(47) On the contrary, many a one is in great Anguish, and longs after it, and generates very painfully, he would fain have uit; but then the Devil rushes upon him, and stirs up Irksomeness [Vexation] and Discontent, and also overwhelms him with great Sins, so that he knows not himself, and then dejects him with Impatience and Doubting; and his Heart stands continually in Anguish, it would fain get out of Evil, and endeavours continually for Abstinence or Forbearance, many Times with Groans, Sighing, and Longing, but then the Devil holds his Sins before him, and bars up the Door of the Grace of God, that he might despair.

(49) Therefore he stands often in Doubt and Impatience; and in such a Man there is great Strife; he knows not himself. He sees and knows nothing else but his Wickedness, and yet is born in God; for his Spirit continually breaks the Gate of the Darkness, but then the Anger in him holds him back that he cannot enter in, but yet sometimes he reaches a Glimpse, from whence the Soul is cheered, and the Pearl is sown in a very dark Valley.

(18) Indeed the Driver said at the Beginning, that it should have Rest with being quiet; but it was Rest only to Flesh and Blood, and yet it was no Quietness neither, but a Furtherance to the Hunting. But when the Mind found itself in great Unquietness of Soul, it recollected the Soul, and sought the Pearl which the Soul had before, and supposed that it lay as a Treasure in the Case of the Soul, but it was gone; and then the Mind sought that [Pearl] in Body and Soul, and behold it was not there, it could not be found; and there was nothing to be seen but the Devil's sour Apples, which were strewed before the Soul, that it should feed on them. But the Soul stood in great Perplexity, and would not eat of its evil Fruit; it called its Virgin, but she sat as if she was asleep.

(50) And then when he considers the sweet Fore-taste of the Pearl which he had, then the Soul would fain go through, and it seeks the Pearl; but then comes the black Spirit, and covers it from him, and then the Storm and Strife about the Pearl begins, each would have its Right; the Soul would have it, and then the Devil covers it, and casts the Wrath and a Sin before it, that the Soul should behold itself therein; then there falls to be Weakness and Neglect, so that the poor Soul becomes weary, faint, and timorous, and so sits still, and thinks continually of some other Way to Abstinence, [or Amendment,] how it might best get the Pearl.

(71) For he is always shut up in the first Principle (as in the eternal Death,) and yet he raises himself up continually, thinking to reach the Heart of God, and to domineer over it; for his bitter Sting in the Birth climbs up thus eternally in the Source of the Fire, and affords him a proud Will to have all [at his Pleasure,] but he attains nothing; his Food is the Source of Water, viz. the Brimstone-Spirit, which is the most aking Mother, from which the indissoluble Band is fed and nourished; his Refreshing is the eternal Fire, and eternal Freezing in the harsh Mother, an eternal Hunger in the Bitterness, an eternal Thirst in the Source of the Fire; his climbing up is his Fall, the more he climbs up in his Will, the greater is his Fall; like one that standing upon a high Clift, would cast himself down into a bottomless Pit, he looks still further, and he falls in further and further, and yet can find no Ground.

(21) It goes not out at the Mouth like a Bodily Substance; it is raw [or naked] without a Body, and instantly passes (at the Departure of the four Elements) into the Center, into the Gate of the Deep, [in the hidden Eternity;] and that which it is clothed with, that it comprehends, and keeps it: If its Treasure be Voluptuousness, Might, [or Power,] Honour, Riches, Malice, Wrath, Lying, or the Falshood of the World, then the fierce Might of the Essences out of the first Principle comprehends these Things, through the syderial Spirit, and keeps them, and works therewith according to the Region of the Stars; yet the [starry Region] cannot bring the Spirit of the Soul into its own Form, but it practises its juggling therewith, and so there is no Rest in its Worm, and its Worm of the Soul hangs to its Treasure; as Christ said, Where thy Treasure is, there is thy Heart also.

(1) WONDERFULLY is a man’s affection varied in ghostly feeling of this nought when it is nowhere wrought. For at the first time that a soul looketh thereupon, it shall find all the special deeds of sin that ever he did since he was born, bodily or ghostly, privily or darkly painted thereupon. And howsoever that he turneth it about, evermore they will appear before his eyes; until the time be, that with much hard travail, many sore sighings, and many bitter weepings, he have in great part washed them away. Sometime in this travail him think that it is to look thereupon as on hell; for him think that he despaireth to win to perfection of ghostly rest out of that pain. Thus far inwards come many, but for greatness of pain that they feel and for lacking of comfort, they go back in beholding of bodily things: seeking fleshly comforts without, for lacking of ghostly they have not yet deserved, as they should if they had abided.

(3) This sorrow, if it be truly conceived, is full of holy desire: and else might never man in this life abide it nor bear it. For were it not that a soul were somewhat fed with a manner of comfort of his right working, else should he not be able to bear the pain that he hath of the witting and feeling of his being. For as oft as he would have a true witting and a feeling of his God in purity of spirit, as it may be here, and sithen feeleth that he may not—for he findeth evermore his witting and his feeling as it were occupied and filled with a foul stinking lump of himself, the which behoveth always be hated and be despised and forsaken, if he shall be God’s perfect disciple learned of Himself in the mount of perfection—so oft, he goeth nigh mad for sorrow. Insomuch, that he weepeth and waileth, striveth, curseth, and banneth; and shortly to say, him thinketh that he beareth so heavy a burthen of himself that he careth never what betides him, so that God were pleased. And yet in all this sorrow he desireth not to unbe: for that were devil’s madness and despite unto God. But him listeth right well to be; and he intendeth full heartily thanking to God, for the worthiness and the gift of his being, for all that he desire unceasingly for to lack the witting and the feeling of his being.

(1) IF we consider now (in the Light of Nature) of Man, the Image of God, of his Beginning, and of his eternal Enduring, Being, [or Substance,] and then of the Breaking of his Body, how Body and Soul part asunder, and whither the Souls go, when the Spirit of their Breath does break [or dissolve] in them, and the Springing or Moving in the Tincture of this World does cease, then we find the Ground of the Unquietness of the Soul, when it is separated from the Body, [being] unregenerated; from whence Lamentation and Desiring arise; from whence then the Babel of Confusion has risen, so that very many Things have therefore been invented to ransom Souls [out of Distress.]

(1) BUT one thing I tell thee, that in this work may a young disciple that hath not yet been well used and proved in ghostly working, full lightly be deceived; and, but he be soon wary, and have grace to leave off and meek him to counsel, peradventure be destroyed in his bodily powers and fall into fantasy in his ghostly wits. And all this is along of pride, and of fleshliness and curiosity of wit.

(15) To him who possesses discernment, all personal life is misery, because it ever waxes and wanes, is ever afflicted with restlessness, makes ever new dynamic impresses in the mind; and because all its activities war with each other.

(3) I say not that it shall ever last and dwell in all their minds continually, that be called to work in this work. Nay, so is it not. For from a young ghostly prentice in this work, the actual feeling thereof is ofttimes withdrawn for divers reasons. Sometime, for he shall not take over presumptuously thereupon, and ween that it be in great part in his own power to have it when him list, and as him list. And such a weening were pride. And evermore when the feeling of grace is withdrawn, pride is the cause: not ever pride that is, but pride that should be, were it not that this feeling of grace were withdrawn. And thus ween ofttimes some young fools, that God is their enemy; when He is their full friend.

(31) "Every man naturally desires a superiority, to have treasures of Gold and Silver [intellect and soul], and to seem great in the eyes of the world. God indeed created all things for the use of man, that he might rule over them, and acknowledge therein the singular goodness and omnipotence of God, give Him thanks for His benefits, honor Him and praise Him. But there is no man looks after these things, otherwise than by spending his days idly; they would enjoy them without any previous labor and danger; neither do they look them out of that place where God hath treasured them up, Who expects also that man should seek for them there, and to those that seek will He give them. But there is not any that labors for a possession in that place, and therefore these riches are not found: For the way to this place, and the place itself hath been unknown for a long time, and it is hidden from the greatest part of the world. But notwithstanding it be difficult and laborious to find Out this way and place, yet the place should be sought after.

(38) Hast thou been a proud vain-glorious, selfishly Potent, and one that has for thy Pleasure Sake oppressed the Needy, then such a Spirit goes forth from thee, and then so it is in the Eternity, where it can neither keep nor get any Thing for [to feed] its Covetousness, neither can it adorn its Body with any Thing, but with that which is there, and yet it climbs up eternally in its Pride, for there is no other Source in it; and thus in its Rising it reaches into nothing else but the stern Might of the Fire in its Elevation; it inclines itself in its Will continually in such a Purpose as it did in this World; as it was wont to do here, so all appears in its Tincture, therein itclimbs up eternally in the Abyss of Hell.

(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.

(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.

(11) Also let a man mark, when he is in this hell, nothing may console him; and he cannot believe that he shall ever be released or comforted. But when he is in heaven, nothing can trouble him; he believeth also that none will ever be able to offend or trouble him, albeit it is indeed true, that after this hell he may be comforted and released, and after this heaven he may be troubled and left without consolation. Again: this hell and this heaven come about a man in such sort, that he knoweth not whence they come; and whether they come to him, or depart from him, he can of himself do nothing towards it. Of these things he can neither give nor take away from himself, bring them nor banish them, but as it is written, “The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,” that is to say, at this time present, “but thou knowest not whence it cometh, nor whither it goeth.”12 And when a man is in one of these two states, all is right with him, and he is as safe in hell as in heaven, and so long as a man is on earth, it is possible for him to pass ofttimes from the one into the other; nay even within the space of a day and night, and all without his own doing. But when the man is in neither of these two states he holdeth converse with the creature, and wavereth hither and thither, and knoweth not what manner of man he is. Therefore he shall never forget either of them, but lay up the remembrance of them in his heart.

(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.

(12) She promiseth much, and performeth little. Moreover there liveth no man on earth who may always have rest and peace without troubles and crosses, with whom things always go according to his will; there is always something to be suffered here, turn which way you will. And as soon as you are quit of one assault, perhaps two come in its place. Wherefore yield thyself willingly to them, and seek only that true peace of the heart, which none can take away from thee, that thou mayest overcome all assaults. Thus then, Christ meant that inward peace which can break through all assaults and crosses of oppression, suffering, misery, humiliation and what more there may be of the like, so that a man may be joyful and patient therein, like the beloved disciples and followers of Christ. Now he who will in love give his whole diligence and might thereto, will verily come to know that true eternal peace which is God Himself, as far as it is possible to a creature; insomuch that what was bitter to him before, shall become sweet, and his heart shall remain unmoved under all changes, at all times, and after this life, he shall attain unto everlasting peace.

(2) And therefore, an I might get a waking and a busy beholding to this ghostly work within in my soul, I would then have a heedlessness in eating and in drinking, in sleeping and in speaking, and in all mine outward doings. For surely I trow I should rather come to discretion in them by such a heedlessness, than by any busy beholding to the same things, as I would by that beholding set a mark and a measure by them. Truly I should never bring it so about, for ought that I could do or say. Say what men say will, and let the proof witness. And therefore lift up thine heart with a blind stirring of love; and mean now sin, and now God. God wouldest thou have, and sin wouldest thou lack. God wanteth thee; and sin art thou sure of. Now good God help thee, for now hast thou need!