(12) When a house is burning, and the fire may fall upon the next house and seize upon the straw and like stuff within it, we carry this stuff away from it; and in like manner must we straightway cast out the things by touch whereof the spirit is inflamed with the fire of wrath, for fear lest the substance of our merit be consumed.

(84) And so instead of the paradisical Joy and Refreshment, there has been a mere Brimstone-Spirit, which stands in Anguish and Trembling, of Corruption [or Fragility,] which kindles the Tincture of the Blood, wherein Tearing, Stinging, and Tormenting is wrought; and if the Fire in the Brimstone-Spirit be too much kindled, then it burns the Tincture up, and the Light of Life goes out, and then the Body falls away to be a dead-Carcase; and if the tart Sourness be kindled too much by the hard Attracting and Holding, then also the Light of Life goes out, and the Body perishes; so also of the Water; if the Tincture kindles itself in the Meekness, then it becomes windy, gross, swelled, wholly dark, also infectious.and corrupt, wherein the Flash of the Life is as a pricking Thorn. And so Man's Life is every where begirt with Enemies, and the poor Soul is always in a close Prison fettered with many Chains, and is continually in Fear that (when the Body shall [die or] break) it may fall into the Kingdom of the Executioner, the Devil.

(176) If thou extendeth the Fiery Mind to the work of piety, thou wilt preserve the fluxible body.

(2) I say not that thou shalt continue ever therein alike fresh, for that may not be. For sometime sickness and other unordained dispositions in body and in soul, with many other needfulness to nature, will let thee full much, and ofttimes draw thee down from the height of this working. But I say that thou shouldest evermore have it either in earnest or in game; that is to say, either in work or in will. And therefore for God’s love be wary with sickness as much as thou mayest goodly, so that thou be not the cause of thy feebleness, as far as thou mayest. For I tell thee truly, that this work asketh a full great restfulness, and a full whole and clean disposition, as well in body as in soul.

AND from the time that thou feelest that thou hast done that in thee is, lawfully to amend thee at the doom of Holy Church, then shalt thou set thee sharply to work in this work. And then if it so be that thy foredone special deeds will always press in thy remembrance betwixt thee and thy God, or any new thought or stirring of any sin either, thou shalt stalwartly step above them with a fervent stirring of love, and tread them down under thy feet. And try to cover them with a thick cloud of forgetting, as they never had been done in this life of thee nor of other man either. And if they oft rise, oft put them down: and shortly to say, as oft as they rise, as oft put them down. And if thee think that the travail be great, thou mayest seek arts and wiles and privy subtleties of ghostly devices to put them away: the which subtleties be better learned of God by the proof than of any man in this life.

(30) Thou must continue steadfast in this resolute Purpose; and though thou gettest no Virtue [or Strength] into thy Heart, and though the Devil also should beat down thy Tongue, that thou couldst not pray to God, yet then thou shouldst desire and sigh to him, and continually hold and go on in this Thought and Purpose, with the Canaanitish Woman; the more thou pressest forward, the weaker the Devil is; thou must take the suffering Death and Satisfaction of Jesus Christ before thee, and must throw thy Soul into his Promise; where he says, My Father will give the Holy Ghost to them that ask him for it. Also, Knock, and it shall be opened unto you; seek, and you shall find; ask, and you shall receive; and the more earnestly thou pressest forth from the Devil, and from thy Sins, the more mightily does the Kingdom of God press into thee; but have a Care that thou dost not depart from this thy Will, before thou hast received the Jewel; and though it holds off from Morning till Night, and still from Day to Day, [let not that discourage thee,] if thy Earnestness be great, then thy Jewel will also be great which thou shalt receive at thy Over-coming.

(18) Understand [or consider] it right; it is the Source- spirit [or working Spirit] out of the Gall which kindles the Heart, whereby the Life was stirred, which is choked as soon as the Tincture in the Blood of the Heart is extinguished. The right Soul has no Need of such Going-forth, it is much more subtle than the Brimstone- spirit, though (in the Life-time) it is in one only Substance.

(7) And therefore take heed to this work, and to the marvellous manner of it within in thy soul. For if it be truly conceived, it is but a sudden stirring, and as it were unadvised, speedily springing unto God as a sparkle from the coal. And it is marvellous to number the stirrings that may be in one hour wrought in a soul that is disposed to this work. And yet in one stirring of all these, he may have suddenly and perfectly forgotten all created thing. But fast after each stirring, for corruption of the flesh, it falleth down again to some thought or to some done or undone deed. But what thereof? For fast after, it riseth again as suddenly as it did before.

(41) What is it now that thou hast after thy Corrupting, when thou diest? Consider thyself, what is it that thou art [then?] Thou art a Spirit: But what Kind of Source [or Property] is it that thou hast in thee? [Surely thou hast in thee] Anger, Wickedness, Pride, Self-seeking, Wilfulness, (in raising up thyself after temporal Pleasure, but finding none;) [thou hast] a false Mind in the Spirit, full of Lies and Deceit, and murderous, [arising in thee] out of the Essences. As thou wast upon Earth towards Men, just so it is [then] with such a Spirit as is gone forth from thee out of the corruptible Body of the Element. And where shall that [then] remain when this World perishes? Dost thou suppose that it shall [then] be an Angel? Has it an angelical Quality, [Source or Property?] Is its Source [or Quality] in Love, Humility, and Meekness? Is it in the divine Obedience, in the Light of Joy?

(44) Thou dear Soul, thus saith the high Spirit to thee; yield Infusion. up thy Mind here, and I will show it thee. Behold, what does comprehend thy Will, or wherein consists thy Life? If thou sayest, in Water and Flesh: No, it consists in the Fire, in the Warmth. If the Warmth was not, then thy Body would be stiff [with Cold,] and the Water would dry away; therefore the Mind and the Life consists in the Fire.

(64) But thou mad World, what shall the Spirit say [of thee?] art thou not my Brother? The Essences of my Spirit stir thee, go forth out of thy Beast, and then I go with my Companions into the Garden of Roses, into the Lily of God. Why keepest thou back, and sufferest thyself to be held by the Devil? Is he not thy Enemy, he does but hunt after thy Pearl; and if he gets it, then thy Spirit becomes a Worm and Beast in its Figure. Why sufferest thou thy angelical Image to be taken away, for temporal Pleasure Sake? Thy Pleasure is only in the corruptible Beast. But what does that avail the Soul? If thou dost not go out from it, thou wilt get eternal Woe and Sorrow by it.