secondly, Covetousness. Thirdly, Envy. Fourthly, Anger. And in these four properties the
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Foundation of Hell consisteth, which thou earnest in thee and about thee. It is imprinted
and engraven in thee, and thou art wholly taken captive thereby. For these properties
live in thy Natural Life; and thereby thou art severed from God, neither canst thou ever
come to him, unless thou so forsake these evil Creatures that they may die in thee.
But since thou desirest me to tell thee how to forsake thy own, perverse creaturely Will,
that the Creatures might die, and that yet thou mightest live with them in the World, I
must assure thee that there is but one way to do it, which is narrow and straight, and
will be very hard and irksome to thee in the beginning, but afterwards thou wilt walk in
it cheerfully.
Thou must seriously consider that in the course of this worldly life thou walkest in the
Anger of God and in the Foundation of Hell; and that this is not thy true native country;
but that a Christian should and must live in Christ, and in his walking truly follow him;
and that he cannot be a Christian unless the Spirit and Power of Christ so live in him
that he becometh wholly subject to it. Now seeing the Kingdom of Christ is not of the
world, but in Heaven, therefore thou must be always in a continual ascension towards
Heaven, if thou wilt follow Christ; though thy body must dwell among the Creatures and
use them.
The narrow way to which perpetual ascension into Heaven and imitation of Christ is
this. Thou must despair of all thy own power and strength, for in and by thy own thou
canst not reach the Gates of God, and firmly purpose and resolve wholly to give thyself
up to the Mercy of God, and to sink down with thy whole mind and reason into the
Passion and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ, always desiring to persevere in the same
and to die from all thy Creatures therein. Also thou must resolve to watch and guard thy
mind, thoughts, and inclinations that they admit no evil into them, neither must thou
suffer thyself to be held fast by temporal honour or profit. Thou must resolve likewise to
put away from thee all Unrighteousness and whatsoever else may hinder the freedom of
thy motion and progress. Thy Will must be wholly pure and fixed in a firm resolution
never to return to its old idols any more, but that thou wilt, that very instant leave them,
and separate thy mind from them, and enter into the sincere way of truth and
righteousness, according to the plain and full doctrine of Christ. And as thou dost thus
purpose to forsake the enemies of thine own inward Nature, so thou must also forgive
all thy outward enemies and resolve to meet them with thy Love, that there may be left
no Creature, Person, or Thing at all able to take hold of thy Will and captivate it; but that
it may be sincere and purged from all Creatures. Nay, further, if it should be required,
thou must be willing and ready to forsake all thy temporal honour and profit for Christ's
sake, and regard nothing that is earthly so as to set thy heart and affections upon it; but
esteem thyself in whatsoever state, degree and condition thou art, as to worldly rank
and riches, to be but a servant of God, and of thy fellow-Christians; or as a steward in the
office wherein thy Lord hath placed thee. All arrogance and self-exaltation must be
humbled, brought low, and so annihilated that nothing of thine own or of any other
Creature may stay in thy Will to bring the thoughts or imagination to be set upon it.
Thou must also firmly impress it on thy mind that thou shalt certainly partake of the
promised Grace in the Merit of Jesus Christ, viz., of his outflowing Love, which indeed is
already in thee, and which will deliver thee from thy Creatures, and enlighten thy Will,
and kindle it with the Flame of Love, whereby thou shalt have victory over the Devil. Not
as if thou couldst will or do anything in thy own strength, but only enter into the
suffering and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and take them to thyself, and with them
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assault and break in pieces the kingdom of the Devil in thee. Thou must resolve to enter
into this way this very hour, and never to depart from it, but willingly to submit thyself
to God in all thy endeavours and doings, that he may do with thee what he pleaseth.
When thy Will is thus prepared and resolved, it hath then broken through its own
Creatures, and is sincere in the Presence of God, and clothed with the Merits of Jesus
Christ. It may then freely go to the Father with the Prodigal Son, and fall down in his
Presence and pour forth its prayers; and putting forth all its strength in this Divine
Work, confess its sins and disobedience; and how far it hath departed from God. This
must be done not with bare words, but with all its strength, which indeed amounteth
only to a strong purpose and resolution; for the Soul of itself hath no strength or power
to effect any good work.
Now when thou art thus ready, and thy heavenly Father shall see thee coming and
returning to him in such repentance and humility, he will inwardly speak to thee, and
say in thee; Behold, this is my son which I had lost, he was dead and is alive again. And he
will come to meet thee in thy mind with the Grace and Love of Jesus Christ, and embrace
thee with the beams of his Love, and kiss thee with his Spirit and Strength, and then
thou shalt receive Grace to pour out thy confession before him and to pray powerfully.
This indeed is the right place where thou must wrestle in the Light of his Countenance.
And if thou standest resolutely here and shrinkest not back, thou shalt see or feel great
wonders. For thou shalt find Christ in thee assaulting Hell, and crushing thy Beasts in
pieces, and that a great tumult and misery will arise in thee; also thy secret
undiscovered sins will then first awake and labour to separate thee from God, and to
keep thee back. Thus shalt thou truly find and feel how Death and Life fight one against
the other, and shalt understand by what passeth within thyself what Heaven and Hell
are. At all which be not moved, but stand firm and shrink not; for at length all thy
Creatures will grow faint, weak, and ready to die; and then thy Will shall wax stronger,
and be able to subdue and keep down the evil inclinations. So shall thy Will and Mind
ascend into Heaven every day, and thy Creatures gradually die away. Thou wilt get a
Mind wholly new, and begin to be a new Creature, and, getting rid of the Bestial
Deformity, recover the Divine Image. Thus shalt thou be delivered from thy present
Anguish, and return to thy original Rest.
The poor Soul's Practice
Then the poor Soul began to practise this course with so much earnestness that it
conceived it should get the victory presently, but it found that the Gates of Heaven were
shut against it in its own strength and power, and it was, as it were, rejected and
forsaken by God, and received not so much as one look or glimpse of Grace from him.
Upon which it said to itself; Surely thou hast not sincerely submitted thyself to God. Desire
nothing at all of him, but only submit thyself to his judgment and condemnation, that he
may kill thy evil inclinations. Sink down into him beyond the Limits of Nature and
Creature, and submit thyself to him, that he may do with thee what he will, for thou art not
worthy to speak to him. Accordingly the Soul took a resolution to sink down, and to
forsake its own will; and when it had done so there fell upon it presently the greatest
repentance that could be for the sins it had committed; and it bewailed bitterly its ugly
shape, and was truly and deeply sorry that the evil Creatures did dwell in it. And
because of its sorrow it could not speak one word more in the Presence of God, but in
this repentance did consider the bitter Passion and Death of Jesus Christ, viz., what
great anguish and torment he had suffered for its sake, in order to deliver it out of its
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anguish, and change it into the Image of God. In which consideration it wholly sank
down, and did nothing but complain of its ignorance and negligence, and that it had not
been thankful to its Redeemer, nor once considered the great love he had shown to it,
but had idly spent its time, and not at all regarded how it might come to partake of his
purchased and proffered Grace; but instead thereof had formed in itself the images and
figures of earthly things, with the vain lusts and pleasures of the World. Whereby it had
gotten such bestial inclinations that now it must lie captive in great misery, and for very
shame dared not lift up its eyes to God, Who hid the light of his countenance from it and
would not so much as look upon it. And as it was thus sighing and crying it was drawn
into the Abyss or Pit of Horror, and laid as it were at the Gates of Hell there to perish.
Upon which the poor troubled Soul was, as it were, bereft of sense, and wholly forsaken,
so that it in a manner forgot all its doings, and would willingly yield itself to Death, and
cease to be a Creature. Accordingly it did yield itself to Death, and desired nothing else
but to die and perish in the Death of its Redeemer Jesus Christ, who had suffered such
torments and death for its sake. And in this perishing it began to sigh and pray in itself
very inwardly to the Divine Goodness, and to sink down into the mere Mercy of God.
Upon this there suddenly appeared unto it the Love of God, as a great Light which
penetrated through it, and made it exceedingly joyful. It then began to pray aright, and
to thank the Most High for such Grace, and to rejoice abundantly that it was delivered
from the Death and Anguish of Hell. Now it tasted of the Sweetness of God, and of his
promised Truth; and how all the evil Spirits which had harassed it before, and kept it
back from the Grace, Love, and inward Presence of God, were forced to depart from it.
The wedding of the Lamb was now kept and solemnised, that is, the
Noble Sophia espoused or betrothed herself to the Soul, and the Seal-Ring of Christ's
victory was impressed into its Essence, and it was received to be a Child and Heir of God
again.
When this was done the Soul became very joyful, and began to work in this new power,
and to celebrate with praise the wonders of God, and thought thenceforth to walk
continually in the same Light, Strength, and Joy. But it was soon assaulted:
from without by the shame and reproach of the World, and from within by great
temptation, so that it began to doubt whether its ground was truly from God, and
whether it had really partaken of his Grace. For the accuser Satan went to it, and would
fain lead it out of its course, and make it doubtful whether it was the true way,
whispering thus to it inwardly; This happy change in thy Spirit is not from God, but only
from thy own imagination. Also the Divine Light retired in the Soul, and shone but in the
inward ground, as fire raked up in embers, so that Reason was perplexed, and thought
itself forsaken, and the Soul knew not what had happened to itself, nor whether it had
really and truly tasted of the heavenly gift or not. Yet it could not leave off struggling; for
the burning Fire of Love was sown in it, which had raised in it a vehement and continual
Hunger and Thirst after the Divine Sweetness. So at length it began to pray aright, and
to humble itself in the Presence of God, and to examine and try its evil inclinations and
thoughts, and to put them away. By which means the Will of Reason was broken, and
the evil inclinations inherent in it were killed and extirpated more and more. This
process was very severe and painful to the Nature of the Body, for it made it faint and
weak as if it had been very sick; and yet it was no natural sickness that it had, but only
the melancholy of its earthly Nature, feeling and lamenting the destruction of its evil
lusts.
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Now when the earthly Reason found itself thus forsaken, and the poor Soul saw that it
was despised outwardly and derided by the World, because it would walk no longer in
the way of Wickedness and Vanity; and also that it was inwardly assaulted by the
accuser Satan, who mocked it, and continually set before it the beauty, riches and glory
of the World, and called it a fool for not embracing them; it began to think and say thus
within itself: O eternal God, what shall I now do to come to Rest?
The enlightened Soul met it again and spoke to it
While it was in this consideration, the enlightened Soul met with it again, and said: What
ailest thou, my Brother, that thou art so heavy and sad!
The distressed Soul said
I have followed thy counsel, and thereby attained a ray or emanation of the Divine
Sweetness, but it is gone from me again, and I am now deserted. Moreover I have
outwardly very great trials and afflictions in the World, for all my good friends forsake
and scorn me; and am also inwardly assaulted with anguish and doubt, and know not
what to do.
The enlightened Soul said
Now I like thee very well; for now our beloved Lord Jesus Christ is performing that
Pilgrimage or Process on Earth with thee and in thee, which he did himself when he was
in this World, who was continually reviled, despised, and evil spoken of, and had
nothing of his own in it; and now thou bearest his mark or badge. But do not wonder at
it, or think it strange; for it must be so, in order that thou mayst be tried, refined, and
purified. In this Anguish and Distress thou wilt necessarily hunger and cry after
deliverance; and by such Hunger and Prayer thou wilt attract Grace to thee both from
within and from without. For thou must grow from above and from beneath to be the
Image of God again. Just as a young plant is agitated by the wind, and must stand its
ground in heat and cold, drawing strength and virtue to it from above and from beneath
by that agitation, and must endure many a tempest, and undergo much danger before it
can come to be a tree and bring forth much fruit. For through that agitation the virtue of
the sun moveth in the plant, whereby its wild properties come to be penetrated and
tinctured with the solar virtue, and grow thereby.
And this is the time wherein thou must play the part of a valiant soldier in the Spirit of
Christ, and co-operate thyself therewith. For now the Eternal Father by his fiery Power
begetteth his Son in thee, who changeth the Fire of the Father, namely, the first
Principle, or Wrathful Property of the Soul, into the Flame of Love, so that out of Fire
and Light (viz. Wrath and Love) there cometh to be one Essence, Being, or Substance,
which is the true Temple of God. And now thou shalt bud forth out of the Vine Christ, in
the Vineyard of God, and bring forth fruit in thy life, and by assisting and instructing
others, show forth thy Love in abundance, as a good tree. For Paradise must then spring
up again in thee, through the Wrath of God, and Hell be changed into Heaven in thee.
Therefore be not dismayed at the temptations of the Devil, who seeketh and striveth for
the Kingdom which he once had in thee, but, having now lost it, must be confounded,
and depart from thee. And he covereth thee outwardly with the shame and reproach of
the World, that his own shame may not be known, and that thou mayst be hidden to the
World. For with thy New Birth or regenerated Nature thou art in the Divine Harmony in
Heaven. Be patient, therefore, and wait upon the Lord, and whatsoever shall befall thee,
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take it all from his hands as intended by him for thy highest good. And so the
enlightened Soul departed from it.
The distressed Soul's course
The distressed Soul began its course now under the patient Suffering of Christ, and
depending solely upon the Strength and Power of God in it, entered into Hope.
Thenceforth it grew stronger every day, and its evil inclinations died more and more in
it. So that it arrived at length to a high state or degree of Grace; and the Gates of the
Divine Revelation and the Kingdom of Heaven were opened to and manifested in it.
And thus the Soul, through Repentance, Faith, and Prayer, returned to its true Rest, and
became a right and beloved Child of God again; to which may He of his infinite Mercy
help us all. Amen.