(57) But for the Whores and Rogues (who run a whoring without marrying in lustful Lechery) we have no other Language for them h; neither can we find any otherwise in the Light of Nature, than that it is an Abomination [or Loathing] in the Anger of God; and if earnest Repentance (with Mary Magdalene) be not there performed in the Regeneration, then we find nothing else but the Anger of God and Hell-Fire to be their Wages. Amen. Of the innocent and righteous Abel. The Gate of the Christian Church.

(2) And on this manner may this deceit befall. A young man or a woman new set to the school of devotion heareth this sorrow and this desire be read and spoken: how that a man shall lift up his heart unto God, and unceasingly desire for to feel the love of his God. And as fast in a curiosity of wit they conceive these words not ghostly as they be meant, but fleshly and bodily; and travail their fleshly hearts outrageously in their breasts. And what for lacking of grace and pride and curiosity in themselves, they strain their veins and their bodily powers so beastly and so rudely, that within short time they fall either into frenzies, weariness, and a manner of unlisty feebleness in body and in soul, the which maketh them to wend out of themselves and seek some false and some vain fleshly and bodily comfort without, as it were for recreation of body and of spirit: or else, if they fall not in this, else they merit for ghostly blindness, and for fleshly chafing of their nature in their bodily breasts in the time of this feigned beastly and not ghostly working, for to have their breasts either enflamed with an unkindly heat of nature caused of misruling of their bodies or of this feigned working, or else they conceive a false heat wrought by the Fiend, their ghostly enemy, caused of their pride and of their fleshliness and their curiosity of wit. And yet peradventure they ween it be the fire of love, gotten and kindled by the grace and the goodness of the Holy Ghost. Truly, of this deceit, and of the branches thereof, spring many mischiefs: much hypocrisy, much heresy, and much error. For as fast after such a false feeling cometh a false knowing in the Fiend’s school, right as after a true feeling cometh a true knowing in God’s school. For I tell thee truly, that the devil hath his contemplatives as God hath His.

(38) "I said, Ye are Gods; and all sons of the Highest." To whom speaks the Lord? To those who reject as far as possible all that is of man. And the apostle says, "For ye are not any longer in the flesh, but in the Spirit." And again he says, "Though in the flesh, we do not war after the flesh." "For flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither doth corruption inherit incorruption." "Lo, ye shall die like men," the Spirit has said, confuting us.

(20) " And guard yourselves from all fornication and uncleanness, And from all pollution of sin, Lest ye make our name a curse, And your whole life a hissing, And all your sons be destroyed by the sword, And ye become accursed like Sodom, And all your remnant as the sons of Gomorrah.

(8) "For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh."

(49) Where is thy Image of God? Hast thou not turned it into a horrible Worm and Beast? O! thou belongest not to the Kingdom of God, except thou be born anew, and that thy Soul appears in the Image of God, then the Mercy of God is upon thee, and the Passion of Christ covers all thy Sins.

(10) Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.

(48) 1 say not that thou receivest the Wrath of God in the Bread and in the Wine, but in thy false Confidence; thou art with thy Body and Soul in the Anger, and wilt not go out from it. Why then dost thou approach often to the Covenant of God, seeing thou art captivated of the Devil? Dost thou think that he will adorn thy Hypocrisy, and will hang his Pearl on thee? Thou art a Wolf, and howlest with the Dogs; thy Mouth prays, and thy Soul is abominably wicked [and naught;] when it goes from the Testament of Christ, it enters into the Stall of Robbery again, and is a Murderer; it howls with the Dogs; it is a bGod. perfidious Whore; when it goes away from the Covenant, it steps into whorish Corners, into the Den of Thieves; and there they stand, and pretend great Holiness. O, this Day is a holy Day to me, I must not sin; and yet they think, Tomorrow or next Day, they will go thither again.

(21) I see, my son, That all the works of. the children of men are sin and wickedness, And all their deeds are uncleanness and an abomination and a pollution; And there is no righteousness with them.

(7) And after this they sinned against the beasts and birds, and all that moveth and walketh on the earth : and much blood was shed on the earth, and every imagination and desire of men imagined vanity , and evil continually.

(47) In the mean Time, thou consumest the Sweat and Blood of the Needy, and thou gatherest all his Miseries and Necessities on a Heap in thy Soul; thou takest his Sweat to maintain thy Pride therewith, and yet thy Doings must be accounted holy; thou givest Scandal to the Poor, so that by thy Example and Doings, he comes to be vile [and wicked,] and to do that which is not right in the Presence of God; he curses thee, and therewith causes himself to perish also; and thus one Abomination generates another, but thou art the first Cause thereof. And thou settest forth thyself never so wisely and handsomely, yet the Driver is still before thee, and thou art the Root of all those Sins, [which thou causest in others by thy Hardness or Oppression.]

(29) But where then is the new Regeneration in Christ through the Holy Ghost? Art thou not Babel, a Habitation of all Devils in Pride? How hast thou adorned thyself? Not for Christ, but for thy own Pride, for thy bldol the Belly's Sake, and thou art a horrible Source; there is a great Fire of Anguish in thy Source, for thou art naked and manifest before God, thou standest as an impudent whorish Woman. Why do you, Laity, hang [and depend] on such a Strumpet? Her own usurped Authority is her Beast whereon she rides; behold, and consider her in the Revelation of John, how the Holy Ghost sets her forth in her Colours.

(7) And suffer not the soul to be eaten with the flesh, that your blood, which is your life, may not be required at the hand of any flesh that sheddeth (it) on the earth.

(82) And the Spirit signifies, that if you do not leave off this Contention, you shall have no other Sign [given you] than the Contention must devour yourselves, you must consume yourselves. Therefore are you not mad? Are you not all Brethren, and are you not all in Christ? If you did converse in Love, what should you need to strive about your native Country wherein you dwell? O leave off, your Cause is evil in the Sight of God, and you are all found to be in Babel. Be advised; the Day breaks. How long will you keep Company with that adulterous Whore? Arise, your noble Virgin is adorned in her orient Garland of Pearl; she wears a Lily which is most delightful; be brotherly, and she will adorn you indeed; we have seen her really, and in her Name we write this.

(9) Do not expect, therefore, the carnal resurrection, which is destruction; and they are not stripped of it (the flesh) who err in expecting a resurrection that is empty. They do not know the power of God, nor do they understand the interpretation of the scriptures, on account of their double-mindedness. The mystery which the Son of Man spoke about, [...], in order that [...] destroy ... ... (2 lines unrecoverable) ... man who [...] book, which is written [...] for they have ... ... (1 line unrecoverable) ... blessed [...] within them, and they dwell before God under the light yoke. Those who do not have the life-giving word in their heart will die; and in their thought they have become manifest to the Son of Man, according to the manner of their activity and their error [...] of this sort. They [...] as he divides the [...], and they do not understand that the Son of Man is coming from him.

(7) And there will not be left any man that eateth blood. Or that sheddeth the blood of man on the earth, Nor will there be left to him any seed or descen- dants living under heaven ; For into Sheol will they go, And into the place of condemnation will they descend. And into the darkness of the deep will they all be removed by a violent death. v

(16) For in thy flesh and blood thou art not able to apprehend it, and though thou dost read it, yet it is but as a fume or mist before thine eyes.

(21) And take no E resent or gift for the blood' of man : blood for lood, that thou mayest be accepted before the Lord, the Most High God; for He is the defence of the good : and that thou mayest be preserved from all evil, and that He may save thee from every kind of death.

(16) Self-honoured, haughty, filled with the pride and the intoxication of wealth, they ostentatiously perform sacrifices, which are so only in name, in utter disregard of precepts. Possessed of egotism, power, and pride, and also of lust and wrath, these people, envious by nature, hate Me in the bodies of others and in their own. ( 16.17-16.18 ))

(4) As far as respects human nature, the woman does not possess one nature, and the man exhibit another, but the same: so also with virtue. If, consequently, a self-restraint and righteousness, and whatever qualities are regarded as following them, is the virtue of the male, it belongs to the male alone to be virtuous, and to the woman to be licentious and unjust. But it is offensive even to say this. Accordingly woman is to practise self-restraint and righteousness, and every other virtue, as well as man, both bond and free; since it is a fit consequence that the same nature possesses one and the same virtue. We do not say that woman's nature is the same as man's, as she is woman. For undoubtedly it stands to reason that some difference should exist between each of them, in virtue of which one is male and the other female. Pregnancy and parturition, accordingly, we say belong to woman, as she is woman, and not as she is a human being. But if there were no difference between man and woman, both would do and suffer the same things. As then there is sameness, as far as respects the soul, she will attain to the same virtue; but as there is difference as respects the peculiar construction of the body, she is destined for child-bearing and housekeeping. "For I would have you know," says the apostle, "that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man: for the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man. I For neither is the woman without the man, nor the man without the woman, in the Lord." For as we say that the man ought to be conti-nent, and superior to pleasures; so also we reckon that the woman should be continent and practised in fighting against pleasures. "But I say, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh," counsels the apostolic command; "for the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. These, then, are contrary" (not as good to evil, but as fighting advantageously), he adds therefore, so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are, fornication uncleanness, profligacy, idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, strifes, jealousies, wrath, contentions, dissensions, heresies, envyings, drunkenness, revellings, and such like; of which I tell you before, as I have also said before, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, temperance, goodness, faith, meekness." He calls sinners, as I think, "flesh," and the righteous "spirit." Further, manliness is to be assumed in order to produce confidence and forbearance, so as "to him that strikes on the one cheek, to give to him the other; and to him that takes away the cloak, to yield to him the coat also," strongly, restraining anger. For we do not train our women like Amazons to manliness in war; since we wish the men even to be peaceable. I hear that the Sarmatian women practise war no less than the men; and the women of the Sacae besides, who shoot backwards, feigning flight as well as the men. I am aware, too, that the women near Iberia practise manly work and toil, not refraining from their tasks even though near their delivery; but even in the very struggle of her pains, the woman, on being delivered, taking up the infant, carries it home. Further, the females no less than the males manage the house, and hunt, and keep the flocks: "Cressa the hound ran keenly in the stag's track."