(10) But he saw and knew very well the divine meekness, and humble being in God his Father; moreover he knew also very well, that it stood in such meekness from eternity, and that he also should generate in such meekness, as a loving and obedient son.

(31) But if it puts its Will forward into Meekness (viz. into the Obedience of God) then it is in the Source [or of the Quality and Property] of the Heart of God, and receives divine Virtue, and then all its rough Essences become angelical and joyful; and then its rough Essences are very serviceable to it, and are better and more profitable to it, than that it were altogether sweet in the Originality; in which [being sweet] there would be no Strength, nor such mighty Power as in the harsh, bitter, and fiery [Essences.]

(14) And then we find also, how the Meekness is the Virtue and the Spirit, so that where the Meekness is not, there the Fierceness (in itself) is nothing but a Darkness and a Death, where no i Growing can spring up, and it cannot generate nor discover its Wonders; and thus we find that the Fierceness [Wrath or Sourness] is a Cause of the Essences, and [that] the Meekness [is] a Cause of the Joy, and a Cause of the Rising and [Budding] or Growing forth of the Essences; and then that the Spirit is generated by the Flowing, [Working, Springing,] and Rising up, out of the Essences, and that the Fierceness so becomes the Root of the Spirit, and the Meekness is its Life.

(10) What is better and nobler than true poorness in spirit? Yet when that is held up before us, we will have none of it, but are always seeking ourselves, and our own things. We like to have our mouths always filled with good things, that we may have in ourselves a lively taste of pleasure and sweetness. When this is so, we are well pleased, and think it standeth not amiss with us. But we are yet a long way off from a perfect life. For when God will draw us up to something higher, that is, to an utter loss and forsaking of our own things, spiritual and natural, and withdraweth His comfort and sweetness from us, we faint and are troubled, and can in no wise bring our minds to it; and we forget God and neglect holy exercises, and fancy we are lost for ever. This is a great error and a bad sign. For a true lover of God, loveth Him or the Eternal Goodness alike, in having and in not having, in sweetness and bitterness, in good or evil report, and the like, for he seeketh alone the honour of God, and not his own, either in spiritual or natural things. And therefore he standeth alike unshaken in all things, at all seasons. Hereby let every man prove himself, how he standeth towards God, his Creator and Lord.

(1) IF we consider ourselves in the noble Knowledge, which is opened to us in the Love of God, in the noble Virgin of the Wisdom of God, (not for our Merit, Honesty, [Virtue,] or Worthiness, but merely of his own Will, and original eternal Purpose) even in those Things which appear to us in his Love, then we must needs acknowledge ourselves to be unworthy of such a Revelation; and seeing we are Sinners, we are deficient in the Glory that we should have before him.

(15) Now there can be no Meekness without Light, for the Light makes the Meekness, and there can be no Fierceness without the Light, for the Light makes a Longing in the Darkness; and yet there is no Darkness there, but the Longing makes the Darkness in the Will, so that the Will attracts to itself, and impregnates the Longing, so that it becomes thick and dark; for it is thicker than the Will, and therefore it shadows the Will, and is the Darkness of the Will.

(17) The first will fashion it according to its fierce Might and Pomp, and mingles therein prickly [stinging] Sourness, Wrath and Malice. And the second Principle with the Virgin stands in the Midst, and sheds its Rays of loving Meekness therein, and resists the first [Principle.] And if the Spirit be kindled in that, then the Word is wholly gentle, friendly, and humble, and inclines itself to the Love of our Neighbour; it desires not to seize upon any with the haughty Sting [or Prickle] of the first Principle, but it covers the Prickles of the Thorns, and qualifies the Word with Clearness [and Plainness,] and arms the Tongue with Righteousness and Truth, and it sheds abroad its Rays, even into the Will of the Heart. And when the Will receives the pleasant friendly Rays of Love, then it kindles the whole Mind with the Love, Righteousness, Chastity of the Virgin, and the Truth of all those Things that are by all Regions tried upon the Tongue. And thus it together with the five Senses makes the Tongue shrill, and [thereby] the dear Image of God appears inwardly and outwardly, so that it may be heard and seen in the whole % Abyss, what Form it is of. O Man! behold what the Light of Nature discovers to thee.

(8) But some one may say, it is not the mark of justice to leave pious men without assistance, when they are ground down by evil men. To which we must reply, that, if those whom you call pious do indeed love things on earth, which are zealously sought after by the earthly, they have altogether fallen from the Divine Love. And I do not know how they could be called pious, when they unjustly treat things truly loveable and divine, which do not at once surpass in influence in their estimation things undesirable and unloveable. But, if they love the realities, they who desire certain things ought to rejoice when they attain the things desired. Are they not then nearer the angelic virtues, when, as far as possible, by aspiration after things Divine, they withdraw from the affection for earthly things, by being exercised very manfully to this, in their perils, on behalf of the beautiful? So that, it is true to say, that this is rather a property of the Divine Justice--not to pamper and destroy the bravery of the best, by the gifts of earthly things, nor, if any one should attempt to do this, to leave them without assistance, but to establish them in the excellent and harsh condition, and to dispense to them, as being such, things meet for them.

(16) For meekness moveth against the wrath, and the wrath against the meekness, and so both are distinct kingdoms in the one only body of this world.

(5) Man in his limitations had not power To satisfy, not having power to sink In his humility obeying then, Far as he disobeying thought to rise; And for this reason man has been from power Of satisfying by himself excluded. Therefore it God behoved in his own ways Man to restore unto his perfect life, I say in one, or else in both of them. But since the action of the doer is So much more grateful, as it more presents The goodness of the heart from which it issues, Goodness Divine, that doth imprint the world, Has been contented to proceed by each And all its ways to lift you up again; Nor 'twixt the first day and the final night Such high and such magnificent proceeding By one or by the other was or shall be; For God more bounteous was himself to give To make man able to uplift himself, Than if he only of himself had pardoned; And all the other modes were insufficient For justice, were it not the Son of God Himself had humbled to become incarnate.

(26) But it is quite otherwise where there is poorness of spirit, and true humility; and it is so because it is found and known of a truth that a man, of himself and his own power, is nothing, hath nothing, can do and is capable of nothing but only infirmity and evil. Hence followeth that the man findeth himself altogether unworthy of all that hath been or ever will be done for him, by God or the creatures, and that he is a debtor to God and also to all the creatures in God’s stead, both to bear with, and to labour for, and to serve them. And therefore he doth not in any wise stand up for his own rights, but from the humility of his heart he saith, “It is just and reasonable that God and all creatures should be against me, and have a right over me, and to me, and that I should not be against any one, nor have a right to anything.” Hence it followeth that the man doth not and will not crave or beg for anything, either from God or the creatures, beyond mere needful things, and for those only with shamefacedness, as a favour and not as a right. And he will not minister unto or gratify his body or any of his natural desires, beyond what is needful, nor allow that any should help or serve him except in case of necessity, and then always in trembling; for he hath no right to anything and therefore he thinketh himself unworthy of anything. So likewise all his own discourse, ways, words and works seem to this man a thing of nought and a folly. Therefore he speaketh little, and doth not take upon himself to admonish or rebuke any, unless he be constrained thereto by love or faithfulness towards God, and even then he doth it in fear, and so little as may be. Moreover, when a man hath this poor and humble spirit, he cometh to see and understand aright, how that all men are bent upon themselves, and inclined to evil and sin, and that on this account it is needful and profitable that there be order, customs, law and precepts, to the end that the blindness and foolishness of men may be corrected, and that vice and wickedness may be kept under, and constrained to seemliness. For without ordinances, men would be much more mischievous and ungovernable than dogs and cattle. And few have come to the knowledge of the truth but what have begun with holy practices and ordinances, and exercised themselves therein so long as they knew nothing more nor better. Therefore one who is poor in spirit and of a humble mind doth not despise or make light of law, order, precepts and holy customs, nor yet of those who observe and cleave wholly to them, but with loving pity and gentle sorrow, crieth: “Almighty Father, Thou Eternal Truth, I make my lament unto Thee, and it grieveth Thy Spirit too, that through man’s blindness, infirmity, and sin, that is made needful and must be, which in deed and truth were neither needful nor right.” For those who are perfect are under no law.

(76) Indeed, thou proud man, the Deity is a very meek, simple and quiet still being, and gropeth not in the bottom of hell and death, but in his heaven, where there is nothing but a unanimous meekness; therefore it is not meet for me to stand against it.

(8) Yet this first Will in the Mind ought not to stay behind in the Abyss of the sour Fierceness, (in which the fierce Malice is,) but ought to go forward in the Center of the Breaking forth out of the Darkness into the Light, for in the Light there is mere Meekness, Lowliness, Humility, Good- Will, and friendly Desires, that it might with its re-conceived Will go out of itself, and to Or earnest Will. open itself in its precious Treasury. For in the re-conceived Will to the Birth of the Light, there is no Source of Anxiety, but only mere friendly Desires; for the Glimpse rises up out of the Darkness in itself, and desires the Light; and the Desiring draws the Light into itself, and there the Anguish becomes an exulting Joy in itself, an humble Chearfulness, a pleasant Habitation. For the re-conceived Will in the Light is impregnated, and its Fruit in the Body is Virtue [or Power,] which the Will desires to generate, and to live therein; and this Desiring brings the Fruit out of the impregnated Will, [and presents it] before the Will, and the Will discovers itself [glimmers or shines] in the Fruit in an infinite pleasant Number; and there goes forth, in the pleasant Number, in the discovered [or manifested] Will, the high Benediction [or Blessing,] Favour, loving Kindness, pleasant Inclination [or yielding Pliableness,] the Taste of Joy, the Well-doing of Meekness [or Affability,] and [further] what my Pen cannot express. The Mind would much rather be freed from Vanity, and live therein without Molestation or Disturbance.

(40) Whereby every one may perceive that this poison and fierceness does not belong to the love of God, in which there is nothing but meekness.

(4) The more conformed thereto, the more it pleases; For the blest ardour that irradiates all things In that most like itself is most vivacious. With all of these things has advantaged been The human creature; and if one be wanting, From his nobility he needs must fall. 'Tis sin alone which doth disfranchise him, And render him unlike the Good Supreme, So that he little with its light is blanched, And to his dignity no more returns, Unless he fill up where transgression empties With righteous pains for criminal delights. Your nature when it sinned so utterly In its own seed, out of these dignities Even as out of Paradise was driven, Nor could itself recover, if thou notest With nicest subtilty, by any way, Except by passing one of these two fords: Either that God through clemency alone Had pardon granted, or that man himself Had satisfaction for his folly made. Fix now thine eye deep into the abyss Of the eternal counsel, to my speech As far as may be fastened steadfastly!

(59) And in this Tincture of the first Principle, the Devil tempted Man; for it is his Source, [Well-spring, or Property,] wherein he also lives. Herein he reaches into the Heart of Man, into his Soul's Essences, and leads him away from God, into the Desire to live in the sharp (viz. in the fiery) Essences, that it might be elevated above the Humility and the Meekness of the Heart of God, and above the Love and Meekness of the Creatures, [on Purpose to seem] to be the only fair and glistering Worm in the Fire-flash, and to domineer over the second Principle. And [thus] he makes the Soul of Man so extremely proud, as not to vouchsafe himself to be in the least like any Meekness, but to be like all whatsoever lives in a Quality [or Property] contrary to it.

(3) Nor could one reach, in counting, unto twenty So swiftly, as a portion of these angels Disturbed the subject of your elements. The rest remained, and they began this art Which thou discernest, with so great delight That never from their circling do they cease. The occasion of the fall was the accursed Presumption of that One, whom thou hast seen By all the burden of the world constrained. Those whom thou here beholdest modest were To recognise themselves as of that goodness Which made them apt for so much understanding; On which account their vision was exalted By the enlightening grace and their own merit, So that they have a full and steadfast will. I would not have thee doubt, but certain be, 'Tis meritorious to receive this grace, According as the affection opens to it. Now round about in this consistory Much mayst thou contemplate, if these my words Be gathered up, without all further aid. But since upon the earth, throughout your schools, They teach that such is the angelic nature That it doth hear, and recollect, and will,

(34) Behold, thou Child of Man, if thou wilt easily draw near to this Knowledge, take but thy Mind before thee, and consider it, and therein thou wilt find all. You know, that out of it proceeds Joy and Sorrow, Laughter and Weeping, Hope and Doubting, Wrath and Love, Lust to a Thing, and Hate of the Thing: You find therein Wrath and Malice, also Love, Meekness, and Well-doing.

(440) that when a man’s desires violently prevail over his reason, he reviles himself, and is angry at the violence within him, and that in this struggle, which is like the struggle of factions in a State, his spirit is on the side of his reason;— but for the passionate or spirited element to take part with the desires when reason decides that she should not be opposed 3 , is a sort of thing which I believe that you never observed occurring in yourself, nor, as I should imagine, in any one else? Certainly not. Suppose that a man thinks he has done a wrong to another, the nobler he is the less able is he to feel indignant at any suffering, such as hunger, or cold, or any other pain which the injured person may inflict upon him—these he deems to be just, and, as I say, his anger refuses to be excited by them. True, he said. But when he thinks that he is the sufferer of the wrong, then he boils and chafes, and is on the side of what he believes to be justice; and because he suffers hunger or cold or other pain he is only the more determined to persevere and conquer. His noble spirit will not be quelled until he either slays or is slain; or until he hears the voice of the shepherd, that is, reason, bidding his dog bark no more. The illustration is perfect, he replied; and in our State, as we were saying, the auxiliaries were to be dogs, and to hear the voice of the rulers, who are their shepherds. I perceive, I said, that you quite understand me; there is, however, a further point which I wish you to consider.

(2) And if "thou prayest in the closet," as the Lord taught, "to worship in spirit," thy management will no longer be solely occupied about the house, but also about the soul, what must be bestowed on it, and how, and how much; and what must be laid aside and treasured up in it; and when it ought to be produced, and to whom. For it is not by nature, but by learning, that people become noble and good, as people also become physicians and pilots. We all in common, for example, see the vine and the horse. But the husbandman will know if the vine be good or bad at fruit-bearing; and the horseman will easily distinguish between the spiritless and the swift animal. But that some are naturally predisposed to virtue above others, certain pursuits of those, who are so naturally predisposed above others, show. But that perfection in virtue is not the exclusive property of those, whose natures are better, is proved, since also those who by nature are ill-disposed towards virtue, in obtaining suitable training, for the most part attain to excellence; and, on the other hand, those whose natural dispositions are apt, become evil through neglect.