spiritual or imaginary as they would sometimes make us believe why would Jesus Christ have made us to ask so many different things If Paradise were not accompanied with the Earth and with all the Creatures which we see and with our Body with all its Functions why must we pray to have our daily Bread when there will be no need of Eating Why should we pray that the Name of God may be Hallowed seeing all the Blessed have always Hallowed it and will never cease to do it tho' we should not pray for it Must there not be in this a Sense which we have not as yet discovered and that this Hallowing of the Name of God ought to be underderstood that all the Men who are upon Earth may Hallow his Name for it cannot be done fully by Angels by the Blessed and by some particular Souls living upon Earth But this Name must be Hallowed generally by all Men in Body and in Soul Which will be when this Kingdom shall come wherein the Will of God shall be done upon Earth as the Angels and the Blessed do it in Heaven and wherein shall be given us also our daily Bread that is every day in particular Graces in abundance for our Souls and all sort of delights to satisfie our Bodies wherein we shall pardon our Brethren their Sins as we shall see that God has pardoned us in giving us besides Pardon Eternal Happiness wherein there shall be no Temptations of the Enemy nor of our Nature for it will not any longer feel any vicious Inclinations where in short there can never enter any Evil but all sort of Happiness of Joy and of Contentments Perfect and Compleat Incomprehensibly Delightful This is what S. Paul saw when he said That they had never entred into the Mind of Man the things which God had prepared for his Elect. All the Holy Scriptures are full of this Kingdom which is to come to us This is the Feast signified by the Parable of the King Who made a Marriage for his Son This Son is Jesus Christ who is Allied with the Human Creature His Nativity in Flesh was but the betrothing wherein he has indeed promised unto Man an Alliance as he had done before to Abraham which will be accomplish'd and consummated only at the coming of Jesus upon Earth in Glory when he shall be perfectly United to Man Body and Soul with the Divinity all together This is that also which is signified unto us by the Parable Of the Master who went into a far Country giving Talents to his Servants to every one according to his Ability and at his return he demanded of each of them an account to give them their Wages Jesus Christ having given his Graces and Talents by his Gospel has ascended unto his Father which is the Long Journey But he will return in his Glory to demand an account of every one of all the Graces received in this time and to place his faithful Servants over great things and make them enter into the Joy of their Lord. This is also the Parable Of the Master who made a Feast and sent his Servants to call those that were bidden who all excused themselves One had bought Oxen another a Field another had taken a Wife The Birth of Jesus Christ was the time when he came to invite Men to the Feast which God would make that he might take his delight with Men and as soon as the day shall come that all shall be ready upon Earth for receiving the Son of Man in his Glory those who were invited by his Evangelical Doctrin will excuse themselves One will say I have been a Merchant I must wait upon my Merchandise I cannot attend it Another will say I have been a Labourer I must take care of my Labours I cannot attend it Another will say I have been Married I must satisfie my Wife and Family I cannot attend it And when Jesus Christ will swear that none of those who were called shall taste of his Banquet That is that all they who have received the Gospel and have not obeyed it shall never enter into his Kingdom For no State or Condition ought to hinder the observing of the Doctrin of the Gospel For Jesus Christ has not brought it from Heaven for the Monks or Religious only seeing there were none such then but he has brought it for all Christians in general whom he has particularly invited to make this Alliance with them And they who would not observe this Holy Doctrin shall never taste the Delights of that Marriage Feast All the other Parables speak of nothing but this Kingdom of Jesus Christ upon Earth when he compares this Kingdom of Heaven to A Grain of Mustard he signifies that it will be only the Little and the Humble who shall inherit this Kingdom and when they shall be mortified upon Earth they will grow so strongly that the Angels of Heaven shall come to rest in their Branches And when this Kingdom of Heaven is compared To a Treasure hid in the ground that he who has found it ought to sell All that he has to buy this ground that he may have this Treasure That is that this Kingdom of Jesus Christ is hid from the Judgment of the Wise being as it were sunk in the ground till the time appointed and then it shall be found by the Simple who labour in this Life to find the Kingdom of Heaven and when they shall discover it they will sell all that they have that they may follow this Evangelical Life In short Sir time would fail me to relate to you in particular all the Parables with all the Passages of Holy Scripture which treat of this Kingdom of Jesus Christ upon Earth because it treats of nothing so much as this as well in the Old as in the New Testament The Song of Zaohary is that he saw by a Prophetical Spirit the Re-establishment of the People of God in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ The Song of the Virgin Mary speaks of no other thing For what ground would she have had to rejoyce in the Lord since all his Life was a train of Sadness and Sorrow What ground would she have had to Sing his Magnificence since she saw him so Poor and Despised in the Stable of Bethlehem and pursued to Death in his Tender Infancy as he was all the rest of his Life What ground of rejoycing to see him Imprisoned and Accused as a Malefactor The Sword of Sorrow had always pierc'd her Heart to see her Son God and Man Beaten Torn and at last Hang'd upon a Cross in her presence It must needs be that her Joy proceeded from a Prophetick Spirit in seeing that one day he would be upon Earth in Glory wherein all Generations would call her Blessed which has never been done For none Praise her but a small number of Christians amidst so many Nations And that sometimes in such a
great desire of Vertue and an absolute resolution of embracing an Evangelical Life having discovered sufficiently by her Discourses that without this no Body will be saved Her Words have so enlightened my Understanding that all the Learning I had acquired seems to me as Darkness and Ignorance in respect of that divine Wisdom which is so mercifully poured out upon the Earth by the Organ of a silly Maid I wish that every one had seen her and heard her as I have done and might receive thereby the same Operations which my Soul has felt for I look upon her Acquaintance as a greater favour than all the Graces and Favours which God has bestowed on me in this World yea even than my Creation it self for that would serve me in little stead without the working out of my Salvation which would have been in great danger if I had not attain'd to the knowledge of my Self and of the Designs and Marvels of God which I have learned and discovered by the means of this Creature and she has certainly been sent me as the only means of the perfection of my Soul and of all those who will profit by the recital of this Narrative which I find my self obliged to publish for the profit of many This is the true Treasure hid in the Earth He who shall find it ought to sell all that he has to buy this Ground to the end he may discover and find this Treasure and take it up with Joy as the most precious Thing of the World I cannot hinder some who wish Evil or are Enemies to the Truth from finding or pretending something that is not agreeable to them for the Light does always offend Blear-Eyes who cannot endure the Light and the Truth which reproves is never agreeable to our Senses But I would admonish them to beware of reprehending or making themselves Masters of the holy Spirit I behov'd for some time to suspend my Judgment as to the Belief of some Points of Doctrin for I had learn'd them from my Masters in another sense but since I have laid aside all these Authors who have written us their Sentiments and fix'd on the sacred Text of the holy Scriptures I have found so much Conformity in them with the Life Manners and Words of this Pilgrimess that no Doubts could come any longer into my Mind and I could not without betraying my Conscience give her so much as one Contradiction Since that gives me an infallible proof that this Soul is truly possest by the holy Spirit who has brought forth in her his Twelve Fruits his Seven Gifts and the Eight Beatitudes which Jesus Christ has taught I should believe I committed a great sin to think that any other Thing might proceed from such a Source than what is Divine so much the rather that I have always remarked that this Soul did act in nothing naturally but by supernatural Motives never being moved but by the motion of the holy Spirit In confirmation of which I would be ready to spend the last drop of my Blood to the end that none might reject this Light to love rather their Darkness as Jesus Christ has foretold that many would do but that every one may embrace it for Salvation to the end we may altogether enjoy the Kingdom of Jesus Christ which is here so particularly treated of with eternal Joy and Contentment Which is earnestly wisht you by Friendly Reader Your most affectionate in JESVS CHRIST Christian de Cort Superiour of the Oratory and Pastor of St. John at Mechlin At Mechlin the 10th of August 1667. M. A. B.'s Confession of Faith which she presented at the Court of Gottorp to oppose the Calumnies which the Church-men had spread that they might raise Suspicions of the Purity of her Faith I. I Am a Christian and I believe all that a true Christian ought to believe II. I was baptized in the Catholick Church in the Name of the Father in the Name of the Son in the Name of the Holy Ghost III. I believe the Twelve Articles of the Creed or the Apostles Symbol and I do not doubt of any one Article thereof IV. I believe that Jesus Christ is true God and that he is also true Man and that he is the Saviour and Redeemer of the World V. I believe in the Gospels the holy Prophets and all the holy Scripture both of the Old and New Testament And I will live and die in all the Points of this Belief which I protest before God and Men to all those whom it shall concern In Testimony whereof I have signed this my true Confession with my Hand and seal'd it with my Seal At Sleeswick the 11th of March 1675. Anthoniette Bourignon L. S. A Catalogue of the BOOKS written by M. A. B. born at L'Isle in Flanders 1. THE Life of M. Antonia Bourignon 2. God's Call and Men's Refusal in 2 parts 3. Light arisen in Darkness in 4 parts 4. The Grave of false Theology driven out by the true coming of the holy Spirit in 4 parts 5. An Advertisement against the Quakers 6. A Treatise of solid Vertue in 2 parts 7. The Light of the World in 3 parts 8. The Academy of learn'd Divines in 3 parts 9. The Testimony of the Truth in 2 parts 10. Innocence manifested and Truth discovered 11. The Touchstone 12. The Blindness of Men now in 2 parts 13. Antichrist discovered in 3 parts 14. The new Heaven and the new Earth 15. The holy Perspective 16. The last Mercy of God 17. The renewing of the Gospel Spirit in 3 parts 18. The Stones of the New Jerusalem 19. The Persecutions of the Just 20. The Morning Star 21. The Confusion of the Builders of Babel 22. Saving Instructions and Advices The most part of these Works are Translated from the French into the Dutch and High Dutch the first part of Solid Vertue the Touchstone and the first part of the renewing of the Gospel Spirit are also in Latin A Table of the Conferences of this first Part of the Light of the World The First Dialogue or Conference OF Gods dealing with A. B. particularly how he immediately instructed her from her Infancy The opposition of Men. Of Christian perfection and of the deplorable state of Christians Pag. 1. The second Conference Of the Judgment of God Of the last times and of the Men of the last times 17. The third Conference The methods by which Christianity has begun to decay from the times of the Apostles and has continued so to do to such a degree that at present there are no more true Christians upon Earth to wit 1. The admission of false Brethren 2. Appropriation 3. Debates 4. Partialities 5. Scholars 6. Disputes 7. The Victory of the Devil 23. The fourth Conference Of the Qualities and Manner of acting which ought to have been in the Guides of the Church to uphold it in its good Estate against all Enemies and not give way to the Spirit of Antichrist as they
said Sir This Submission is the Preparation required For if you set up for the Doctour or for the knowing Man you will oppose the Light of the Holy Spirit the Source of all Wisdom It must alwayes be believed and acknowledged that he is wiseâ— than all the Doctours that ever were in â—he World and that we learn more by a small â—ay of his Light than by a Hundred Years of very assiduous Study Therefore reckon all your Learning Ignorance and become as a Child newly born again that you may receive these new Notices which will give you more Light than all the Fathers had together Because they never discovered the hid Treasures for the Time was not yet come Every one spoke of it according to his Conceit and not according to what it really was For it was a Sealed Book that none was worthy to open but Jesus Christ himself after he was put to death and Crucified To this very Time there is nothing in all the Holy Scripture fulfilled but this Death which will make way for the Wonders of God that have remained hid till now and begin to be revealed to those who shall be humble in Heart But the Wise shall perish with their Wisdom Therefore I exhort you Sir to Simplicity and Submission that you may be worthy to receive the Light which breaks forth in our Days and to behold the New Jerusalem descend from Heaven adorned as a Bride in the Day of her Espousals The Alliance of God with Men will then be accomplished The Earth will then be renewed All Creatures will quit their Malignity which shall be confined to the Center of the Earth to torment the Bodies and Souls of all those who would not submit their Wills to God They shall receive Pains and Anguish according to the Measure of their Sins being overwhelmed with the Malignities which were caused by these Sins The Eighteenth Conference Speaks of Hell and of the Damned which shall be they who have followed their own Will which is the cause of all Evil and that few are disposed to quit it that they may resign themselves to God and receive the Divine Truth I asked her If all Men who will not submit their Will to God shall be confined to Hell She said Yes Sir assuredly they shall None shall escape Hell who have followed their own Will And this most righteously For God cannot save him who withdraws from him and who with his full Reason and the Consent of his Will will independently follow his own Inclinations as if he were Soveraign and without a Creatour We know well enough we cannot save our selves and that our Salvation depends upon God and yet we hope to be saved though we have quitted our Dependance upon God and adhere to our selves This is a false Perswasion which the Devil and the World set before us to make us insensible of our Misery For God will never save him who will not depend upon him If through Frailty we commit some Acts of Independence upon God and afterwards repent of them we may yet hope for Pardon But when we see that all Men live and dye in following their own Wills and will not leave it off being readier to murmur against God than to yield up their Wills to him he must of necessity render to them according to their Works God made no Malignity in the Elements nor in any other Creatures having created all good and perfect But Sin and the Self-will of Man has brought a Malignity into all Things And therefore it belongs to him as being the Work of his Hands And if it be just to render to each one what belongs to him it is necessary that Man have for his Portion the Malignity of all the Creatures to all Eternity as being the Works of his Hands that the Fire burn him the Water swallow him up the Wind bluster the Earth be Thorns to prick him the Dogs bite him the Wolf devour him the Lion tear him the Serpent poyson him and all the other Creatures shall spue out their Malignity upon Man who brought it upon them by forsaking his Dependance upon God I said to her That upon this Supposition all shall be damned Because none resign their Will to God since every one enjoyes it as much as is possible for them She replied Sir I have told you long ago that Paradise was shut and that none did any longer enter into it Because no Body resigns his Will to that of God The Maximes of the Church have so blinded Mens Spirits by so many different wayes of Salvation that none consider the Obligation that lies on them to resign their Wills to God They think to be saved by going to Church frequenting the Sacraments c. though nevertheless they follow their own Will in every Thing This ruines all the World and has caused the general Judgment For God having beheld all the Earth found not one who was resigned to him nor so much as one that did good All having forsaken God to follow their own Wills And this general Evil has caused the general Sentence which is irrevocable Because there is Time no longer If any desires to be converted he must make haste For the Last Times are near their End They began when Jesus Christ became Man and by Grace have continued till now to give Man a full Measure and abundance of Time for his Conversion Time is come to its End Yet a little Suffering and the Judgment will end and the Wicked shall go to the Abyss of all Evils and the Converted to the Enjoyment of all Good which shall never end and that not only spiritual but also bodily and material For all the Creatures will render their Duty to Man as soon as he shall pay his Duty to God They were created to serve for the Delight of Man as he was created to serve for the Delight of God And as soon as he shall be converted and enter into a Dependance upon his God he shall experience that the Beasts and Elements shall submit also to the Will of Man For for this they were all created And if we see the Beasts and Elements rebel against Man this is for no other reason but because he rebels against his God For else all inferiour Things would be entirely subject to Man if he were entirely subject to God even though it were in this Miserable Life We have Examples of this in the Life of many Saints who because they resigned their Wills to God had in this Time of Penitence the Power to command the Elements and to be familiar with the Wild Beasts One carried Fire without being burnt by it Another stay'd the Sun And several have tam'd Wild Beasts and commanded the Wind and Tempests of the Sea with so many other Wonders playing with Serpents and recreating themselves with Birds which assembled by
be found in either of these cases And 't is that only we ought to examine without regulating our judgments according to the differences we observe between the persons that speak to us For in Jesus Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek Roman or no Roman Male nor Female It is here a Maid that speaks to you none of those great Men who are so frequently reprov'd Do not verify by your experience that saying of the Scripture When the rich and mighty speak all hold their peace and what he says they extol to the heavens but when the mean man speaks they say who is this even tho' he offer wise things they would not yield to him If there be any valuable prejudice it should certainly be in favour of the meanest weakest and most contemptible persons since God himself has declared 't is his pleasure to make use of them and Jesus Christ was so rejoyced at that choice that he says to his Father I thank thee O Father Lord of heaven and earth that thou hast hid these things from the wise and from the learned and hast revealed them unto Babes even so Father since so it seemed good unto thee Is there any thing meaner weaker and more contemptible in the esteem of the World in the matters of Doctrin than a Maid And can any thing be more proper to verify that declaration of the choice of God He has also promis'd the pouring out of his Spirit in the last times upon Daughters as one of the most signal marks of his power And certainly the weakness of the instrument is an evident sign of him who employs it It is plain that such an extraordinary effect must proceed from a cause that is extraordinarily powerful and that cause must be God himflef when the effect is good and useful Secondly in Divine things you must have no regard to the natural qualities of the mind or rather to the human means by which 't is cultivated such as Sciences Study Reading and the like Divine truth is so far from depending on such things that 't is rather obscur'd by them It may be justly reckon'd a prodigy if such unnatural methods should be attended with success when men endeavour to derive into ill prepared Vessels by the exercise of ther corrupt faculties things that are altogether independent upon them and are freely infus'd by a calm insinuation into Souls that are at rest from their own tumults Truly we might be astonish'd if the Learned should find solid truth by persuing such methods as would certainly banish it out of their minds if they were already possess'd of it Man having lost saith Solomon by much reasoning the uprightness in which God created him But when God speaks to us by simple and unlearned laiks we cannot suspect them as we would suspect the Learned that they feed us with their studied speculations or the prejudices they have drunk in at Schools and drawn from the works of Men and repeat to us the songs their Teachers have taught them to sing The Person who speaks here is without study even without reading and which is more without meditation Search a little to find out the source of this fountain and to understand well what Master could have instructed her it could neither be Man the Devil nor Nature But the thing which you ought most to observe that you have no regard to the conduct of Men. I mean that you do not imagine that the Truth much less Salvation depends upon them their Opinions Orders Directions Submission or that it is tied to them by a necessary bond since it has no essential union but with God alone and may be forsaken by all men if they will as any man may and too many actually do This unhappy prejudice has ruined the Christian Church who imagin'd that she could not possibly fall after she had establish'd her self upon the authority of certain particular Persons human Successions outward Assemblies and other Circumstances that are not at all inconsistent with the Spirit of Error It is certain there are few Christians and even few Catholicks who do not see that the Church is extreamly fallen away and corrupted But the Learned have found out a distinction to charm this evil They say that tho' the Church may fall into a moral corruption and be guilty of back sliding from the practice of a Christian life she is still infallible and incorruptible in matters of Faith It is much to be feared that this distinction serves rather to flatter the Spirit of pride than promote that of Humility which is the Spirit of the Gospel and that it proceeds rather from human interest which prepossesses and darkens even the best minds than from an enlightned charity which designs to excuse the evils of the Church as far as Truth permits May not those who have made this distinction perceive they are so far from excusing the Church or lessening the guilt of her fall that they render her guilty of the fall of Devils whereas her Adversaries pretend only to hold her fallible after a manner conformable to human infirmity It seems they contradict themselves in this distraction for can that which has no faith be incorruptible as to faith and that which is not only destitute of the works of Faith but whose works are corrupted and consequently opposite to those of Faith can that have Faith Shew me says the Apostle Shew me the faith of which thou boastest without thy works and I will shew thee the faith which I possess by my works Treating the Man as vain and empty who would give way to such thoughts What then would he have said of those who maintain that one may be not only destitute of works but that even his works may be evil and habitually evil or which is the same thing that his Manners may be corrupted and that nevertheless he might be infallibly possessed with the purity of the true Faith But it may be they understand by Faith Speculations Notions the knowledge of spiritual Things but St. James reckons those things when they are alone and barren to be a diobolical Faith since he expresly ascribes it to the Devil And how can this diminish or cover the evil of the Church that tho' her Manners are corrupted she has nevertheless with an infallible certainty the knowledge of Divine things and the decerning of Truth and Falshood of good and evil This would be rather to make her fall equal to that of the Devil to make her sin with knowledge in the midst of her light and against it Those who assert this Opinion represent her without conscience render her more odious to God and Men more devilish and condemn her to a place in Hell far below the Infidels rather than if they should say that her Morals are or have been Corrupted for her being mistaken in her Knowledge and believing that to be good and true which is not really so
penitence because they had too much love for themselves and too little affection to seek God esteeming their ease more than the contentment there is in the loving and following of him for this cause they had left her And as for Dangers God preserv'd her she having past thro many dangers without being hurt that her confidence was in him alone who has all power in heaven and in earth that he never forsakes them who put their confidence in him that she reckon'd it a happiness to suffer hunger thirst and other troublesome things since Christ had chosen such sufferings to give us an example and to the end we might follow him and that she had no other intention in this undertaking but to abandon the world to deny her self and to imitate Jesus Christ which she could not so well do in her own Country since the care of temporal wealth the love of friends and the pleasures there are in being honour'd and esteem'd are all things which withdraw from God and hinder the resigning of our selves to him that penitences chosen after our mode are full of self-love but that those which God permits to befal us are pure that the length of the way was not troublesome to her for she had no desire of ever staying in one fixt place because there she found too many distractions by the importunity of the conversation of men who would have disturb'd her inward repose and that she desir'd very much to live unknown We admir'd all this answer for it seem'd not to proceed from human sence since Nature takes no part in so pious a resolution and one must live supernaturally to despise ease friends and honours and to love sufferings and fatigues and flee the conversation of men seeing they are all sociable Creatures delighting themselves among their equals and rejoycing to converse with their like It gave us sentiments of confusion saying one to another what Confusion shall we have in the day of Judgment when simple Girls do such things to please God and we amidst all our Learning and Studies are so far remov'd from such sentiments Truly this Child will condemn us We resolv'd to accompany her and to examine her more narrowly seeing there was something peculiar in her above the spirit and capacity of the female sex for her discourses were firm constant and full of judgment and of divine wisdom tho no ways artificial nor polite but simple and true and in every thing admirable We ask'd her if it was therefore necessary that every one should leave their Country to be sav'd To which she answer'd No for God is to be found every where and in all places that those who are not wedded to any thing have no need of doing it but as for her the removing from her native Country serv'd her as a powerful means to love God alone since before her withdrawing from it her affection was set upon her City her House her Parents her Friends as all appertaining to her but that having done violence to her nature to abandon them she had acquir'd a great liberty of spirit to flie unto God But for other persons who feel no affection to those things which belong to them they may indeed work out their salvation in every place saying that every one ought to examine themselves in this matter as in all others and to remove or avoid all things which hinder them from resigning themselves wholly to God without doing of which there is no salvation And having ask'd her if to be sav'd one must suffer hunger and thirst and all other things troublesome to the body She said That a man ought not to seek nor affect these things but when it pleases God to send them by any accident he ought to suffer them willingly and to rejoyce that he makes us worthy to follow him and to imitate his sufferings Having ask'd her if poverty was necessary to salvation She said That temporal Goods were not evil in themselves but that poverty of spirit was necessary to salvation because a soul who loves and desires temporal goods cannot love God with all his heart nor fulfil the first and the greatest Commandment that riches were a great burthen that they occasion'd great distractions and disquiet that the most secure way was to rid ones self of them unless they serve as means to advance the Glory of God or succour our Neighbour in his necessity that many deceiv'd themselves believing they possest them without affection to them while they would be much troubled to abandon them that we may indeed use them but not love them that many will be damn'd for having lov'd riches and that a great many are stopt in the mid way of Vertue by the cares and desires of riches And asking her if one might not receive honour or suffer to be belov'd by men She said That he who makes himself be honour'd robs the honour which is due to God only and if it be fit to suffer honour for any estate or dignity it ought to be suffer'd with regret as a thing perillous to the infirmity of our corrupt nature which willingly delights in honour which ordinarily tickles the sense and blows up the heart making the soul to perish forasmuch as the honours which we receive without referring them to God are all sins for there is none but God alone who deserves honour and man how great and exalted soever he may be can never merit any thing but contempt and confusion for he being nothing but a silly worm of the earth has notwithstanding rebell'd against his God and Creator And as to the desire of being lov'd by men that this proceeds from self love that our nature affects always to be lov'd to receive some effect of good will from those who love it but that all which is of nature is not of Grace that he who acts spiritually and seeks the perfection of his soul ought to regret and be troubled to see that man who is created only to love God should amuse himself in loving such a creature as he who has no power to better the object which he loves and that it is loss of time and the turning of ones self away from God to love men or to desire to be lov'd by them We may indeed desire that they love God in us for we are all his Images and we may also love them as the Images of God since he commands us to love our Neighbours as our selves for asmuch as both are the Images of the same God but this love ought to be so purely for God that we should have no respect of persons rich poor friends and enemies kindred or strangers and which is very rare to see that in our love we should affect those in whom God lives and operates
never repent of them as long as they presume to be sav d according to the doctrine of the learned of this age This is not against the goodness and mercy of God because he has left us his doctrine in writing in his Gospel and the other holy Scriptures which will never perish according to the promise that heaven and earth shall pass away but his words shall not pass away Every one may have recourse thither without amusing himself with the new inventions of men Leaving the fountain of living waters to draw out of broken Cisterns which can hold no water Ignorance will not excuse sin We feel indeed in our Conscience that we do not follow the doctrine of Jesus Christ that our life and our manners are in nothing conformable to the life of the first Christians that our heart is not inflam'd with the LOVE OF GOD nor Charity to our Neighbour and nevertheless we would flatter our selves with the presumption of our salvation because men do promise it to us who have no power to give it to us no more than to themselves In this point our Ignorance is too gross and affected and will not serve to excuse us before God but will rather serve for our Condemnation for we might always find the truth if we had done our endeavour to seek it But because our Guides have taught us ways of salvation more pleasing to our senses and to our taste we have follow'd them rather than those which Jesus Christ has shewn by his deeds and taught by his word It is just that he abandon us to the spirit of errour since of our own free will we have more esteem'd Error than the Truth which alone leads to Salvation I ask'd her If she did not esteem the Priests and Guides of Souls and if to attain to Salvation we ought not to follow their Instructions She said Yes Sir I honour and esteem true Priests because they ought to be the Ambassadors of God to distribute to the ignorant the points of Faith and the doctrine of Jesus Christ which is the nourishment of all Christian Souls But I may say with a sensible regret that I know no true Priests who are simple Ministers of Jesus Christ only to declare and interpret his word because every one ofthem abounding in their own sense teach that which is most sutable to their inclinations They ought to be nothing but the Organs of the Holy Spirit and it seems they are become his Masters Humane Learning and Studies have depriv'd them of the Gospel simplicity they ascribing to themselves what appertains to God conducting Souls by their own measures not by the Rules of the Gospel forasmuch as they themselves do not follow them Some indeed speak the words of the Gospel but they do so gloze and disguise it that no body thinks himself obliged to put it in practice Which is very lamentable for Jesus Christ yesterday and to day is altogether the same and will be even to the end of the world without any change or mutation This being most true how is it possible that any can be sav'd while they do not follow in any thing what he has taught us He has said that he who does not deny himself cannot be his Disciple which no body does On the contrary every one loves himself and yet they call themselves the Disciples of Jesus Christ It must needs be that the one or the other is deceiv'd This impossibility which Jesus Christ has laid down is it render'd possible by the authority of those Guides who assure all the world of their Salvation while they love themselves This cannot be true for Jesus Christ cannot lie but men indeed may err especially in things wherein they have interest for if they taught simply that a man must deny himself and the other points of the Gospel they would give severe reproofs to themselves because their lives and manners are very far from this practice therefore they study to find out glosses reasons and exceptions to the end they may find means not to be oblig d to follow and practice this holy doctrine which is repugnant to their sences Thus every one lives in a presumption of his Salvation without any ground for these men are not Saviours and cannot save us but are rather Seducers of whom Jesus Christ foretold that they should come in the last times in which we are certainly fallen at present wherein the spirit of error does fully reign where truth is stifled and lying prevails The Second Conference Of the Judgment of God Of the Last Times and of the Men of the Last Times REmarking these last words I ask'd her if she sirmly believ'd that the last times were come and whither the Judgment approached She said to me Believe me Sir there is nothing more true we actually live in the last times and the judgment is so near that before three years I believe you will see the effects of it I could not be perswaded to believe this continuing pensive and silent which she perceiving said Sir the difficulty you find to believe these things proceeds from the universal darkness that is now upon the earth by which all the world is blinded and no body sees where he goes no more than they who liv'd during the Egyptian darkness which was so great that none could stir out of the place in which they were this was nothing but the outward figure of the inward darkness in which men walk at present We do not perceive that we are fallen into the last times nevertheless we may see by the lives of men now that all the signs are fallen out which Jesus Christ has foretold viz. that iniquity shall be multiplied and Charity in many shall wax cold and so of the rest Who can doubt that this is not at present when iniquity is so great and so universal that there is no more faith nor law among men People study nothing but to deceive their Neighbour the Father cannot trust his Son nor the Son his Father the Brother rises up against the Brother friendship is only feign'd business is full of deceit and fraud We see nothing but pride and ambition reigning in the hearts of all men Judges are without equity Priests without sincerity Cloysters fill'd with avarice and the devout full of malice which has been at all times in some particular persons but is at present so multiply'd that it possesses almost all men in general and charity is not only waxt cold but is altogether frozen and become dead in the hearts of men So that these signs of the last times are all fully accomplisht Read if you please the Epistle of St. Paul to Timothy where he says that in the last times there shall come men loving their own selves c. You will see more clearly than the Sun all
the marks and signs of the last times fulfill'd and perfectly accomplisht The life of men is the open book in which these truths are written and the holy Scriptures are the equitable Judge which pronounces this sentence Read Sir with attention they will deliver you from the difficulty you find in believing this for tho indeed they do not determine precisely the day of judgment yet they will make you see sufficiently that the cheif signs which must precede it do already appear That no body will believe this is a most certain evidence of it for Jesus Christ says that it shall be as in the days of Noah they were eating and drinking and marrying and giving in marriage and knew not until the flood came and took them all away Even so is it at present they take their recreations and pleasures heaping up earthly treasures building houses and temples as if they were to remain here to eternity while all must very shortly perish And no body will believe it according to the prediction of Jesus Christ when he compares these last times with those of the universal deluge He says in St. Math. 24. it will be as in the days of Noah adding when you shall see the abomination of desolation to be in the holy place flee away Do you not think Sir that this abomination is now in the holy place if Envy were lost it might be recover'd in the Cloisters if Avarice were dead it would be reviv'd by the Priests Vain-glory and Pride is no where so prevailing as among the Clergy in one word Simonies and all other sins abound in the place which ought to be holy What more sure marks would you have than those which Jesus Christ himself has declar'd to us should precede the Judgment if you desire to see the Stars fall from Heaven the Sun to be darken'd the Moon not to give her Light all these are nothing but material signs which can do no harm to Souls but serve only for outward evidences of the wrath of God and to the end that even insensible things may feel the terrors of that great day as the Rocks did when they were rent at the death of Jesus Christ This added nothing to his passion nor render'd those who put him to death more criminal for they were nothing but insensible rocks without souls or reason Even so will it be as to the Stars and the other celestial bodies if they change colour or suffer any other alteration this will not be hurtful to our souls which are spiritual and cannot receive any punishment by these visible and material Stars so much the rather that these signs and Stars cannot be understood but spiritually For how could the Stars fall from Heaven since the Mathematicians tell us that one Star alone is seven times greater than all the Earth so great a thing cannot fall into one so small for it would not be capable to contain it And if we take the mystical sense calling by the name of Stars persons luminous in Doctrine the Doctors and Guides Prelates Bishops and all those who are plac'd in Dignities to whom the name of Stars may be appropriated as being the Lights of the world this sign would also have at present its sense accomplisht for we see every day such persons fall from righteousness and truth who for some worldly interest or humane respects fall from the truth of the Gospel which is the true heaven of Souls and wallow in the earth among its riches and pleasures as secular persons do In former times how many of those were seen who had their hearts and spirits continually towards heaven their lives and manners did enlighten all the world as the Stars of the Firmament but at present they are fallen into the mire of earthly affections So that it may be truly said that the Stars are fallen from Heaven and that the Sun also is become without light For Truth which is the true Sun of Righteousness cannot any longer appear openly it is become black and hateful to all the world who desiring to be flatter'd and prais'd cannot hear the truth because it reproves the falshood which now prevails These two signs of the Sun and of the Stars appear at present in their full accomplishment in the mystical and inward sense which is much more than if they did appear in the literal and material sense for the reasons above-mentioned and if the Moon be not as yet without light it will be so very shortly in the mystical and perfect sense The Moon is all transitory things which after the manner of the Moon do encrease or diminish according to good or bad fortune These things will lose their light so soon as Wars shall have destroy'd and ruin'd temporal wealth Then all that pomp and magnificence which shines in the Sanctuary will lose its splendor and will no longer yeild any thing but blood Since for Gold and Silver they will cut the throats of those who are plac'd in the highest dignities so that what shines and glisters to day in the Church will wholly lose its lustre and light and by this means this Moon will be darken'd I entreat you to read attentively the 24th Chapter of St. Matthew it speaks of the present time All the Parables do the same I wish I had time and leisure to explain them to you you would see as well as I that the Judgment approaches for all the forerunning signs are already come People do not perceive them for want of reflecting seriously enough on the holy Scriptures or upon the inward life of men now adays they amuse themselves with regarding only their outward piety imagining that there are yet a great many good men because they appear such but before God all are corrupted They resemble the Apples of Sodom which appear beautiful without and have nothing within but rottenness This is the true symbole of the life of Christians now which God makes me perceive abundantly by his inward light This fill'd me with astonishment and desiring to understand her more clearly I ask'd her whether there were not any good men or true Christians in our days She said to me No Sir THERE ARE NO TRVE CHRISTIANS VPON EARTH There are indeed diverse persons who seem to be good men and are really so in comparison of the wicked they may indeed pass for Saints before men but before God they are not true Christians for tho they do not act wickedly but frequent the Sacraments and other exercises of Devotion yet nevertheless they have not the LOVE OF GOD nor Charity for their Neighbour in their hearts much less a hatred of themselves or a desire to embrace the Cross Sufferings and Persecutions to follow Jesus Christ On the contrary they so love themselves that all their designs aim at nothing but their own satisfaction even in the most pious things You would be astonisht Sir to see what difference there is between the sight
but I make very small reckoning of this visible and bodily Antichrist because he can seduce none but those who desire to be so He shall be known for a wicked one because he will deal harshly with those who yield obedience to him which will occasion Martyrs and make many good men to be sav'd by the resistance they will make against him These evils are not terrible but to the faint-hearted who are not train'd up to sufferings but I reckon this invisible and spiritual Antichrist of whom I have spoken to you to be far more pernicious because he seduceth the well-meaning under the appearance of a false good this is much more to be fear'd The evil which is manifest is easie to be avoided by those who hate it but the evil which is cover'd with piety and holiness is insensibly follow'd by those who are good and love piety who would never follow Antichrist discover'd nor the evil which they knew to be such I told her that I had never heard of this spiritual Antichrist that I would willingly know who he is and what difference there is between him who is to come in the flesh towards the end of the world and him who crept into the Church from its beginning She answer'd Sir this Antichrist is the Devil who from the creation of the world made war against men that he might make them forsake God and their own Salvation for these ends he made Eve and Adam fall into sin he tempted Cain to kill his brother Abel and is the Author of all the other evils and sins which have since come upon the earth This Devil has always led men to do evil from this he is call'd the Old Serpent because he has shed his infernal venom upon the earth from the beginning of the world But since he knew that God so lov'd the world that he has sent his Son to instruct and save it he has redoubled his rage against men and by new subtilties has endeavour'd to hinder their Salvation that with himself he might draw them into his own miserable wretched Condemnation But perceiving that the word of God was sent to them from heaven not by voices thunders or burning bushes but by a sensible and visible body which the same God had taken for this end that he might teach them palpably by an Organ like to their humane nature the Devil perceiving that he could not any longer have such hold of men because of the vertue of that word which was able to create the universe he deviseth to appear like the Son of God and after the manner of apes endeavour to imitate his actions covering himself with Sheeps skins tho he be the true ravenous Wolf He slipt from the very beginning into the Church which Jesus Christ was going to build that he might oppose and contradict his word under pious pretexts and covered his malice with hypocrisie that he might the better contradict and oppose the doctrine of Jesus Christ and from thence he has truly born the name of Antichrist and there never will be any other Antichrist but this same Devil who was formerly call'd the Old Serpent There is no distinction between him who slipt into the Church in its beginning and him who shall be incarnated towards the end of the world for it is always the same Devil who only takes different methods that he may the better decoy men according to the various occurrences of time He began his Reign from the birth of the Holy Church and has always gradually advanc'd it by continuing still to oppose the Doctrine of Jesus Christ till he has effac'd it out of the memory almost of all men which we may perceive in this age wherein the Doctrine of Jesus Christ is no more in use than if it had never been brought into the world which makes me believe that he is now born since he has full dominion over the hearts of men who instead of persevering in the Doctrine of the Apostles have insensibly follow'd the Doctrine of this Devil and of Christians are become Antichristians for who does not see at present that Wars Discords and Dissentions reign among Christians instead of the Peace which Jesus Christ establish'd It may indeed be said that there is not any longer one stone left upon another of the true Temple that is to say that there are not any longer two Christian Souls united in the same heart and the same will in Jesus Christ and instead of that Communion of Goods which Jesus Christ brought into his Church there is nothing to be seen in it but self-interest and self-seeking without any care for our Neighbour As for the Mutual Charity of loving our Neighbour as our selves it is so despised that he who should put it in practice would be scoff'd at by all Christians much more he who should choose the last place or who should take less when he might have more To give to him who would take from us or indeed to hold up the cheek to receive a blow would be reckon'd a great folly among the Christians of this age who will scarce suffer an offensive word without resenting it or avenging themselves Who is there that takes up the Cross to follow Jesus Christ since every one avoids sufferings as much as he can and instead of the Cross takes all Contentments agreeable to his senses as far as they are lawful and permitted And so of all the rest of the Doctrines of Jesus Christ no body studies to put them in practice on the contrary every one resists them and does the quite contrary without considering that all that is against Christ is certainly Antichrist And as it is not necessary for Salvation that all Christians should see the carnal body of Jesus Christ to render them his true Disciples it is enough that they know and follow his Doctrine even so to be the followers of the Devil it is not necessary that they see this Antichrist in the flesh it is enough that they follow his doctrine which is much more hurtful to Souls than that incarnate Devil can be unto Bodies therefore the furious is not so much to be dreaded as the crafty and concealed he can but wound or kill the Body by his fury but this wounds and kills Souls by cheats and delusions I could not but acknowledge such clear and evident truths neither had I more than one doubt to propose about them viz. whether this Antichrist in the flesh was already born which being supposed how he could make any suffer Martyrdom and occasion the salvation of many of those who should resist him seeing she believed that all Christians were at present become Antichristian so that they could not be disposed for Martyrdom nor for resisting of him whom they loved and followed She said Sir I cannot doubt that this Antichrist in the flesh is born already for the wickedness of the world is risen to the highest
and instead of saying to sinners go and sin no more as Jesus Christ did to the persons whose sins he pardon'd as to the Paralitick and to the Woman taken in Adultery these Confessors say come again to Confession and we will still absolve you Jesus Christ says If thou hast a quarrel with thy Brother leave thy Offering and go be reconcil'd with thy Brother and these Confessors with a word send them quickly to the Altar without Reconciliation Do they not act directly in opposition to Christ I said to her that I had never searcht so deep in this matter but that I would willingly know if it be not of Confession that Jesus Christ speaks when he says That which you bind or loose in earth I will do it also in heaven and then when St. Peter ask'd If he should seven times forgive his brother who had offended him Jesus Christ answers not only seven times but seventy seven times She reply'd Sir take heed this light is not from men I never spoke so openly to any body but I see plainly that you will profit by it To give a solution to your first question Whether Jesus Christ did not speak touching Confession all that you shall do on earth I will do in heaven this is certainly as to the remitting and retaining of sins but it is not after the manner that men understand it for God never gave this authority to men in themselves but to his Church which is nothing else but his word and therefore this authority does reside always where this word resides Moses and so many other Prophets who wrought so many Wonders in the world perform'd them by vertue of this word and not by their own authority and power They went always to God to know what they ought to do and they wrought according to his will in no ways according to their own for man has nothing of himself but an impotence instead of power but the word of God has power in all places where it resides even tho it should reside in a wicked soul Therefore sometimes even the beasts have wrought miracles By vertue of this word the heavens and the earth do subsist It has the same vertue to remit and retain sins in the bodies of Confessors that it had in the natural and humane body of Jesus Christ for it is always the same which proceeds from Almighty God The only difficulty that I find is to know whether it can still reside in the Confessors at present who do not follow the rules of this holy doctrine God has indeed promis'd to pardon sins to penitent sinners and these Confessors do pardon them to sinners persevering and continuing in their sins so that if it were true that these Confessors could pardon sins according to their own fancy a man would only need to be in favour with some of them to be assured of his Salvation It would be in vain therefore for Jesus Christ to have suffered and endured so much to â—each us humility patience penitence and all the rest if these Confessors with Absolvo can thus forgive us all our sins Every one might indeed live as he pleas'd as they do now without caring much for God since he might obtain Salvation by the means of a man who would call himself the Saviour and Forgiven of sinners I think a man must be deprived of all judgment not to discover this deceit whereas at the same time so many persons live and die in this blindness This is a grosser darkness than that of Egypt As to the second point whether it be in Confession that we must forgive seventy seven times That cannot be authoriz'd by this passage since we find no where that Jesus Christ did forgive sins more than once to those to whom he pardon'd And if a sinner were truly penitent he would be careful not to fall again so often but if he be not penitent he is not capable of obtaining pardon so much as once for Absolution does always suppose Contrition otherwise it would not be available St. Peter asks how often he shall pardon his brother who offended him but Penitents have not offended their Confessors when they go to Confession these so numerous pardons respect the indulgence that we owe to our Christian brethren that we may leave vengeance to God alone but they do not at all regard sacramental Confession The Eleventh Conference Outward Devotions imposed by men are not of true Faith Of the true Church which cannot err in what it imposeth The Doctrines of Jesus Christ and those of men True Prayer HAving heard all these reasons I felt my self in very great perplexities not knowing what â—o reply to such firm reasonings I said only that the Hereticks were not always to blame when they spoke against the Abuses of the Roman Church She said to me Sir I never convers'd with any Hereticks and I desire not to know what their sentiments are in this matter I was born and baptiz'd under the authority of the Roman Church and I never yet travell'd out of it where I might meet with any Hereticks to know what they say of Catholicks but I have learn'd all that I tell you in a profound recollection of spirit join'd to a serious experience I have made frequent Confessions and perform'd all the other particular Devotions of Christians as my Parents did with an exact observance but when it pleas'd God to enlighten me I perceiv'd clearly that Faith does not consist in the wearing of a pair of Beads a Belt or a Scapulary nor yet in hearing many Masses or confessing often and communicating as they taught me but that it consists in the belief and practice of what God has commanded and taught us That all these outward devotions did rather serve as means to withdraw and distract us from the continual attention which we ought to have upon God Therefore I have quitted them all and have fixâ—d upon the Truth of the Gospel which I knew from my tender youth tho I could not follow it because they taught me otherwise In which I fail'd greatly by the Counsel of men God drew me to himself and they drew me to them I regret nothing more than the time that I have spent in following them for all that they call Devotions is nothing but amusement which keeps us tied to the earth and to the creatures Our affections are towards our ghostly Fathers their Masses and Sermons their Churches and the means of adorning them and to all that is sensual which hinders them from being united in God I ask'd her whether all these outward devotions were not good and saving since the Church had instituted and approven them and if she could err in what concern'd the Faith and the Instruction of the faithful She answer'd No Sir the Church can never err in any thing for she is the wisdom the goodness and the power of God the fountain of all
wisdom the original of all goodness and incomprehensible power In short the Church is God himself who cannot fail or err therefore Jesus Christ says he that hears you hears me because the word of God is God as our word is us our heart must be where we speak and also our understanding even so where the word of God is which is his Church there the holy spirit is which is his understanding and the almighty power which is his heart From whence it appears that the holy Trinity composes the Church which is no other but the power of the Father the wisdom of the Holy Spirit and the good will of the Son All these things are found united in the Church for God having a design to make man after his likeness he transferr'd to him his own qualities therefore he gives to his Church the power to pardon sins goodness by the communication of his word and his wisdom by the understanding of that word Jesus Christ who took human flesh has brought us the word of God which has taught us his wisdom and shewn us his love even as by our word we express what is in our understanding and the affections of our heart which God also did to us when he sent us his word upon earth by the organ of the humanity of Jesus Christ He made this alhance with men that he might have them after his likeness Therefore he has call'd them his Spouse and his Church which is altogether divine and spiritual But men would indeed disguise it and render it material sensual and carnal in giving the name of Church to men who do not possess this word without which they cannot be the Church nor have the power the wisdom nor the love which God gave to his lawful Spouse Therefore they may greatly err and fail in appointing and approving of rules for Christians And whereas you ask Whether all these outward Devotions which are now in use in Christendom be good and saving I doubt it very much for Jesus Christ taught not such varieties of devotion as we see now adays but he taught solid and inward vertues as Faith Hope and Charity Faith to believe in an Almighty God of whom we hold all things Hope to hope in him only without putting our confidence in any other thing and Charity to love him alone without placing our affection on any created thing whether in heaven or in earth These are the instructions of Jesus Christ but those at present who are call'd Church-men teach no other thing but to resort to Churches to frequent the Sacraments and to say a great many vocal prayers by rote and number With these outward things they make men believe that they are true Christians which cannot be since Christianity consists in a spiritual and inward life for it is divine and not humane If these outward devotions had been means proper for us to become good Christians we may be perswaded that Jesus Christ would have taught us them for he had more wisdom to foresee our need and weakness than these guides of souls can have and likewise more love to take care that nothing should be wanting to us for the time to come He left only his word to serve for the nourishment of our souls saying that it is the bread come down from heaven and that whosoever shall eat it shall not die whereas these persons give us only the Eucharist for nourishment in which the promise of Jesus Christ cannot be accomplisht for the host does not descend from heaven as his word does and they who eat it do not all live for ever For we see abominable souls even Sorcerers do communicate frequently and thereafter die in their sins We see also Bigots communicate very often who never attain to true faith nor the knowledge of the truth without which they cannot live for evel How then should the word of Jesus Christ be fulfill'd that they who eat this bread shall not die since all those die eternally after having so often eaten the Eucharist Jesus Christ cannot lie for he who incorporates his word shall never die because it gives life and nourishment to the soul and makes it live eternally I said to her This being suppos'd we must needs be in a time of great darkness in which there are many errors and many more erroneous who run blindly to damnation because the most pious hold Rome and all her Council for the Church She said Sir the Devil upon a false supposition finds matter enough to raise fine edifices I have no particular knowledge of Rome nor of her Council but I tell you in truth if the Pope with all his Council would say any thing to me which was contrary to the Doctrine of Jesus Christ I should not be oblig'd to believe him nor yet are any other Christians The Bark should never be taken for the Wood because it can never beat Fruit as the Tree would do tho it had little Bark The true Church where-ever it is brings forth always holy Fruits and if the Tree be known by its fruit we will know the Church by what it brings forth The practice of those who are Members of Rome doth sufficiently evidence to me that the holy spirit cannot be the Author of those things which are contrary to the practice of Jesus Christ We see the Prelates attended with Servants Coaches and Trains like to secular Princes their Furniture and Houses do surpass them Iâ— they had faith to believe that God being man was poor and despisd they would blush for shame as all other Christians to make themselves thus to be honoured Their faith being dead they run blindly to damnation This vail which is put before their eyes to make them believe that the Church ought to be upheld by worldly honours serves for nothing but to flatter them and to render them insensible of their misery For if the Church had had need of temporal wealth and honour Jesus Christ would have provided it sufficiently for all appertains to him being King and Creator of all things He knew all the revolutions of time he would surely have foretold them that it should be permitted them at a certain time to make themselves be honour'd and serv'd but on the contrary he foretels that God will cast down the mighty from their seats that he will resist the proud and will exalt the humble and there is nothing which he says more expresly than that we ought to learn of him to be meek and lowly in heart to which Lesson the arrogance and the pride of Christians now are directly opposite and they who may be called by their proper names Antichristians because they are thus oppos'd to Christ for these only are Christians who put in practice this doctrine of Jesus Christ all others who bear this name without doing it are nothing but rotten Members of the Church and it were better they were cut off
well and secure The Thirteenth Conference Of true Faith according to the tenour of the Creed Of the knowledge of God and of our selves by the consideration of his Works I Told her That I did not believe that I had true Faith and that she had sufficiently made appear to me that I could not be right therefore I desired to understand of her wherein true Faith does consist tho' it were but upon my own account for I desired to profit in it She said Sir let us examine a little together our Creed and see if there be so much as one Article of it observed even by the most perfect Christians now-a-days If we believ'd that God is Almighty that he created the Heaven and the Earth could we live without loving and fearing him as we do Could we also attribute to our selves the earthly good things which all the World seeks after and loves since they are all created by God and do all appertain to him in Property which we do daily usurp In the second place If we did believe in Jesus Christ the only Son of God who was conceived of the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary could we reject his Instructions since he is the Son of God the Fountain of all Wisdom Could we follow a Carnal Church seeing she is altogether Spiritual engendred in the Body of Jesus Christ by the operation of the holy Spirit Could we also live in Luxury when God chose a Virgin for his own Mother Would we not endeavour to love Virginity since God has so much esteem'd it Moreover if we believ'd that Jesus Christ the Son of God has suffer'd even so far as to be Crucified Dead and Buried could we live so softly seeking all eases to our Body not willing to suffer any thing that is painful nor affronts nor tribulations when we believ'd that the Son of God has indeed suffer'd for us even to a shameful Death yea was buried as a corruptible Man Would we not imitate or follow him at some distance in case we had the faith that we profess Moreover if we believ'd that he is risen from Death to Life that he is ascended into Heaven were it possible that we could love this present Life while we hope that we shall rise again since Jesus Christ is risen again to ascend unto Heaven Would not this withdraw our affections from the Earth through the hope of ascending unto Heaven with Jesus Christ Were it possible that we would build Houses and make so many other settlements as we do on Earth as if it were our abiding City And if we did believe that Jesus Christ will come from Heaven to judge the quick and the dead were it possible that we would live in so great a neglect of our Salvation with so little care of making ready our Accompts to render them to that great Judge who will demand of us an account of all our Thoughts Words and Deeds Would we not rather lay aside all our worldly Affairs to attend on this which is the most important to us yet on the contrary is often the least of our â—ares And did we believe likewise that there is a holy Spirit and a holy Church is it possible that we would be so little Spiritual so Natural and Earthly so wedded to our Senses in which we live sometimes more brutishly than the Beasts themselves whereas our Souls ought to be wholly Spiritual and Holy since we have a Holy Spirit and a Holy Church And did we believe the Communion of Saints is it possible that every one should be so much wedded to his own Interest and Wealth If Prayers and good Works ought to be all common amongst Christian Brethren how much more ought temporal Wealth to be for the succour of our Neighbour which is very far from Mens dispositions now who study nothing but to keep up and increase their own Wealth understanding no other thing but mine and thine both in Spirituals and Temporals And did we believe in the remission of Sins how would we be penitent and contrite to obtain the pardon of them instead of continuing in them through hardness of heart as we see the most part of men do who finish their Lives in black thoughts and despair instead of having immediate recourse to mercy according to their belief For he who has promised the remission of Sins has not promised them time to persevere in them If this belief were real they would not persevere in them for one day for they are not certain of living so long And did we believe in the Resurrection of the Flesh how could we love and esteem our flesh in a condition so miserable as that of this mortal Life We would greatly contemn it in the hope we had of its Resurrection l in which it should live most happy delivered from so many miseries calamities and maladies under which it groans during its exile in this miserable World which setting aside the hopes of its Resurrection must rather be called Death than Life the belief of this Article would give a disgust of the delights of this present Life and make us aspire towards that to come And did we believe in Life eternal what would we not do to obtain it We would voluntarily forsake Father Mother and all our Goods to obtain this eternal Life for it deserves more than a thousand Worlds which cannot last but for a small time in respect of Eternity whereas we see the most part of men so in love with this miserable Life that they would fain abide here for an Eternity though it be filled with miseries and calamities Do you not see Sir that there is no more faith in the House of God That no body lives conformably to his belief That they place faith only in Words as I have told you formerly They say over it may be every day their Creed and yet they do not observe so much as one Article of it These are nothing but words that vanish into Air and nevertheless they would take it very ill to make appear to them that they have not true faith tho' it be always operative and never idle True faith works always the vertues of which I told you in the Souls which possess it and if these operations are not seen it may indeed truly be said that these Souls have not faith for it can never be any where without operating its vertues no more than the Sun can be without giving his beams Consider it well Sir and you will find my saying true and you will condemn your self I told her I perceived clearly that People lived in a distraction of spirit and that few persons knew themselves That it was no wonder they knew not God since they did not know themselves and that truly we were deceived She replied Sir he who knows God will always know himself and he who knows himself will assuredly know God for the one is linked unto
the other a serious recollection of spirit may teach us this We speak of God says she as if he were some Phantom of Paradise as an imaginary thing and of our selves as a temporal and transient thing Where is the man living who can comprehend what God is and in what place he abides It is true we have need of some words to signify what we would say therefore we say that God is in Paradise as in the place of his abode But we must not be so simple as to believe that God has any particular abode for there is nothing which can contain him being greater than all things We say that he is in the Heavens and nevertheless the Heavens are but his Creatures very uncapable of being able to contain him We say that he is on the right hand of his Father whither he is ascended These are all words to signify in our Gibberish our little conceptions but we can never attain to the knowledge of what God is or Paradise or even our own Souls for this cause we make often wrong judgments and the Learned fill our minds in this as in other things with the Idea's of their Imaginations which are of little use for our Salvation and far less for the Glory of God for frequently we give attributes to him which do greatly diminish it to speak after our fashion It is enough for our Salvation and his Glory that we know that there is one God and that he is the fountain of all Wisdom the accomplishment of all Power the perfection of all Goodness who never had beginning and shall never have end that he is an invisible and incomprehensible Spirit and that he has given us an understanding to comprehend all these Divine Attributes through the operations which they produce in our minds We may first know that there is a God because we feel in our selves that we have a dependance upon something which we cannot comprehend since all those things which we see in Heaven and in Earth are not capable of having created us nor of maintaining us for all men and all the stars with all that is created in heaven and in earth cannot add one hair unto our head nor give us one moment of life We must conclude therefore that there is a God above all things who has created all who upholds and governs all by a supream power since nothing can have given being unto its self there must have been of necessity some author of all things who has given them all a being and beginning No body can be ignorant of this truth tho they had nothing but a Pagan light And to perceive that he is the fountain of all wisdom we need but consider this beautiful universe how marvellously well done it is What artifice could keep the Globe of the Earth among the Waters What can give splendour to the Sun Beauty to the Moon Lights to the Stars Who can make a tree a fruit a flower a plant of so many different herbs Who can have made the birds of the air the beasts of the earth and of the sea in so many different kinds And above all who could have formed the body of man so wonderfully shap'd with so many different members How many veins muscles and tendons do concur to tye up this tender flesh What master could ever make such a master-piece must not this proceed from the fountain of all wisdom from which all the wisdom of men is derived which we admire without knowing the author of it except by the operations which we experience in our selve Who can be ignorant of his infinite wisdom while he looks upon the Creation and the upholding of this great Universe Who does not feel that he has not in himself any power if it be not given from a supream power which we do not know Who can be ignorant of that Incomprehensible Goodness while he receives every moment the effects of it All that man has he holds it of the Goodness of God for he could not have merited any thing before that God of his Goodness alone did create him We perceive evidently that he is an Invisible and Incomprehensible spirit for none ever saw God or can comprehend what he is He can never have had beginning having given beginning to all things How can that end which is eternally incomprehensible our soul cannot even comprehend itself nevertheless we may well judge that it is immortal for the Wisdom of God could never have created it to live for so small a time as we are upon earth He would have done a thing which was not good which cannot be for our soul is always in bondage so long as it animates this our miserable body God should not be just if he gave it not another time to rejoyce with him else the end of its creation should be miserable It must needs be for accomplishing the goodness and righteousness of God that it live a blessed eternity so that even he could not have created our body to live only this so miserable short life by far greater reason our soul which he created after his own image and according to his own likeness could not be created to be only a Prisoner in our body where it cannot act but by its co-operation with it no more can God act in us but by the co-operation of our soul because there is an indissoluble union in respect of the one and of the other For God is united with our soul as our body is also united with the same I admir'd these marvellous and unheard of discourses and that I might understand more I told her I had never sufficiently understood how the knowledge of God was unseparable from the knowledge of our selves She said to me Sir this is very easie to comprehend if you will seriously reflect upon it for no body can know that God is the fountain of all wisdom without perceiving at the same time that we can have nothing but ignorance only as experience makes sufficiently appear that no body has wisdom at his wish that it must be derived from that supream fountain whose works being considered it must be presently known and acknowledg'd that all our wisdom how great soever we may have imagin'd it being compar'd with the wisdom of God is nothing but pure ignorance and this not being known we will think that our wisdom is great As a person is always the most beautiful and the most perfect when she is alone but approaching others who have more perfection than she this makes her know what she is truly Even so when we know the perfections of God we know our own imperfections If we know his almighty power we shall presently perceive our own weakness or the perfection of his goodness we shall discover how far ours is from it For this cause I have said that we cannot know God without knowing our selves neither can we know our selves without knowing
directed unto all men who were to come of Adam because he held in his power the free will of all his posterity Therefore God spoke to all men when he spoke to our first Father The Prohibition which he gave him m not to eat of the fruit of a tree was nothing but an outward sign of the dependance which he ow'd unto God even as a Superior reserves to himself some yearly rent in the Donation which he makes of his Lands or Mannors to the end that always these goods or lands may be oblig'd yearly to acknowledge the Superiour upon whom they depend God had bestow'd on man all this beautiful world which we behold with all that is in it but he would have him still to acknowledge the dependance that he had upon his God and Lord that the knowledge of this might oblige them to love such a Benefactor who had given them all these created things which they might enjoy provided always they did acknowledge and love the God who had so freely bestow'd them He forbad them to eat of one Tree only permitting them to eat of all the rest to shew that he permitted man to enjoy all the fruits of the earth provided he preserve always the obligation that he has to God He requires for a Testimony of this that he abstain from eating of this forbidden fruit to the end he might never forget the love and the obedience which he ow'd unto the Lord from whom he had receiv'd all things This Prohibition is no other thing but a Command to love him which being done man might do all that he desird This Commandment was also given unto man when God requir'd Sacrifices from him not that God had need of beasts or other things but he demands this outward testimony in confirmation of the inward acknowledgment and love which they bear unto God the giver of all things The Law he gave to Moses contain'd also no other thing but this love and gratitude which we owe unto our God Tho these Commandments are divided into ten yet they are all comprehended in that of loving and acknowledging God for all the rest are but prohibitions not to do the things which would hinder this love and gratitude because he who takes the name of God in vain or he who steals or covets his Neighbors goods or commits Fornication and so of the rest does not love nor acknowledge God And to make this love and acknowledgment easie to him God forbids him to commit these things as being contrary to this love But as to the summ of these Commandments it consists in one only to wit in the love and acknowledgment of God when he commands to keep holy the Feasts and to honour Father and Mother all this depends upon the love of God which we ought to testify also outwardly in sanctifying the days which are dedicated unto him The honour which we owe to Fathers and Mothers signifies only an acknewledgment that we owe unto our Benefactors of whom God is the principal yea even the giver of all things but because our Parents do us good in nourishing helping caring for us and teaching us during our weakness he commands us to honour them as little Gods for the small good things which they do us to the end that by this outward acknowledgment we may be mindful of our acknowledgments which we owe to God in proportion to the benefits which we receive from him Behold how God has many times forbidden us not to love the creatures since by so many diverse ways he commands us to love him to the exclusion of all things Which Jesus Christ himself has well exprest to us when he says that we must love God with all our heart with all our strength and with all our thoughts There could not be more express terms to shew that our heart is created for God only and for nothing else I receiv'd such light by these reasonings that it was my delight to hear them And to make her speak the more I said to her that there were some Authors who maintain'd that it was impossible to love God with all our hearts and to keep his Commandments She was mov'd with anger saying What injury do they to God by such sentiments I swear to you Sir these persons know neither God nor themselves when they assert such things They are insupportable to me What well dispos'd Soul could suffer that they should say of God that he has given Commandments to man which it is impossible for him to observe This is to desire to make him pass for a Tyrant and also for an Ignorant For to lay on a heavier burthen than our shoulders could bear would be a Cruelty and to damn men for not having done that which was impossible for them a Tyranny Could God give insupportable Laws without being unjust Could he overcharge men without cruelty He who made men could he be ignorant of their strength and capacity that he did not give them laws according to their weakness or infirmities What Blasphemies do they commit against the supream Wisdom which knows all things What injury to that straight Righteousness What contempt to make him ignorant of the strength and capacity of men He who knows the most secret thoughts of the heart and all things past and to come as well as the present O ingrate creature If thou knewest thy self thou would'st perceive but too much that thou art capable of loving God with all thy heart For there is nothing more natural to man than love and there is nothing which does more oblige to love than the benefits receiv'd without having merited them What is wanting to you therefore to be able to love with all your heart Is there any thing more lovely than he all-beautiful all-good all-wife all-perfect in short the accomplishment of all perfections Our heart which cannot live without love could it find any object more lovely or any greater subject of acknowledgment for so many benefits received from him I said to her That it was truth and that no objects could be found so worthy of our affection as God is but the evil came from this that we did not see nor feel God as we do the creatures which are material and sensible to our senses She said to me It is true Sir God being a pure Spirit is not visible nor sensible to our natural senses But believe me he is more visible and sensible to our understanding by his works than are all the creatures together and he does us also much more good than all that is created in heaven and in earth For this cause we ought to love him alone more than all other things together for if our understanding would apply its self to the consideration of the wonderful works of God it would find more ground to love God than any thing how lovely soever it might be even according to the natural senses All
the mischief proceeds from this that our senses are distracted from the works of God and that we apply them to know and to love earthly objects which are below us and unworthy of being lov'd by us for they can give us no other thing but divertisement of mind and amusement of our senses without any profit since all is but vanity passing away in a moment without leaving any thing in our souls but vexations and regrets at death Behold the height of all the happiness we can ever hope for in loving any creatures whatsoever A mans mind must be infatuated if he do not find in the works of God and in his operations which we experience in our selves all sorts of occasions to love and to follow him For who can consider the beauty of the Sun and of the Stars of Heaven the good and fertility of the Flowers and Fruits of the Earth without being ravish'd with admiration in considering what beauty and goodness he must have who gives them to all these things We amuse our selves sometimes in loving a stone a flower or a humane creature for its beauty and we do not raise our understandings to love the fountain and the giver of all these beauties which is God! most durably beautiful who cannot fade as do all these other beauties which are nothing but phantastical and changeable If God had not the perfection of all beauties how could he give it to so many diverse things for one can never give that which he himself has not Who can say therefore that we do not see nor feel God as we do the creatures since he shews himself and lets himself be felt by his operations which are sensible to our senses Who can say that he does not continually perceive God operating in him and doing him infinite good That we have a being is by the good will of God That we see or speak or hear are the gifts of God That we reason with our understanding that we enjoy our five natural Senses these are all gifts of God which no body can give unto himself and which cannot be acquired by Gold and Silver or Freinds let them be who they will The daily food of our body does it not all come from God For what man can make a grain of Corn or a Strawberry to grow All these things with a thousand others do they not afford us sensible enough subjects to know and to love God Can we say in truth that we do not see him nor feel him since he makes himself to be seen and felt every moment by so many benefits which our Soul and our Body do receive in so great abundance which cannot come from any other but from God himself It would be more true to say that we could not love the creatures than that we cannot love God for they can give us nothing and God gives us all that we see by our natural senses and that this impossibility of loving God and of fulfilling his Commandments is apply'd to a contrary sense and that it is more impossible to love the creatures with all our heart because they can never fill our soul for it is spiritual and they are material and therefore no congruity in them to be loved with all our heart which cannot be filled but with God alone The Fifteenth Conference That God has never given to Man but one only essential Command which is that of his LOVE which is most easie and most agreeable and the Love of all other things most vain I Said unto her That she confounded the Ten Commands of God into one and that they who say it is impossible to keep his Commands speak of all not only of the first She reply'd Sir the first is the only Commandment to which God would have us subjected He has never laid any other burthen upon our shoulders but this gentle Yoke of LOVE All the other Laws and Commands are occasioned by our sins and are ordain'd by God for no other end but that we may know them and beware of them He perceiv'd that men from the beginning of the world began to appropriate to themselves Beasts and other earthly goods as things depending upon themselves which led to a forgetfulness of and an ingratitude to God Therefore he appointed the Sacrifices of Beasts and the other First Fruits that by these outward signs they might always preserve in their heart the remembrance that all which they possest came from God It was his will also that they should build him a rich Temple for the same reason that all men might always acknowledge that all their treasures riches and magnificences came from God and did belong to him Therefore he requires that they build him a magnificent Temple Not that God has need of Temples of Riches or Treasures being All in himself But he requires that man retain this acknowledgment of God that by the remembrance of so many benefits he may be oblig'd to love him and to fulfil this first Commandment That he gave to Moses ten Commands written in stone was when men began to multiply their wickedness giving themselves to swear rob bear false witness commit fornication and the rest the goodness of God forbids all these things fearing lest the ignorance of these evil deeds might be the cause of their damnation By these Commands he shews them their sins forbidding them to commit them any longer because all these things were hinderances of loving God as he had commanded them The Law of Circumcision aim'd also at the same to make man acknowledge that he held his life of God and for an outward sign of this acknowledgment he requir'd that he should shed of his blood Not that he had need either of the blood of men or beasts but it is his will that all things should acknowledge that they receiv'd all their being from God that this acknowledgment might oblige them always to love their Creator Even the Evangelical Law consists in no other thing but in this first Command of loving God with all our heart The counsel of poverty chastity and the rest of the Evangelical counsels are given us only for means to attain to this LOVE because he who loves riches luxury himself or other things cannot love God with all his heart nor fulfil this first Commaadment By which you may perceive evidently Sir that all the Commands of God are comprehended in the first and that all the rest are only prohibitions to do what would hinder this love that God has never given us any other Law but that of loving him and that the pity which he has to see us perish made him give all those prohibitions contain'd in his Commandments Can this be evil or impossible to be observed as you have affirm'd to me Is it impossible to be in the world without killing robbing committing adultery and the rest It is rather impossible for him who has common sense to do
come to tell you that this is the Will of God you will never do it for God has no Will to make you leave it more than he had any to make you undertake it It concerns every one to examine what Mean will be most proper for him to facilitate his Salvation One may sufficiently perceive in his Conscience without consulting any Body whether Offices Estates and Benefices have been to us the means of more Union with God than if we had not possess'd them and if they have made us draw others to the same Union If we do not find this it is to be feared that our Offices and Benefices have not been sought for or possest for the Love of God but for some Human Accommodation which respects nothing but the Earth This being discover'd it is in your Will to resolve if now you desire to labour for Heaven or rather for the Earth I said to her That I would not pretend any longer to any thing upon Earth that I was very sorry that I had had some Pretensions thereto but that I durst not quickly abandon all without the Advice of some learn'd Person fearing that I might do evil She replyed Sir You are yet far from the Kingdom of Heaven when you will needs advise with Men if you shall follow Jesus Christ Has not he said He who leaves not Father and Mother and his own self cannot be his Disciple Now would you go to ask Counsel of any Man when Jesus Christ has given you his Where could you find better Men are all interested in their own Judgment and will never advise but what they judge most advantagious for Men they having no Light to perceive any other thing They are Flesh and judge according to the Flesh Would you refer what concerns the Salvation and Perfection of your own Soul to their Judgments You must needs perish with them For the Wisdom of Man is foolishness before God All the Evils of the World do proceed from this That Men are govern'd and advised by one another Is it not said somewhere Wo to the Man that puts his Confidence in Man I have also told you That if the Blind lead the Blind both shall fall into the Ditch For my part I can say in Truth That I do not remember that I ever committed any Faults but when I believ'd the Counsel of Men. We ought to go to the Source Sir and let alone the Streams The Gospel is left us in Writing for our Eternal Rule If the Apostles and other Disciples of Jesus Christ had gone to ask Counsel of Men they would never have follow'd him For Men would have call'd it a Folly to abandon all as they do yet to this Day For being of the Earth they respect nothing but the Earth and are blind in the things of the Spirit We can never do ill to follow the Counsels of the Gospel but indeed we may in following the Counsels of Men how learn'd soever For their Doctrines are of this World and that of Jesus Christ is of God The Seventeenth Conference How to discern whether the Motions which do press us to leave the Outward Hindrances to Divine Communion be from God or not That there are likewise Inward Hindrances and that one ought not to be wedded even to good Means I Said to her That I had not Light enough to be sure of my own Motions and to discern whether they are from God or from the Devil or from my self She said That it was good to discern them that the Motions from God do incite always to humble things which the Devil and Nature do oppose because they are things despised by Men and therefore these Enemies do abhor them What comes from God incites to Sufferings and to Patience the things which come from the Devil and from Nature do incite to seek our Ease and Pleasures without desiring to suffer any thing The things of God do lead to Poverty and Self-denial the Devil and the Flesh do desire Riches and seek to be esteem'd and praised In fine Sir says she what comes from God is always conformable to the Doctrine of Jesus Christ For God cannot be contrary to himself Therefore the Light which you have receiv'd that moves you not to seek any longer for any thing upon Earth is but too sufficient to assure you that this Motion comes from God because neither the Devil nor Nature would ever rid themselves of their Pretensions upon each For they cannot profit by any other thing Nature could not sin any more without aiming at earthly things and the Devils could have no hold of a Soul which did not aim any longer at any thing upon Earth We might walk surely on such a Resolution without waiting for Counsel from Men who with their Wisdom do often quench the Lights of the Holy Spirit It were far better to consult the Gospel I was constrained to yield to such Truths I said to her that I would abandon all and would follow her all the Days of my Life She said with Joy Sir How happy will you be to abandon all Your Soul will be at liberty to fly unto God Your Spirit will be calm and your Body better disposed You will experience thereby both Bodily and Spiritual Good But I intreat you do not resolve to follow me always for as for my self I am willing to die alone and as for your concern it will be a greater Perfection that you be disingaged from all Creatures to the end you may wait upon God alone All Company how perfect soever it be is not God He requires our Heart so pure that he does not suffer that it should be divided So long as I can be helpful to you I love indeed to discourse with you But I wish rather that you may speak with God who is the Fountain of all Light He can teach you more in one Moment than all the Men of the World would do in a thousand Years So soon as you shall have found his Conversation you will not be able to take Pleasure any longer in any other Speak to him always Sir until that he answer you He will do it assuredly According as you shall separate your self from the Creatures accordingly you draw the nearer unto God There needs but to remove the Hindrances and this Divine Sun will shine fully into our Souls warming them with his Love He has infinitely more Desire and Affection to receive us than we have to seek him even tho' we be great Sinners he rejects no body he rather embraces them as the Father did his Prodigal Son You are his Child and the Work of his Hands Go to your Father with great Confidence He loves you He seeks you and calls you Do not delay any longer Go forward seek no longer for any other thing but him alone With extream Joy did I hear this Discourse asking her by what means I might find this Communion with God
says That they shall live for ever He has said elswhere That neither Whoremongers nor Drunkards shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven Neverthelss we see daily such Persons receive the Eucharist Can they live for ever without entring into the Kingdom of Heaven There would be a great Contradiction in the Words of Jesus Christ He cannot save those whom he condemns nor say to those who shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven that they shall live for ever It is assuredly his Word which he calls his Flesh and his Blood For whosoever shall eat it that is to say incorporate it as the Nourishment of his Soul it must needs be that he live for ever for this Word gives Life Eternal and he who feeds upon it as on his daily Bread can never die this is the Tree of Life seeing it gave Life to all things This Word has created Heaven and Earth of nothing How should it not give Life unto the Soul which receives it And if it have the Force to translate Bread into the Body of Jesus Christ as they teach how shall it not change our Souls into the Spirit of Life Eternal if we receive and incorporate it as becomes Jesus Christ said These are my Mother my Sisters and my Brethren who hear my Word and do it To shew that he esteems more the Receiving of his Word than the having contributed to the Formation of his Human Body it being most certain that the Virgin Mary was more happy in receiving and doing his Word than in being his natural Mother I said to her That there were many Errors in the Church if the Sense that she proposed ought to be received That it was very clear and intelligible but it had never been understood after this manner She said Blessed be God Sir that he grants yet this Mercy to the World to send his Light amidst the so obscure Darkness into which it is brought at present All the highest Mysteries of our Faith are involved in this Obscurity nothing is understood in a perfect Sense and they do often apply Senses contrary to the Truth They have walk'd as groping even till Now. It is no Wonder if they fall from one Error into another insensibly It is a great Happiness that it has pleas'd God to let us live even until the Time that he comes to enlighten the World after that so great a number have perish'd through Ignorance We have no more deserv'd it than they Let us endeavour to apply it rightly unto our Salvation without letting the occasion slip which is now so freely offered us How many souls are there of such a tender Conscience that they dare not reject a Sentiment which comes from the Roman Church or any Decree of its College fearing to offend God because they look upon it and take it for the Holy Church I knew a Person of a very good Life a Doctor of Theology who said That if the Pope forbad him to read the Gospel he durst not read it any longer So much was he preoccupied with this Belief that Rome is the Holy Church Upon this Supposition all the most pious do follow that which is Evil without perceiving it because they have taught us that we owe a blind Obedience As if we were permitted to follow Evil blindfold which is a great Error For we are all oblig'd to discern whether what we follow be good or bad For Example This Doctor could not abstain from Reading of the Gospel without offending God highly tho' the Pope had forbidden him to read it because this Prohibition is contrary unto Jesus Christ who has brought his Word from Heaven to be the Rule of our Life and the Nourishment of our Souls and has said That it must abide in us for ever How could we cast it behind us because a Pope forbids it who cannot destroy what God has establish'd nor forbid what he has commanded without being Antichrist for all that is against Christ is assuredly Antichrist We may indeed believe and follow what the Pope and his Councils do ordain us when they are things conformable to the Law of God and the Doctrine of Jesus Christ which is no other thing but the Explication of the Law Tho' this were taught us by the Devil himself we could not do ill to follow it But the things which are contrary ought never to be blindly follow'd God has made us Reasonable Creatures to the End we may discern Good and Evil. All the Blindness that a true Christian ought to have is to captivate his Spirit under the incomprehensible Works of God not to captivate it to believe that that which is Evil is Good A man must have lost Sense and Spirit to abandon himself to such a blind Obedience which nevertheless the most part of pious Christians do who do yield in all things to the Ordinances of the Pope or of his Council If this Mischief be not shortly at an End and if the Truth be not discover'd in this Point all the World will perish Because many things will be determin'd which will be against God tho' it were nothing but the Infallibility of the Pope It contradicts directly the Truth because no Man can ever be infallible how holy soever he may be S. Peter the first Pope did expresly deny his Master and did really err in dissembling because of the Jews for which S. Paul reproves him Can it ever be said without Blasphemy that a Man is Infallible secing Infallibility appertains to God alone Neither the Pope nor any other can err or fail in following the Doctrine of Jesus Christ but in following their own Judgments or those like themselves they may fail and err greatly I ask'd her How it was possible that God should have left his Church for so long a Time in Errors She said Sir God has not left his Church in Errors she can never err nor fail for she is one and the same thing with God As the Bridegroom is but one Flesh with his Spouse even so the Church is but one Spirit with God Therefore she can never be left in Errors not for one Moment But the Errors which I discover to you Sir are in Men not in the Church for the Church is no where but in the Souls which possess the Doctrine of Jesus Christ who have never err'd so long as they abide in it The Church is a Spiritual and Invisible Spirit which renders it self visible by the Human Bodies which this Spirit animates So long as these Bodies are animated and possest with this Spirit of Jesus Christ they are all Members which make up this Church But if this Spirit withdraw himself they are no more but Members of Flesh not Members of the Church Errors therefore are insinuated into these Members of Flesh not into the Spirit of God But whereas these Members of Flesh did possess formerly the Spirit of the Church
they have retain'd the Name after having lost the Spirit and their Souls being void of Faith God takes no longer Pleasure in them but they are abandon'd to the Spirit of Error Not that God on his part leaves the Church to err but these Men having forsaken their God have form'd a Church of Flesh which cannot be the true Church which is a pure Spirit as God who is not visible but by his Works so the Church is not visible but by the Bodies of those who possess this Spirit It appears sufficiently that what they now call the Church is not govern'd by Divine Principles but by Human and Natural I ask'd her Whether the Pope the Cardinals the Bishops Prelates Pastors Priests Monks and other Persons making Profession of the Catholick Faith were not the Church And if all these Members together do not make up a Church She said No Sir all these Persons tho' met and assembled in one and the same Place do not make the true Church so long as they do not possess the Doctrine of Jesus Christ It is nothing but an Assembly of Flesh subject to Corruption Every one acts there according to his own Sense There they propose and resolve according to Human Arguments not according to the Spirit of God who is not to be found where things are manag'd only by Civil and Politick Measures which do not regard the Glory of God but human Accommodations The holy Spirit does not animate so vile Subjects Nevertheless he governs always the true Church in what Place soever it be He never abandons it But who can discover it It is so hid and unknown that no Body discerns it It is a Treasure hid under the Earth of which Jesus Christ has spoken by Parable saying That the Kingdom of Heaven is like unto a Treasure hid in the Earth and that he who has discover'd it must sell all that he has to buy this Ground that he may find this Treasure There is no Kingdom of Heaven but in the Church that is to say There is no Salvation out of the Church and not knowing where to find it who can look for Salvation It it no wonder Sir that I said unto you heretofore That Paradise was shut forasmuch as I cannot see where the Church is and consequently where Salvation may be had It is a Vine which is cut even by the Root and Ground We see indeed its Branches extended far enough But they are nothing but dead Wood being cut off from the Root no Fruit can be any longer expected from them The Members which at present they call the Church are cut off from the Root which is Jesus Christ which brought forth great Branches But since they have been cut off from their Root they are fit for nothing but to be cast into the Fire which you will see very shortly Sir in case God give you yet some little Time to live The Twenty First Conference Where the true Church is Where God is How he speaks to the Soul and the Soul to him and how we ought to dispose our selves for this Divine Conversation I Ask'd her If there was no fix'd Place where we might find the Church That for my part I would search for her because I would seek to be saved She said to me Sir The Church is everywhere where there are Souls possessing the Doctrine of Jesus Christ There are no other Places proper or destin'd for the true Church to reside in All those Persons who are call'd Churchmen are as so many Stones with which they have built a material Church which serves now for the Offering of Sacrifice and it may be shortly will serve for a Stable for Horses These Stones and other Materials are not the Church tho' they serve to the Structure of a Building which may be both for Holy and Prophane Uses Therefore Sir the Church is not to be sought for in any fixt Place which is material but in Spiritual Souls who also cannot be found because they are oblig'd to keep themselves hid as the Body of Jesus Christ did before his Passion For they would do them no less Evil than they did to him because the Envy of the Prelates is now far greater than was ever that of the Pharisees who put Jesus Christ to Death God gives you a holy Desire of seeking the Church for he has said Seek the Kingdom of Heaven and the rest shall be added to you This is a Sign that the Church is not tied to any material Place for then there were no need to seek it but to go to the Place where it is For Example If the Church were at Rome there were no need to seek it We would know assuredly where it wâ—re Since Jesus Christ says it must be sought this is indeed a Sign that it is hid and unknown And likewise all they who seek Rome do not for this receive all the rest in Gift since so many things are wanting to them even after they are Romanists Which would not befal a true Christian who would be content with what were purely necessary with which God would always infallibly provide him I said to her That I was not truly satisfied for the Good of my own Soul That I would willingly know where I might find the True Church that I might have Salvation She replyed Sir The Church is within you If you seek the Kingdom of Heaven only let Jesus Christ reign in your Soul by his Doctrine then the Kingdom of Heaven will be in your Soul God being there He reigns always where he is He would reign in all the Souls of Men if they did not put Hindrances thereto The Centre of our Souls is God who being Salvation and Life we ought not to seek without us the Church nor the Kingdom of Heaven For he is not an Earthly and Temporal God but Celestial and Eternal The Church being the Word of God it is in us since he cannot be without his Word as we are always in the Place where we speak He is not Earthly for Jesus Christ says That his Kingdom is not of this World It is therefore a heavenly Kingdom which is in us because God is there whose Kingdom is Celestial and Eternal Where then would you seek the Church and the Kingdom of Heaven but in the Centre of your Soul That is the certain Place of its Residence We may be deceiv'd in all other things but not in this infallible Truth If every one had sought the Church and the Kingdom of Heaven in the Centre of his Soul there would not have been so many Persons deceiv'd Since they have sought God without themselves in so many divers means they have gone astray from him by the same means by which they ought to find him and whilst they sought for the Church in so many Masters Doctors and Directors they have stray'd from that which is Holy to follow a
become Man-like to us and then our Souls only were like to him It is a more perfect and accomplish'd Conversation of Body and Soul than that of the Soul only But because God will give in the End an accomplishment to all things in an altogether perfect Sense he would have taken Human Flesh that he might converse with us perfectly even tho' Adam had never sinn'd and tho' there had not been any need of redeeming us by his Death God is not become Man to suffer or to die but to converse with us and reign in us visibly and sensibly upon Earth which will be made the Paradise of the Delights of God with Men. I ask'd her If it was not needful that God should become Man to redeem us since we were all lost by Sin She said No Sir God is not subject to any thing and has no necessity He had no need to become Man to redeem us He might with a Word have render'd us the first Grace seeing that with the same Word he had created the whole World He could have created a thousand Adams and a thousand earthly Paradises with the same Perfection in which he had created the first of nothing whom he might justly have let perish eternally instead of becoming Man to redeem them But he could not take his Delight with Men perfectly unless he made himself Man like to them If Man had been like to God and not God like to Man there would have been some Defect in these Delights at least on Man's part who would not have had perfect Delight without seeing his God like unto him as a Lover takes Pleasure to wear the Colours which his Mistress wears This testifies reciprocal Affection when one renders himself as like as may be to that which he loves This Fountain of all Love could do what he would It was needful therefore that he should become Man even tho' Man had not fallen into Sin to the end he might live with him in perfect Resemblance unto all Eternity in all sort of Delights which Happiness is suspended unto Man until that he have accomplish'd his Penitence to which he is subjected by his Sin Which being finished he will enter again into Communion with God as if he had never offended him He will speak with God Face to Face by his Humanity which will be rendred immortal as well as that of Jesus Christ that they may delight themselves perfectly together upon Earth which will then be rendred Paradise by the lovely Presence of God who for these Ends became Man not that he might suffer or die which he would needs do by accident for the Instruction of Men and their Relief I said unto her That this had never been understood after this manner and that many Fathers had call'd the fall of Adam happy which had caus'd the Incarnation of the Son of God without which Fall God would not have become Man She said Sir This is very ill understood The Fault of Adam ought rather to be call'd very unhappy which has caus'd the Sufferings and the Death of Jesus Christ who would assuredly have become Man not suffering but reigning not despis'd but honour'd by every one not poor and vile but in Riches and in Glory not in Reproach but ador'd by all Men living He would have become Man to reign not to suffer for if the design'd End of his Incarnation had been Suffering and Death the Fathers of the Antient Law would not have had Ground to have so much desir'd and aspir'd after that happy Day that they might see with their Eyes God made Man who should deliver them from their Captivity Could they Desire their Deliverance at so dear a Price as the Passion and the Death of Jesus Christ They would have had a pure Self-love in regarding only their own Deliverance and not the Glory of God which could not be met with in the Reproaches Affronts Pains and Death of Jesus Christ which are all things repugnant to his Glory who could not be honour'd by being hang'd between two Malefactors So many Holy Prophets who have foretold the Coming of Jesus in the Flesh did not speak of his Coming to suffer but of his Coming in Glory When David invites all Creatures to praise the Lord he does not speak but of the Time that he must reign upon Earth For he says Heavens Waters Earth and all Creatures bless the Lord. Nothing of all this has blest him in his first Coming in the City of Bethlehem For even Men themselves did then reject and pursue him to put him to Death As King Herod search'd for him a little after his Nativity If the Angels did sing then Glory to God in the highest and on Earth Peace to Men of Good Will This could not be but by a Prophetick Spirit in regarding his Glorious Coming which will glorifie God and will give universal Peace to all Men of Good Will who shall then be upon Earth seeing that at his Birth as since Men of Good Will have never been in Peace but pursued and persecuted yea even Jesus Christ himself And how should God have been glorified by this Birth seeing that he has been the more blasphemed by Men. I entreated her to tell me for what Reason Jesus Christ became a Suffering Man since he could have redeem'd us without Suffering or becoming Man before the Time of his glorious Coming She said The LOVE Sir which God bears unto Man made him take Human Flesh before his Coming in Glory he perceiv'd that Men would stray always more from him and altogether forget their Duty so that almost no Body would any longer acknowledge God Atheism was almost through all the World Even his own People which were the Jews had made his Law void by their Traditions Every one follow'd the Learned and were lost through Ignorance To remedy which God became Man that he might come and teach them and redress their Faults by Deeds more than by Words For these Ends therefore he takes a Human Body like to us to the End he might walk first in the Life which he would point out unto us and perceiving that Men were undone by the Wealth and Honours of the World he takes a poor Mother who was so despis'd and abandon'd that she was oblig'd to bring him forth in a Stable with all the Inconvenience that Poverty brings along with it And to make appear to Men that Prosperities the Friendships and Caresses of Men did serve for Hindrances of Conversation with God he leaves his Country to go into Aegypt out of all Acquaintance being oblig'd to this by the Pursuits and Persecutions of Herod He labours for gaining his Bread that Men might willingly labour for accomplishing their Penitence At length he begins to teach by Word and to shew to Men wherein they were wanting that they might attain to Salvation He explains to them wherein the Law of God consists and gives them the
Evangelical Counsels for observing it aright He is despis'd and rejected by the Great Men of this World He is also Reproach'd Buffeted held for a Wicked One To shew that the Praises of Men are not to be sought for but their Reproaches rather to be endur'd for the Love of God At last he is put to Death for the Truth enduring all with Patience To teach us to suffer patiently even to Death And all that he has endur'd has been to give us an Example I ask'd her In case Men had not come to so great Extremity of Evil whether she believ'd that Jesus Christ would have come so soon to take Human Flesh She Replied No Sir he would not have come till the end of the World to judge and condemn Men in abolishing Evil He would have come in the glory of all his Majesty with all his Angels not in Contempt and Sufferings He would have come to Reign not to undergo an infamous Death If you read attentively the Prophets Sir you will find that they speak far more of this coming in Glory than of that in Reproach For the coming of Jesus Christ in Glory is as it were THE SUM OF THE DESIGNS WHICH GOD HAS OVER MEN And the coming in Reproach is as it were the Accident of the said Designs Therefore there will be much more spoken of through all the Holy Scriptures Read Sir attentively all the said Scriptures from the creation of the World you will find that they all will aim at this Kingdom of Jesus Christ on Earth with Men for this is the end of their Creation God can never reign fully in Men until the time of this coming in Glory because that they living yet in the liberty of doing evil do not yet give full possession to God to reign in their Souls for very often or at least by accident Sins do rule there Which we have seen in the greatest Saints of the World A David a Solomon all the Apostles and Disciples of Jesus Christ yea all those who have since been esteemed Saints have all in general fallen into Trespasses and have strayed from God for some time By which he could not find in them his perfect reign as he will do after his glorious Coming For then all will be Deify'd Bodies as well as Souls And there will be an end of all Evil. God will then have his full dominion over all Flesh which has never been For the most part of Men in all times have Blasphemed and Despised him tho all were created by him to love him and to adore him They have yielded their honour and love to the Creatures instead of the Creator Is it not fit Sir that these things be one day repaired and that God be worshipped in Spirit and in Truth by his Creatures I said to her That assuredly God would after that manner be adored in Heaven but that I could not comprehend how he could be so here upon Earth She said I perceive Sir that you take for Heaven and Paradise some precise place or some particular part which ferves for a Residence to God And for my part I cannot believe that there is any thing capable of containing God for he is greater than all things and cannot be contain'd by any thing less than himself The Heaven is but his Creature which we say is on high and God has neither high nor low for he contains all Heaven and Paradise is always in him for there can be no other but his Presence and he who is in his Presence is in Heaven and Paradise For my part I know no other They tell us many imaginary things of God and of Paradise which have very little relation to what they are It seems God is like an earthly King who is lodged in some Palace of Wood or Stone These are all Speculations of Men as earthly as their Affections For God cannot have any fixt place for his Residence seeing he comprehends all things When I say that God will be upon Earth reigning with Men the Earth will then be Paradise for in all Places where he is there is always Paradise If God were in Hell Hell would then be Paradise there being no other but the presence of God That makes in all places where it is Heaven and Paradise When this presence is in our Soul our Soul is Heaven How can you not comprehend Sir that God could be truly adored in Spirit and in Truth upon Earth seeing he has so often promised to make an Alliance with Men Must not this Alliance be made upon Earth God being a pure Spirit has no need of any Station but Man having a Body has need of some Place to contain him The Earth was created for this necessity that it might contain the Bodies of Men. Why then should not God come upon Earth to dwell with them seeing they cannot go where God is in that purity of Spirit Of necessity he must either come upon Earth or indeed they could not be entirely united together I asked her When Jesus Christ shall come to reign upon Earth and to Allie himself with Men She said As sooon as the Plagues shall have rooted out all the Wicked or the greatest part of them then He will appear in the Clouds and all the World shall see him You may indeed live till then Sir if God please For my part I hope to see him and to reign with him Eternally In this all my hopes and my joy do consist For this Life is too miserable to take any contentment in it without the hope of this time to come I say it will be very shortly for I see the Measure full and Mens sins are come to the height They cannot be more numerous And if there were not some small Veil of Human respect they would Murther Rob commit Adultery and do all sorts of Abomination publickly as well as they do them before God But Pride keeps these things yet concealed that they may not be despised by Men And as for what passeth only before God or a few Persons they make no more reckoning of it It seems all is lawful provided it be not discovered What greater Evil can be expected The abomination of Desolation is in the Sanctuary Tho Christians be the People of God they have denied his Faith and have abandoned it to become Idolaters of one another Every one has his proper Idol one worships his own Body another his own Spirit another his Learning another his Riches another his Honours another his Children or other Creatures In short none adore God but with their Lips Is it a wonder that the Judgment is near when we see that all Men have abandoned their God Is it not time that he likewise abandon them which he cannot do but according as Man withdraws himself from God by the same consequence God is withdrawn from Man for two things cannot stay together when the one withdraws it self
the one withdrawing makes a separation as if they both withdrew So that God is as much remov'd from Man as Man has remov'd himself from him And having thus abandoned God what can we expect but universal Plagues which our universal Evils have drawn down upon our guilty Heads Which Plagues having purg'd our Crimes and burnt the Tares the good Grain will then be gathered into the Granary of God which is the Kingdom of Jesus Christ I ask'd her Whether this Kingdom of Jesus Christ shall remain upon Earth for ever She saith yes Sir It will be Eternal and never end If you believe in Life Eternal which is an Article of our Creed you believe in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ upon Earth I have also told you that there is no other Paradise but the Presence of God And whereas Jesus Christ is God as my word is me his Body must have some Station as also all the other Bodies of the blessed God being a pure Spirit has no need of any Station nor yet our Soul which is also a Spirit A Spirit is through all and comprehends what is at a distance as well as that which is near As our Thoughts have no need of a way to go to Jerusalem They go thither in the twinkling of an eye for they do not stay in any place Even so God has no need of Heaven nor of Earth to stay in being a pure Spirit nor yet our Souls which are in Paradise when they are united unto God But our Body has need of Heaven and Earth and of all the other things which God has created for it because it is material it must also stay upon material things suitable unto its nature Therefore God has created all this World with all that is in it that Man may have his full delights as well in his Body as in his Soul For God makes nothing imperfect but all his Works shall have their compleat Perfections And resolving to create Man a kind of Creature Spiritual and Bodily both together he gives himself to him for to satisfie his Soul which is a Spirit he will give him likewise all created things to satisfie his Body So that the Soul shall take its delights with God and the Body its delights with Heaven and Earth and all the other Creatures For God has created them for those ends and for no other thing that Man might have his full perfect contentment of Body and Mind in that Life Eternal wherein Jesus Christ will reign always in Body and Soul with the Bodies and Souls of the Blessed who shall be united in Spirit unto God and in Body unto the Body of Jesus Christ Behold the alliance which God promised unto Abraham which he did not see but very far of and we see it now very near Do you not think Sir that this Kingdom of Jesus Christ must be upon Earth seeing that he has taken a Human Body like unto ours A spiritual thing cannot support but that which is spiritual But a material must have a stay agreeable to its Nature which is also material Who can or would change that Excellent Order which God has establish'd in all his Works so just and so perfect which alone are worthy of Admiration as the Author is of Adoration Can you yet doubt Sir that Jesus Christ shall reign upon Earth seeing it is a just and necessary thing Would you believe that God should create all this beautiful World only for this miserable Life of Penitence and that at the end of it he should abolish this great Work of his Hands or that he should consume by Fire the whole Universe This would not be a just thing that he had made all these things only for our Miseries This would be as much as to say that God had had little Wisdom I was ravish'd out of my self to hear things so unheard of so admirable and so charming And that I might understand a little more I ask'd her if the Earth and the World would abide for ever She said Yes Sir the Earth and all the rest that God has created will abide for ever in the State in which he established them at their Creation For the whole works of God are all Everlasting Therefore he has created all things with Seeds for to spring and to engender Eternally All which Generations must be made for the delight of Man without Pain or Labour All things would have brought forth their Kind according to their Species in a good and delightful manner x The Sun would have given his light and heat in measure without any Excess the Air without Storms the Sea without Tempests The Fire could not have burn'd us nor the Water drowned us nor the Earth brought forth Thorns nor the Beasts bitten and poyson'd us but all sort of things would have served us for Delight and Recreation So many little Beasts which are upon the Earth and in the Air which seâ—ems useless to us were created to the end that even the least of our Senses might be Recreated Even the diversity of Flies and many other sorts of Animals Herbs Trees and Flowers all these were created not only for the necessities of Men but also for their Delights Which things had nothing but Goodness and Perfection without Sharpness Prickings or Bitings How much more ought Man to be Good and Perfect seeing all these other things which were subjected to him had so much Goodness and Perfection You might ask me from whence it comes that all these Creatures are become Evil seeing they were created so good and perfect I will answer you That the sin of Man has caused all these Disorders and with Justice For all the Creatures of God ought to rise up against Man and take vengeance of his Ingratitude according to their power because he had merited that all that was given him for Joy should serve him for Grief Seeing he who ought to have serv'd for a delight z unto his God turns away from him to offend him his Justice would require that all the Creatures should do the same toward him since he had done it toward his God who had infinitely benefitted him more than any other Creatures which might well offend Man and become his Enemy when he was become the Enemy of God who tho he could not render his Creatures Evil because he is the source of all Goodness from whence nothing that is evil can ever proceed yet he might well permit that his Justice should be exercised by those inferior Creatures when Man had so justly deserved it I asked her If all those Creatures Animate and Inanimate would have an eternal Being She said Yes Sir nothing will perish of all that God hasmade But the evil that is in all these Creatures shall be taken away because it does not come from him and all that comes from Men shall Perish For Example That the Sun burns us and dazles the eyes which look upon him This
comes from Man who has distempered that excellent Star by his Sin That the Air is stormy that the Water is troubled That the Earth brings forth Thorns and Thistles This is for no other reason but to take Vengeance of the Disobedience which Man hath committed against God The Dog bites The Wolf devours the Serpent Poysons and all those other Evils which the Beasts do to Man this is for no other reason but to render him the Punishment that he has merited by his Sin If the Fire burn him if the Air infect him if the Water suffocate him this is but for a just Punishment If the Earth doth not bring forth its Fruits without Labour this is but for a Penance of Man's Sin In short all the Creatures whatsoever even to a Flea are obliged to hurt Man because of the Disobedience that he has committed against their Creator and this by Right and Justice But as soon as his Penitence shall be accomplished and he shall obtain the absolute pardon of his Sin all shall be re-established in their first Estate and shall not fall away any more for the glorious presence of Jesus Christ will confirm them in Grace maintaining them in eternal Peace all the Creatures with men and they shall do then what they should have done from the beginning of the Creation Man's Rebellion against God ceasing This will then be a continual and eternal delight for all things God will do the will of Man who shall love him and Man will do the will of God upon whom he shall depend All the Creatures will do the will of Man who shall command them In short God Man and all the Creatures will have but one and the same will without any Rebellion Will not this then be a Paradise of all the universal World They have sometimes told us extravagant Stories of Paradise but this was but to make us understand that it should be filled with all sort of Contentments as they say to Children that there they shall eat Sugar with Spoons because Children have their delight in it But nothing of all that is told us of it can be true except what God has revealed of it at present because the time approaches and will not be long in coming I ask'd her If Men will be confirm'd in Grace without being able to sin or fall any more as they have done once in Adam She said Men Sir will not remain without Sin by constraint or necessity because God would have them in a Free State that the love he bears them might be perfect but they canuot fall nor sin any longer for they will be eternally united unto Jesus Christ beholding God in Spirit and that glorious Body in Flesh who will Govern them and take his continual Delight with them which will hinder them from thinking of sinning or falling It is true Adam did converse sometimes with God but in a manner that was not Humane and had also Intervals For if he had always continued in Conversation with God he could not have Fallen But in diverting himself from him to hearken to his Wife and the Serpent he falls into Disobedience through the wandring of his Spirit Now in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ there can be no Straying he will be always present with them he will replenish them with Graces and Joys so abundant that nothing can any more divert them No body will say any longer Know the Lord For all shall Know him and Love him The fault of Adam and the hard Penitence which it occasion'd will make them see abundantly what it is to forsake God Likewise they shall not be any longer subject to Concupicense for they shall all be satisfied in Body and Spirit by the glorious Spiritual and Bodily Presence of Jesus Christ who having removed all their Sins will replenish them with the Holy Spirit in Fulness so that they cannot have any more inclinations to any Evil so much the more that it shall be removed from the whole Earth and that all that is evil shall perish I said to her That all the Interpreters who speak of Judgment say That the last Fire must consume all the World She said Sir These Interpreters could see no farther than their Sight reach'd but hold for certain all that I tell you These are Divine Truths The World will not be utterly Destroyed but all Evil shall be Consumed One part of wicked Men will die by the Sword another part by the Pestilence and Famine and all those Beauties and Riches which have served as Fewel to sin will be all burnt and consum'd by Fire which will purge the whole Earth by its heat And as heretofore the World was once purged by the waters of an universal Deluge even so shall it be then by Fire The World did not perish by the Waters but indeed all wicked Men with all their Wickedness and the Subjects of it The same altogether will come to pass by Fire which will burn and purge all Iniquity without sparing any thing But nothing will perish of the Works of God The whole Globe of the Earth will remain The Heavens and the Elements will be shaken but will not perish no more than the Servants of God for whom he will reserve some little corner of the Earth to save them from Shipwrack as he saved Noah in the Ark. How greatly desirable is it to be of that Little Number I asked her If these things would fall out at the day of Judgment or rather at the coming of Jesus Christ in his Glory She said Sir We speak of Judgment as if it would be done in one day or as suddenly as an Enchantment This will not be done as we think The Judgment is already made I believe I have told you heretofore The irrevocable Sentence is given there needs no more but to put it in execution The Unrighteousness of Men has so opposed the Righteousness of God that it cannot be any longer without Chastisements or otherwise he would not be Just The Sword of Justice must needs cut off all that it meets in opposition to it And at this time all oppose this Righteousness Therefore all must be cut off This is the Sentence wich shall not be revoked because Men will not revoke their Unrighteousness This Sentence will be put in execution not in one day as People imagin but by little and little to give time and leisure to Men to be Converted if they will seriously think on it Wars are the beginnings of Sorrows After that will follow the Pestilence and Famine Earthquakes in several places Yea even Fire it self as the forerunner and giver of Advertisement All this will prove worse until the consummation of all Evil As the waters of the Deluge always continued yea encreased untill they had carried away all the People who then lived upon the Earth so shall it be of the last Plagues which are already
may hinder this our Conversation with God even tho it were our own Eye which we ought to pluck out if it hinder us The Twenty eighth Conference How we ought to Pray and to understand the Lord's Prayer in its perfect Sense which regards the Dispositions and Graces that shall be bestowed on us in the Glorious Kingdom of Jesus Christ of which there are here Marvellous things spoken I Asked her How I ought to Pray to the end I might attain to this continual Communion She said to me Sir This Conversation is true Prayer which consists in the elevation of ones Spirit unto God And as long as we converse with God we are still in Prayer whether we adore him for his Almighty Power or bless him for his Favours or beg of him his Light and that which is necessary for us This is to Pray always as long as our Spirit is elevated unto God I know no other method of Praying If you ask of me words for Praying I will tell you what Jesus Christ told his Disciples when they intreated him that he would teach them to Pray as St. John did his Disciples Say Our Father which art in Heaven hallowed be thy Name and the rest of the Lord's Prayer in which is comprehended all that we can ever ask of God for his Honour and our Salvation In these words are comprehended all the Adorations which we owe to God all the Thanksgivings which we can render him and all that we may or ought to ask of him for our selves and for all others This is the Prayer which Jesus Christ himself did compose and the only one which he taught his Disciples of which we ought to make more reckoning than of all the Prayers in the World Many Persons give themselves to divers Vocal Prayers composed by some Saints or to a number of Beads saying a great many Paters and Aves without reflection so that if we should enquire of these Petitioners what they ask'd of God by so long Prayers it may be it would be hard for them to tell because all passes in many words without much attention Others who seem more Pious and advanced in Virtue give themselves to some mental Prayers and pass many hours in silence on a design to pray to God But at the upshot of all there does not proceed any fruits from all these Prayers for we see them as imperfect at the end of twenty Years of their Prayers as the first day that they began them Yea very often they break their Head and crack their Brains by the force of multiplied Conceptions one Petition only of the Lord's Prayer well understood is of more worth than all these I said to her That I did not well understand the Petitions of the Lord's Prayer entreating her that she would explain them to me She said to me Sir you ask a thing which a long time ago I judged necessary for all People For I think no body does yet well understand that Prayer But we will need a little time to rest to declare it to you in particular Let us sit down here and I will tell it you First when we say Our Father which art in Heaven Hallowed be thy Name We acknowledge That God is our Father that it is he who has Created and Formed us Who art in the Heavens That is higher than all things We use the word Heaven because we know nothing by our Humane Understanding which is higher than the Heavens and when we would say that God is above all things we say he is in the Heavens to make our Sentiments in a certain manner to be understood And when we say His Name be Hallowed this is to wish that all Creatures may adore and bless him which has never yet come to pass on Earth where Men themselves do Blaspheme his Holy Name on all occasions by Word and Deed. God could not have formed this Petition for us if he were not one day to grant it to us For he could not make us ask a thing which he would not give And whereas all his Works will be perfect it cannot suffice that some particular Souls do hallow his Name It must be in a perfect sense that all Men in general with all other Creatures do hallow him which will not be untill Jesus Christ Reign in his Glory upon Earth Then all things will hallow the Name of God but never before And when we say Thy Kingdom come This is no other thing but to Pray that we may arrive at that blessed Kingdom wherein Jesus Christ shall reign over all the Souls and Bodies of the Blessed and over all Creatures For we have never had this Happiness that God should Reign entirely even in our own Souls Having always given hindrances thereunto by our corrupt Nature yea even in the Souls of the Apostles and other Saints God has never compleatly reigned having always there met with some hindrances or rebellions of their own Will against his He can never reign perfectly in us until he have rooted out all our Evils and Miseries that we may Reign with him Which we have never as yet done tho' we have desired to be wholly unto God we have never reigned over all our Passions and Affections so as that we might reign fully with God But we hope that after the Judgment this Kingdom of God will come unto us This is the hope of our Prayers Thy Kingdom come And when we say Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven We beg also the same Kingdom For in our present state we cannot obtain that the Will of God be fulfilled in us and in others as it is fulfilled in God who is always without any contradiction No body can perceive his own Will to be so united unto the Will of God as that of the Blessed who are dead in the Lord On the contrary many do directly resist his Will and the most Perfect follow it at some distance and not as the Angels and the Blessed do in Heaven For where God is all his Will is accomplished and where he is not all is there contradicted Therefore in this Life we never do the compleat Will of God as we shall do it in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ where Earth and Heaven will be the same thing Then his Will shall be fulfilled in Earth as it is in Heaven which we must always pray for untill we have obtain'd it as also That He give us daily Bread That is what we stand in need of daily for the Soul and for the Body Now likewise we cannot obtain these two things during this Life For he who would have bodily aliment ought always to labour and take pains and be sollicitous both in Body and Mind to obtain his aliment and when we receive it it is but in form of a reward because of our Cares and Labours For otherwise we must dye for want if we did not labour both in Body and
Mind So that this daily Bread is not given us but acquired by Cares and Labours No more than the Food of our Soul which is the Word of God which ought daily to maintain it This is not given us daily for we must be at great care to search for it yea we know not where to find it So many Glosses so many Explications of this word that they would indeed make us swallow Poyson for Bread We must indeed watch and be at pains to find this true Food of our Souls But in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ the Word of God will be given us by the mouth of Jesus Christ himself which will nourish and fully satisfie our Soul As likewise all things necessary for the Entertainment of our Body shall be given us without pains care or labours The Fruits will grow so agreeable and substantial that it will require no other pains to be sustain'd by them but the delight of eating them Our Bodies will have no longer need to be covered or warmed for all the Elements will of themselves serve them with delight All this will be daily real gifts for they will be all freely given us of God without our Care or Labour Whereas in this World we have nothing but are as Workmen who receive the Wages of their Labours So that God cannot have made us ask the things which are impossible for us to obtain in this World Of necessity he must give us another in which we may obtain in Perfection the effect of our Perfections For as much as he never gives any thing imperfectly neither will he have us to put up unprofitable Requests as the seven of the Lords Prayer would be For there is not one of them which can be perfectly given in this World For if God did not forgive us our Offences but in the same manner that we forgive those who have offended us there would befal us no great Happiness in Paradise because those whose Offences we forgive are not always in our presence on the contrary we withdraw from them Sometimes out of Aversion sometimes that we may have no more occasion of being offended by them If God pardon us after this manner we would be of the Damned Souls For the Hell of our Soul is no other but the privation of the presence of God And as we do not give our Goods nor our Favours to those who have offended us and we think we do them enough of favour when we do not wish them Evil nor rejoyce in their Misery If God after he has pardon'd us our Sins should give us no more of his Goods and Graces than we give unto those who have offended us what Felicity could we hope for after the Pardon of our Sins but to fall again yet into greater Faults For his Graces and Benefits are necessary for us every moment to preserve us from Evil. And if he did not give us his Kingdom and his Treasures from whom could we expect for Happiness For no other but he can give it By which it appears clearly that we cannot ask for this World here That he forgive us our Offences as we forgive those who have Offended us because we would ask an Evil thing for our selves It must needs be that we ask these things for the time that we shall live with Jesus Christ in his Kingdom where being united unto his great Mercy we shall pardon our Enemies so perfectly that we shall desire the same Happiness for them which we shall receive from God who will not only pardon us our Sins but will deal with us as if we had never offended him giving us his Treasures and his Glory which will oblige us to do the same with those who shall have offended us For it would be unjust for us not to shew to our Neighbour the same Mercy which we receive from God This we cannot do nor comprehend during this miserable Life where being remov'd from his perfect Mercy we are as far from the Commiseration of our Neighbour and we can no ways beg of God that he deal with us as we deal with our Brethren without begging our ruin seeing if he should grant us this Request he would confine us to Hell which is the privation of the Vision of God From whence it appears That we look for another Heaven and another Earth where God will grant us all the Requests that he has made us to ask by this Prayer seeing that not one of them can be granted in this present World For if we examine also the Sixth Lead us not into Temptation We will find that the more we Pray the more we are Tempted For the Holy Spirit says If you would serve God prepare your Heart for Temptation Could Jesus Christ have made us to pray not to be led into it while in the mean time he lets us fall into it the more strongly This would be unjust He has taught us to ask nothing but what he will give us in a compleat and perfect sense But this will be after that we shall have accomplished this short penitence and shall go to reign with him Then there will no longer be any thing in us that will lead us into Temptation for we shall be fully satisfied with the presence of God not being able to love nor desire any other thing nor to move but by the motion of the Holy Spirit who will deifie even our Bodies which can no longer be led into Temptation as they will be always during this Life For the Devil will never cease to make War against us and more against the Good than the Wicked who are his own without trouble But for the Good he must win them by the strength of Temptations Therefore we must not hope to obtain in this Life the Sixth Petition of this Prayer Which is not to be led into Temptation no more than the seventh and last wherein we pray that God May deliver us from Evil For we shall never be delivered from Evil Seeing we are still more and more opprest with it and the Just themselves are never without suffering of Evils which the Wicked do them in abundance Despising Persecuting and pursuing them even to Death If these are never delivered from Evil how much less can others be who are likewise charged with the Evils of the Soul besides those of the Body which are common to all Could we always pray to be delivered from Evil without ever obtaining it What vain Prayer would this be to groan under the burthen of all sorts of Evils in Body by so many kinds of Diseases and in Spirit by so many Infirmities Weaknesses and Inconstances and in Soul by so many Sins and Imperfections and with this to pray to be delivered from the Evils which are unseparable from this Life It must needs be that God would have us to ask at present what we ought to obtain afterward And if this Kingdom of Heaven were nothing but
Heaven and the rest shall be given you this also will not come to pass in this Life For the Servants themselves who seek the Kingdom of Jesus have suffered many Necessities and Lazarus at the the Rich Man's Feet could not obtain a crum of Bread tho' he did not cease to ask it If the Promise which Jesus Christ has made of giving the rest to those who shall seek his Kingdom were to be understood of this present Life none if the Friends of God would stand in need of any thing tho' they should not ask of any it would be needful that God accomplish what he has promised them And if the Kingdom of Heaven were only spiritual as People do imagine there would be no need of any rest or other things after having obtain'd this Kingdom which would suffice fully Do you not see Sir that this promise of Jesus Christ is to be understood of his Kingdom upon Earth where he will give besides his Glory all material things for the delights of our Body Which he calls The Rest and makes us understand that we shall not need to seek and labour to have them but that he will give them freely as an excess of Blessedness And when Jesus Christ says He who shall leave Father Mother Brethren Sisters Lands or any other thing for his Name shall have a hundred fold in this World neither can this be understood of this present Life for the Apostles and so many other Saints who abandon'd all to follow him had not an hundred fold in Earth Mother Brethren Sisters Houses or Lands but on the contrary had need of many things after having abandon'd them Jesus Christ himself after having abandoned the delights of Heaven says That he had not in this Life a stone where to rest his Head How then should his Promises be true that he would render a hundred fold in this Life Jesus Christ can he lie and make all who have abandon'd all for his sake to be afterward in want of things necessary which would be very far from having the hundred fold of them We see the Wicked have ordinarily more Prosperity in Earthly Goods than the Just Jesus Christ would be a deceiver to falsifie his Promise which he has made unto all those who shall forsake all for his sake This cannot be thought But he promised to those who shall have left Father Mother or any other thing for his sake that they shall possess Life Eternal which shall be in that World when Jesus Christ shall come to dwell with his Creatures where he shall render the hundred-fold of all the things which they shall have forsaken for his sake for one Father they shall find an hundred because all those Blessed Ones shall have the Hearts of a Father and Mother toward their Neighbour All shall be Brethren and Sisters under the government of one and the same Father And the Earth being purg'd from all the Wicked shall suffice to give unto the Just an hundred times as much as they shall have abandoned in this miserable Life Lo thus the Promises of Jesus Christ shall be accomplish'd in a perfect sense in his Kingdom which can in no wise be accomplish'd in a perfect sense elsewhere no more in the Empireal Heaven as is imagined than in this time of Penitence There would need years of time to relate unto you Sir all the passages of Holy Scripture which verifie these Truths for when Gabriel says of Jesus Christ that he shall be great and be called the Son of the most High he cannot speak of his coming in the Stable of Bethlehem for he was but a little Infant abandoned and neglected of Men where his Grandeur did consist of Poverty and Miseries And when he began to be known and to speak in publick they call him the Son of the Carpenter and of Mary amongst the common People Which is very far from being call'd the Son of the most High and how should he lift up his Horn seeing he was wrapt up in Swadling-cloths and bound with Swathing-bands And it seems he had not strength to resist King Herod and the Pharisees who pursued him to death before whom he fled instead of resisting Do you not see Sir that nothing has in this World its perfect Sense Nevertheless all that is spoken by the Holy Spirit must be intirely fulfilled And if we hope that this accomplishment ought to come to pass in this time of Penitence we deceive our selves for the more it shall continue the more will Men mistake the greatness of God and the less will they call him the Son of the Most High and the less will he make his strength appear that he may give place to Man to use his Free-will But as soon as the time of the Reign of Jesus Christ shall come he will exalt his Horn to exercise his Power and condemn the Wicked and he shall be known of all Men for the Son of the Most High For he will come in Majesty and Power to rule over all things Whereas in the Empireal Aether there will be no need of exalting his Horn and shewing his Power seeing all submit to him by Love It is therefore of the day when he shall come to reign upon the Earth that Zacharias speaks by his Prophetical Spirit when he saw the Glory of Jesus Christ upon Earth And when he himself says If I be lifted up I will draw all unto me he does not speak but of this Kingdom to come For he has not drawn all unto him by his death upon the Cross because the most part of Men has since voluntarily yielded themselves unto the Devil The Twenty ninth Conference Of the Marks to know that we are fallen into the last Times and that the World is Judged to wit That Men are without Righteousness Truth and Goodness before God and that the execution of the Plagues makes it already effectually to appear I said to her That I understood sufficiently what she meant by this Reign of Jesus Christ upon Earth that I would apply my self to discover it more intreating her to tell me the Marks whereby to know that we were in the last times and that the Judgments were at present begun She said Sir observe well the deportment of Men and you will see clearly that it must needs be that they are Condemned for therein you do not perceive any Penitence nor desire of amendment On the contrary they grow every day worse and cannot so much as suffer that the truth of their faults should be shewn them and reckon themselves more secure in evil-doing than the Good have ever been in well-doing For the Saints themselves have feared God and dreaded Death Whereas Men at present have lost the fear of God and fear only Men and instead of dreading the passage of Death they dread only the day in which they must lose their Life which they love more than God Every one lyes
always to aspire to that which will be eternal But on the contrary we would be content to lose it the Eternal provided we might live here always All Men almost are in this Error by which they draw down the Plague of Pestilence to put an End to Desires so impious which have made them abandon their God This Life must needs be taken away from us since it serves as a mean to withdraw us from God The Plague of Pestilence is justly sent upon us to give Death to those who love their Lives more than God As is also that of Famine because so many Men have abandon'd their God for the Pleasures of the Mouth How many are there who love Meat and Drink more than Spiritual Delights Provided the Mouth and the Belly be satisfied they care very little for God Is it not fit that they endure Hunger who think of nothing but of filling themselves This evil is so general that in the best Assemblies of Christians now-a-days they speak for the most part of Eating and Drinking to keep themselves chearful Is it not fit that this should be chastised with Justice by an universal Hunger since this Sensual Appetite has caused an universal Sin by almost all the Men of the World From whence I draw the certainty that all are judg'd and that the Sentence is irrevocable Because no Body repents of these three Sins which form the last Plagues and God cannot defer longer to send them I ask'd her how we could believe that the last Plagues were begun She said Sir Do you not perceive that we are abandon'd to the Spirit of Error That Lying prevails and that Truth is opprest That Men promise themselves Peace and Security in the midst of such evident Perils That there is no longer Righteousness nor Sincerity or Fidelity among Men That Evils are conceiv'd without Fear and brought forth without Reprehension That the Just is punish'd as guilty and the Guilty supported and defended That there is no longer neither Faith nor Law among Christians and that they live in a Neglect of God and of their Salvation Are not these the greatest Plagues that could ever befal the World They are more to be dreaded than Fire Pestilence War and bodily Famine which can but kill Bodies Whereas these Spiritual Plagues kill the Soul which is an Eternal Spirit Behold Sir with the Eyes of Truth and you will see that all Souls perish without perceiving it Which is the greatest Punishment that God can ever permit to befal Men. Many say blindly We are at the End of the World for Wickedness abounds in all places There is no Trust to be given to any They deceive one another without Faith or Honesty In saying this they speak the Truth without knowing it far less apprehending it Many Signs have appear'd in Heaven in the Sun in the Stars fearful Comets menacing great Evils which did affright some at first but so soon as the Devil had Leisure to make his Adherents study to find out Reasons shewing that these were but natural things engendred in the Air he made the Fear of those threatnings of God sent as the Forerunners of his Justice to evanish out of their Minds The Sea has yielded blood And as soon as this has ceas'd the Memory of it has been effac'd Fire has burnt many Cities and they have presently found out some Invention to cover all these Warnings which God gives us saying That these are Casual and Natural Things As also the swallowing up of several Towns and Cities caus'd by Earthquakes They attribute all these Things to future and to natural Causes saying That these Countries situate toward the Sea are subject to Earthquakes In short Sir they make all the Threatnings and Warnings of God to evanish out of Men's Minds that no Body may enter into himself to be converted unto him through Fear and Trembling Some Stroaks of Thunder us'd sometimes to shake intire Cities where the People ran to Confession to prepare themselves for Death But now when they see so many several Effects of the Justice of God by Men's being abandon'd to all sorts of Sins and also by all those outward Sings in Heaven and Earth which have appear'd in our Time and to our Eyes no body is converted unto God for this Far less do they Imbrace the Spirit of Penitence It seems they mock at God's Warnings saying These are Natural Things But I would willingly demand of these Ear-flatterers If God ought not to send his Plagues but by supernatural Things and to make Chimera's in the Air He who has created all the Elements must not he make Use of them to chastise the Offences which we commit against him Is there not need of Natural Things to make our Body suffer which are likewise Natural If the Bodies of the damn'd shall indeed be punish'd with Natural Things why should not in like manner our Bodies which are yet living upon Earth Since they are not sensible but of Natural Things they must needs have Subjects conformable to their Nature The Deluge was made by a Natural Rain And the last Plagues will be made by Pestilence War Famine and Fire all Natural Things because the Heaven the Earth and all the Elements ought to rise up against us to avenge the Offence that we do against their Creator and ours If the Fire shall kindle by some accident or the Earth quake by the Tossings of the Sea and overturn Cities would this be accidental unto God who says that to him the Hairs of our Heads are numbred Would he thus let such grievous Accidents fall out Without his Permission this cannot be true But the Devil to divert us from believing that these things are the beginnings of the last Plagues makes it be said by his Adherents that these are Natural Things that no Body may turn to Repentance The Thirtieth Conference How God permits Man to be abandon'd to the Spirit of Error I Ask'd her How God permits that we should be thus abandon'd to the Spirit of Error She said Sir God permits it by his Justice because we have left his Spirit of Truth to hearken unto and follow Lyes He compels no Body leaving every one in the Liberty wherein he created them If Man therewith will needs abandon his God and adhere unto the Devil he lets him for he will not take away again the Free-Will which he has once given him which God will never take back again for he is unchangeable in all his Doings And having once found it good that Man should be a kind of Creature altogether free he cannot afteward find it evil but will leave him this absolute Liberty unto all Eternity If he will use it to love God he will follow the End for which it has been given him and if he will use it to do evil and to withdraw himself from God he is free God will not
away all the Fruits of the six Days Labours which he did in creating this beautiful World if all this shou'd be for the Devil and his Adherents No no Sir this cannot go so God must have his time to reign over all his Creatures that they may adore and know him the only true God and that the Number of his Elect may be multiplied as much as he has destin'd them that these never dying may bless him to all Eternity This is the Kingdom of Jesus Christ which I wait for Sir with Chearfulness Nothing can afflict me in this Hope It is a joyful Life to think on it what Joy must it be to possess it I said to her That these Words did ravish me with Pleasure but that I had also in Exchange the Grief to believe that all Men now are in a State of Damnation for fear lest I also be of the Number She replied You may indeed rejoice Sir 'T is the greatest Ground of Joy that we can ever have 'T is the Master-piece of all the Works of God and the Accomplishment of all things For this the World is created for this Man is created and for this God is become Man The Coming of Jesus Christ in Sufferings was for Sinners but his glorious Coming will be for the Righteous Therefore he says being in the World I am not come to save the Righteous but to bring Sinners to Repentance God from all Eternity design'd to become Man to the end he might not only make Man like to him but that God also might be like to Man that he might take his perfect and compleat Delight with him 'T is good to consider this Sir that God is not become Man only on design to suffer and to die For this would have been a sad Subject and the ancient Patriarchs wou'd have had little Ground to have prayed and desired so earnestly that God should become Man to see him hardly used suffering Reproaches Scourges and so cruel a Death The Love they bare to God wou'd rather have made them desire to remain in their Captivity than to be delivered from it at so dear a Price as the Sufferings and the Death of God-Man All those Wishes and Aspirations which all the Fathers and Prophets of the ancient Law made cou'd not be for this Coming in Sufferings but rather that glorious Coming wherein Jesus Christ being lifted up will draw all Men unto him which his Death on the Cross has not done because very few followed him then and no body follows him at present This is very far from drawing all to him seeing so few have been drawn from the Beginning of the World even till now Must there not a Time come wherein that he may fulfil his Word he will draw all in general to him Must he not also to make the same Accomplishment take away the Sins of the World For his Death instead of taking away the Sins of the World has rather brought on more because they have encreas'd and multiply'd since Can God fail in his Promise Must there not come a time when he will take away all the Sins of the World If this were not God shou'd not be faithful in his Promises which cannot be true For Heaven and Earth shall pass away but his Promises shall not pass away There is not a Syllable of them which shall not have its entire Accomplishment in an altogether perfect Sence They wou'd sometimes make us believe that all this shall be fulfilled in Paradise and they tell us that nothing defiled can enter there How then shall there be Sins there to be taken away And if all the Blessed are united to him there will be no more need of drawing them I said to her That I was so convinced as to believe that we must look for a new World and a new Earth and that I knew well enough that nothing of the holy Scripture shall have its Accomplishment in this World but that I was not freed from the Trouble of believing that all Men now were in a State of Damnation of which Number I was one tho' nevertheless I desired to be saved whatever it cost She said Sir to discover Truths you must always take things in their Source Consider I pray you that the Coming of Jesus Christ in Sufferings was for no other Grounds but to make known to Men their Sins in which they liv'd so blindly that the most Part knew not what they did but followed one another insensibly in the Way of Perdition as they do yet at present God of his great Mercy wou'd have become Man before his Coming in Glory that he might bring Light to Sinners whereby they might know their Sins and to teach them in particular what they ought to do and avoid to the end they may observe the Law of God which he came not to change nor abolish no more than to give a new one but only to teach the Means by which Men shou'd easily attain to the observing of this Law of God which was given from the Beginning of the World and will never be changed For God will never demand any other thing of Men but the Dependence which they ought always to acknowledge they have on their God who has created them and given them all things In the Practice of this Dependence is contain'd all the Law and the Prophets and the Doctrine of Jesus Christ They can have no other thing in Substance But Men being fallen from the observing of this first Law have need from time to time of divers Means to raise them again from their Fall For these ends Jesus Christ is come into the World timously and ere it perish before his limited time that taking Humane Flesh he might teach Men palpably according to their Senses to the end they might not be any more ignorant of any thing but might get out of Darkness to discover their Sins and see clearly the Way they ought to take to come to Salvation And that those Means which Jesus Christ came to teach them might not seem too grievous and difficult to them he wou'd needs pave the Way himself and put them in practice all the time he was on Earth to the end Men might afterwards follow his Steps and imitate his Example By this Foundation Sir you can easily discover whether all Men be in the Way of Salvation or Damnation Lay this down first that no body shall be saved but he who keeps the Law of God Secondly that Men thro' their Frailty cannot observe this Law but by such Means as Jesus Christ has taught them because they imagine that they live in a Dependence upon God when they do but depend on their own Wills To make this known Jesus Christ teaches them that to be his they must deny themselves Not that this Law of denying ones self was ordain'd in these precise Words in the Beginning of the World but it was tacitly contain'd in
and Submission so that we need not seek for them It is only necessary that we practise this Resignation of our Will to God for accomplishing the saving Penitence which he has enjoyn'd us and for the Exercise of all sort of Vertues For as soon as God shall be Master of our Will he 'll lead it to all good so that we shall do no longer Evil even in temporal things For God will govern all with his Spirit of Righteousness Goodness and Truth which can never fail in any thing Righteousness doing good to all and evil to none Truth giving Light to discern all things and so to bring all to a good End If you resolve Sir truly to resign your self to God you shall enjoy all this Happiness but as long as you act by your own Will you 'll spoil all and shall not be saved I said to her That this Way was so streight that one would be afraid to pass through it and that it would make one afraid that he could not be saved She said This Way is only a little streight at the Beginning but as soon as one has forc'd himself to depart from his own Will 't is then so large free and pleasant that there can he nothing more agreeable For the Soul which has resign'd its Will to God lives like a Child without Care and tho' Heaven and Earth shou'd be overturned she is still in Repose and without Fear knowing well that God who governs her is able to preserve her through all She seeks no longer after any thing knowing well that her God will still provide for her She has no more Desire after any thing for she finds in God a Satiety and perfect Satisfaction She places her Hope no longer in any thing but the Promises of God In short Sir this is a Life wholly delightful and pleasant full of solid Contentment which is not founded upon the Levity of Chances or Changes of Men but upon a permanent Stability Whereas on the contrary the Life of one who is governed after his own Will is very miserable and he walks continually upon the Briars and Thorns with which it is sown So that a Soul subject to to its own Passions furnish him with a kind of Martyrdom How many Vexations and Cares are there to satisfie this Self-will which often is unsatiable The more 't is satisfied the less 't is contented How often does our Self-will throw us into irreparable Mischiefs It 's ignorant inconstant insolent hasty and enclin'd to all sort of Evil so that he who follows it is oblig'd to lead a miserable Life and to end it in an unhappy Death It seems Sir you are afraid yet of resigning your self to God as if this Resignatination were a streight Way and troublesome Life when you see by so many Truths that 't is so sweet and agreeable and on the contrary that which seems so pleasant to you is so painful and dangerous All the Difficulty that you 'll find to make this Resignation is no other thing but a Shadow which appears something and in Effect is nothing As soon as you shall turn away your Eyes from your self to look towards God this Shadow of Apprehension will vanish and you shall see it no more I said to her That I was not so much afraid of resigning my self to God For I wou'd willingly do it but that in several Recounters she had given me Occasion to doubt of my Salvation She said Sir do you love flattering Discourses more than the Truth If it be so you may retire from me For I am settled in the Truth and I have no desire to depart from it I can make no Reflection whether it pleases or displeases my Hearers but I am resolved still to observe it tho' it wou'd cost me my Life For he who forsakes the Truth forsakes God which I will never do I love rather to lose the Favour of all the Men of the World than to omit the Truth when I am oblig'd to speak it But setting aside this Obligation I can very well hold my Peace because Jesus Christ has said that Pearls should not be cast before Swine If the Truths that I have told you beget Scruple in you 't is a sign that you are not resolved to be sav'd For otherwise you wou'd greatly rejoyce to understand the Truth Those who are called Swine in the Gospel are Men who make a Dunghil of the Roses of true Vertue or of the Pearls of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ Those hidden Secrets are precious Stones and he makes a Dunghil of them who says that they are imaginary or contriv'd things or Heresies All these Sentiments make a Dunghil of the Pearls which are presented to them and according to the Counsel of Jesus Christ they ought not to be told to such but to those who value them as they merit And when yor tell me that I give you occasion to doubt of your Salvation by speaking of true and solid Vertue it seems you wou'd also make a Dunghil of its Roses I have told you the Truth That no body shall be saved but he who of his free Resolution resigns his Will to God's and denys his own You need not therefore doubt of your Salvation if so be you will do this Sir but if you will not doubt confidently of your Salvation For you shall never obtain it This Doubting is good if thereby you take a Resolution to search for the means of your Conversion For the Fear of God is the Beginning of true Wisdom If you be not in Fear as to your Salvation you will presume of it and therefore will be sure of your Damnation Because he who presumes to have it uses no Endeavours to obtain it but dies in a Sin against the Holy Ghost Therefore it is a great Advantage that I have made you doubt of your Salvation since this Doubt will certainly lead you to Salvation I said to her That I desired indeed to have the Fear of God and of my Salvation but that I saw my self so far from this perfect Resignation that it seem'd to me I could never attain to it She said Sir that is nothing but a panick Fear because there is no Ground to fear what we wou'd willingly do If you have been resolved in it for so long a time past suffer not the Devil to tempt you now For there is no more Difficulty at present than the first Day you had the Will to do it Be not carried away by imaginary things which are nothing but Amusements Fix on the Reality of the thing You perceive clearly that you have a Free Will and Choice and that by this you act in all things It is by it you go from one Place to another It is it that desires to see and hear It makes you covet or pretend to Wealth Places or Honours It is it also that desires Pleasures and Prosperities It is it likewise that wou'd rule over others
Time is come to put this Sentence in Execution It will begin with the Plague of War and then that of Pestilence and after of Famine that there may be time given to all Men of good Will to repent and to take these Plagues in Penitence for their Sins and by these Sufferings to find a Way to return to God with all their Heart and to rise from Death to Life that is to say from Sin to Grace as the Jews shall do by being converted first of all that the Lord may find them watching at his Coming and may say to them Well done good and faithful Servant because thou hast been faithful in a few things I will set thee over great things Enter into the Joy of thy Lord Which Joy shall be recovered at the Coming of Jesus Christ in Glory who will overthrow all Evil by the Brightness of his Coming which shall be seen and understood by all the Men who shall then be remaining on the Earth Thus it is that God orders these last things with Weight and Measure that he may still exercise his Righteousness Goodness and Truth even to the End of the World waiting still for Sinners to Repentance being desirous that they shou'd be converted and live Whatever Men say God will never depart from his eternal Qualities and will not confound his last Works no more than he did his first For he continues still firm and constant in all his works If Men will not know this 't is their own Fault and the Effect of the straying of their Minds Nevertheless it is time to open their Eyes For the Plagues are begun I said to her That the Jews were wilfully obstinate not to believe that Jesus Christ was God which the Christians did believe assuredly and consequently they were nearer to be converted than the Jews She said Sir the Jews are less obstinate than the Christians because there is more Ground for their Unbelief than for that of the Christians who reject the Coming of Jesus Christ in Glory tho' it be verified by all the Holy Prophets the Apostles and Jesus Christ himself who in so many divers Places declare his glorious Coming and very few speak of his Coming in Reproach This makes the Jews doubtful knowing that God never surprises any but often foretells the things that must come to pass and they finding so frequently in the Holy Scripture the Prophesie of his Coming in Glory and so seldom his Coming in Reproach they have some fundamental Reasons for which they cannot believe his Coming in Reproach But so soon as the Truth shall come to enlighten them they will yield to it because they love it Whereas the Christians do formally resist it and wilfully impugn it and will not believe what they read so often nor hearken to the Light that is offered them thereupon being desirous to continue obstinately in the Persuasions in which they have been trained and blindly to believe the Sentiments of Mens preferring them to the Truth of God So that the Jews will sooner believe that Jesus Christ is God than the Christians will believe that the same Jesus Christ shall come to reign in Glory upon Earth tho this Coming be much more to be desired and valued than that Coming in Sufferings and Reproaches For he who highly esteems God will be troubled to believe or see he shou'd be abased or despised and become the Reproach of Men he who deserves all Honours in Heaven and Earth Hereby the Jew's have more humane Ground not to believe the Coming of Jesus Christ in Sufferings than the Christians have not to believe his Coming in Glory which is more honourable pleasant and desirable tho' the Jews as well as the Christians do very ill not to believe both the Comings of Jesus Christ which are equally true both the one and the other I said to her That she seem'd to hold the Jews Part more than the Christians She said Pardon me Sir I am not partial and if I were I wou'd rather take the Christians Part among whom I am born than that of the Jews whom I never saw I hold only the Part of Truth without leaning to any Side because I have no Pretensions upon Earth Neither Jews nor Christians will give me any thing But God will judge me in Truth and Righteousness Therefore I will always observe it without Respect to any body If I knew not that the Jews are more disposed to receive the Truth than the Christians I wou'd not speak to their Advantage But I cannot conceal the Truth when it is asked me If you address these Jews you will find my Saying true For I know nothing of my self All comes from a Source from whence no Lye can be drawn I am not enclined for the Jews nor for any other Sect in the World For I know none of them that are well pleasing to God But I love those best that are most disposed to receive the Truth and to be converted unto God and I remark this People of the Jews to be more disposed for this than any other Which in Trust I declare to you Not that I may be lov'd or despised but that I may simply declare the Truth as I know it Make a Trial of it Sir and of all the other Things which I have told you you will find them in their Time all true For I am not for telling things that are extravagant or without Necessity You will have Need after this to know all that I have declared unto you They will be very profitable for you and for those whom you shall judge capable of receiving them Doubt nothing of them Conceive and digest them all You shall receive from them great Light in your Understanding and Strength and Nourishment to your Soul and you shall still enter farther into the Knowledge of God and of your self which shall be an Everlasting Happiness for you Beware of being tempted to believe the Contrary Because the Devil will surprize you with false Appearances under a Pretext of scrupulous Piety and Justice The Eighteenth Conference How the Holy Spirit gives his Light to the Soul I Said to her That I would not doubt of her Words because I believed that they all came from the Holy Spirit She said Softly Sir all my Words come not from the Holy Spirit For he does not dictate to me all the Words that I must pronounce but the Substance of all that I say because I would never speak otherwise than by his Motion and no other Discourses are necessary for me For I have no Desire to please any and all that makes not for the Glory of God seems to me a superfluous and useless Thing Therefore I do not willingly utter any Discourse but these to which the Holy Spirit moves me But he does not dictate to me all my Words I have Need to express my self by Humane Reasons or Comparisons because otherwise they could not understand me For
Prayer He himself fasted Fourty Dayes in the Desert and was an hungred But these Reformers speak of nothing but filling their Belly well the better to excite their Lust Are not these who would Reform the Roman Church fine Zealots for the Glory of God We see also that all their Reformation has brought nothing but Schisms and Divisions among the Reformed themselves There is nothing there but Debates and Dissensions They wrote to me some while agoe that Two Preachers of the same Reformed Communion had fallen by the Ears together even in the Temple and the one had rent the others Garment from Head to Foot These are the Effects of their Reformation and of the Remedy they say they have provided for the Abuses of the Roman Church The Scripture sayes That the Tree is known by its Fruit. From whence we may infer how pernicious these Reformations must be which have caused such Mischiefs in Christendom having brought in nothing but Hatred among Christians though Jesus Christ did so much recommend to them To love one another By these Reformations they have despised hated and persecuted one another beat rob'd kill'd and murthered one another without compassion to maintain the Opinion that they have undertaken to believe though all their Opinions be equally bad the one erring one way and the other another So that to maintain the Errours of these Reformers these Christians kill'd and murther'd one another instead of loving one another according to the Counsel of Jesus Christ And these Enmities continue to this Day and they hate and despise one another upon the Account of their Religion though all of them signifie nothing and no Religions can save any Nothing but the Love of God brings Salvation and all these Persons love themselves only and live all according to the Motions of Corrupt Nature Their Religions consisting in nothing but Theory and vain Speculations not at all in Practice But to flatter them with some Piety and Devotion their Reformers have put the Bible in their Hands and some Songs to sing in the Temple since the Priests and Religious Romanists used to sing in the Temple and corrupt Nature has no Repugnance to Songs it rather delights in them as all these Reformers do at this Day who lift up their Voice as well as they can to make their good Voice be heard in the Temple where they sit at their own Ease with the Bible in their Hand on which they profess to read that they may learn to discourse of it though I have not known one Person who puts in practice so much as one Point of the Gospel Lo this is all the Service that these Reformers have learned their Disciples together with the Lords Supper that is performed without Devotion or Piety And notwithstanding of this they call themselves good Christians Evangelical Persons Predestinated or Regenerated Ones and other good Names Though they be as far from Salvation as Heaven is from Earth But these Reformers have known so well how to perswade them of an Imaginary Salvation by their Scholastick Reasons and Glosses that they have thereby so confounded their Spirit as that they receive Lyes for the Gospel That which is most to be admired is that among so many Persons of Vnderstanding who have followed these Reformers none have perceived the Cheat of these Sensual Reformers who teach a Life quite contrary to the Evangelical Life which speaks of nothing but denying a Mans Self bearing down his Flesh and doing Penitence with a Threatning that without this Mean we shall all perish It must indeed be said That from that time Men have been abandoned to the Spirit of Errour and Lying and that Mens Spirit has been quite blinded by Sin and is since still more blinded since yet in our Time we see Persons of a like Temper liâ—t up themselves above others and call themselves the Reformers and Restorers of Israel and separate from the rest of the Reformed that they may live separate from the World in greater Holiness than others Though in their Manners they be as sensual yea more than those whom they have forsaken For having no Accommodation of Worldly Goods and being unwilling to Work but desirous to be well Treated and Served they undertake Reformations drawing over to them Wealthy Persons that they may obtain their Aims and they make all their Goods common In which the Poor cannot but have Advantage and the Reformers Services and a good Time of it according to their Aim since in effect many follow them and give them all their Wealth with which they Eat and Drink and Marry as those did in the Dayes of Noah On which Terms they make them Preachings of Fine Studied Words and fitted for the Gust of the Hearers who are well pleased to have found out a way of Salvation so well accommodated to their Corrupt Natures since they make them believe that they are all ruled by King Jesus They are perswaded by their frivolous Discourses that this is true and thus Men are yet amused by Men as they were in former Times And I can see no other Remedy but that God overturn all these Churches made with Mens Hands that he may establish one made of Spirit and of Life where we shall worship God in Spirit and in Truth Which he makes me hope shall come to pass very shortly since he makes me declare so many Truths with the hazard of my Life to overturn Babel and revive True Christianity Blessed shall he be who shall receive them from God's Hand and shall not resist the Truth as Jannes and Jambres did since these are undone for ever But receive the saving Truth that God has communicated to me in this LIGHT OF THE WORLD which will Illuminate youâ— Soul In the mean time I remain Friendly Reader Your very Affectionate in Jesus Christ ANTHOINETTE BOURIGNON THE LIGHT of the WORLD The third Part. The first Conference Declares that God has never demanded any other thing of man but the dependance of his Will on Gods and that all other Laws are given him by Accident and to discover his Sins HAving been absent for some time from this illuminated Soul I went to find her again to entreat her to pray for me and to tell her I was resolved more than ever to resign my self wholly to God that I might receive his Divine Light She said Sir as soon as you shall make this Resignation of your self and shall deliver up into God's Hand the Freewill that he has given you you shall receive the Holy Spirit which will teach you all things But never turn back again to resume your own will otherwise the last Fault will be worse than the first Since you have now received more Light than formerly walk according to it and do not any more regard the World nor the Creatures for they cannot save you You must fall into the Hands of God whether you will or no No body can escape this whether he live well or
of all honour which then all the world will render to him and just to render compleat Justice to every one There are so many innocent persons afflicted and Saints unknown and despised on the other hand there are so many wicked men honour'd rais'd to places and Honours and even held for Saints All these being Dead and the Truth as to them undiscover'd must not God avenge the quarrel of the Good and make appear the wickedness of the wicked that he may be Just Good and True I said to her That every one look'd for these Reparations in the day of the general Judgment which must be done in a little time or suddenly where every one shall be recompenc'd in Heaven according to his Merits or Sufferings She said Sir They will make God a God of Confusion What appearance is there that this Judgment can pass in a day or suddenly since the whole world must appear there It should be necessary that all the men in the world should after the manner of an Enchantment be Transported to the same place in an instant who could hear in that croud the Justification of the Righteous If it were to be done only by word they would not hear one by reason of another and if every one in particular must be spoke to to declare his good or evil Deeds it would need a long time before all were repair'd Years would not suffice to Judg so many men as have been upon the Earth Truly Sir all the speculations of men are nothing in respect of the Truth but Chimera's in the Air. God took six days to Create the World deliberately and in order as he has done all his works by weight and measure without any disorder or confusion He made Noah prepare an hundred years before the Deluge and when it came it began to Rain which Rain lasted forty days The Plagues are now begun and will follow in order even to their end and the Judgment will also go on in order so deliberately that there shall not be the least confusion in it for that can come only from men and not from God who does all in Order Neither is there any imaginary Heaven as people fancy it where every one shall be Rewarded or Restored for Heaven is no other but the presence of God who contains all things and can't be contain'd by any because he is greater than all things We are in Heaven when we are resign'd to him whether we live or die we are still in Heaven when we are in God Now being thus Divinely in God we do not notwithstanding receive the material and bodily reparation of the sufferings which we have materially and bodily endur'd And as God has given us both a Body and Soul he has also given us a Paradise both of Body and Soul For this cause God would have become Man even tho man had never sin'd for God makes all his works perfect and compleat The Soul can indeed have its compleat Paradise by the Presence of God because it is a Spirit like to him but the Body can have no Paradise but a Material and Bodily one like it self because it is of a Material Nature it cannot have a perfect happiness by a Spirit or Divinity Lo this is the reason why Man that he may be happy must of necessity have his Paradise in the world which was Created by God for no other end but to serve for a Paradise to Man whom he was pleas'd to Create of a Bodily and Spiritual Nature both together and he has also prepar'd for him both a Bodily and Spiritual Blessedness which are the Presence of God as to the Spiritual and for the Corporeal the Earth and the World and all that therein is By which you may see Sir the truth of the coming of Jesus Christ upon Earth to Reign with Men that their eternal Blessedness may be compleated and that every one may have a Reparation by fulfilling all Righteousness not in a speculative or imaginary way or of a short continuance but a Real Divine and Corporeal Reparation which will last for ever For God's Recompences are not Temporal and Finite but Eternal as coming from an Eternal God who can't give finite or imperfect gifts Consider Sir all these Truths and you will perceive sensibly why Christ must come to Reign upon Earth and that he has not taken an human Body to Reign in the Empyreal Heaven which is Divine but only to Reign on Earth for this Divinity has no need of any Body but this body has need of and must of necessity have some material place to contain it such as the Earth is And if to repair an injury done to any it be needful to make the reparation in the same place and before the same persons where the injury was done why should not God repair upon Earth the injuries received there On Earth they shall be repaired as on Earth they have been committed The Eighth Conference Shews that M. Anthoinette Bourignon is sent from God to declare the Truth to Men. I said to her that I was now convinc'd of all that I must confess before all the world that she possest the Holy Spirit for a humane Spirit could never give so clear an understanding of all the marvels of God She Said Sir you are not deceived in believing that I possess the Holy Spirit because he lives in me and teaches me all that I have told you for I have never learn'd any thing from any man neither would I learn of them because they are in darkness and do not know the Truth in any thing They believe they are very Learned and they are nothing but ignorants being turn'd away from the Truth by so many Novelties which they have made them believe They will needs maintain the Roman Church to be holy and own her Councils as acted by the Holy Spirit while neither the one nor the other is true For the Church is the Babylon of confusion and the Councils are the means by which the Devil has withdrawn Christians from the Law of God they having Ordain'd so many outward things that the inward may be forgotten and that thro so many Natural things People may think no more of the Spiritual Their Commands their Sacraments their Indulgences are all diversions from Salvation to obtain which there is nothing needful for all persons even those who are without God's Grace and straying from the way of Salvation but the observing the Commands of God and the Doctrine of the Gospel for God will never give any other Commands and Jesus Christ will never give any other Counsels than those he has given us by his Doctrine of the Gospel He says That he is not come for the Righteous but for sinners This being so all sinners who desire to be converted must take up this Gospel-Life by which they shall certainly attain to Salvation since Jesus Christ is
live and dye in amusing our selves with the Hopes of Salvation without any ground Because it ought to be founded only upon the Resignation of our Will to that of God That which we least think of is the most necessary I said to her Since this Resignation of our Will was the only thing needful we ought to fix upon it and that neither Books nor Study nor any other Means were any longer fit for attaining to Salvation and that Man was very void of Judgment in burthening himself with so many other things She said Sir Man is truly void of Judgment while he amuses himself with so many different Things since there is but one thing necessary All the rest is superfluous and useless There is no need of Studies nor Benefices that we may resign our selves to God nor of Honours nor Riches nor Places and Dignities For all this respects the Earth only and Humane Accommodations A little Aliment will serve for this short Life Alas why should we vex and amuse our selves to make up a Fortune here which must remain on the Earth and all Humane Delights must dye with us Is it not a great Folly to embroil our selves in Places Offices and Benefices for so short a Time as this Life lasts during which we have no need of any thing but a little Meat and Drink with some Cloaths to cover our Body No Body has need of any thing else neither King nor Pope more than others with all their Wealth and Grandeurs but this little Aliment and whether we leave behind us at death Land or Money 't is all the same thing The Body rots in the Ground and we carry nothing away the Rich no more than the Poor the Noble than the Beggar Death levels all without any Preference Must not a Man be very void of Judgment to desire Goods which are a Burthen to us painful to get troublesome to preserve and grievous to be parted with What a folly does he commit who from his Youth gives himself to the Study of Letters or other Sciences on design to attain to some Office and Dignity and when he has attain'd it reckons himself happy As if any Happiness could be found in Miseries And does not discover that truly the Wealthiest and the Greatest are the most miserable and subject to more Cares and Vexations to more Fatigues and greater Accounts to be charged on their Souls and Consciences For he who has but a small Labour sufficient for the maintenance of his Life without pretending to more is a thousand times happier than a Rich and Great Man in this World and has also a far less Account to render to God For Offices and Riches lay great Obligations on him that possesses them So that what we imagine to be a Happiness brings upon us great Mischief robbing us of our Time which ought to be employed only in fulfilling our Penitence and also exposing our Souls to many Hazards of their Salvation and it wholly hinders the Resignation of our Will to that of God For he who covets the Offices Honours Riches and Grandeurs of this World cannot be resigned to God because all these things proceed from our own Will seeing that of God aims at no other thing but Eternity whereas all that is Temporal and passes away is opposite to it We would laugh to see a Pilgrim heap on his Head or Shoulders the Earth which he should only tread upon that he may advance in his Journey and we think we are very wise in Loading our selves with Gold and Silver which should only serve us for a Foot-stool and we oppress our Understanding with Cares Studies and so many different Distractions whereas we have but one thing only to care for which is to resign our VVill to that of God and to live without Care in this Resignation of our Will to his This is all that God will always demand of Man without obliging him to any other Thing And when we amuse our selves with so many different Things we Act against the Command of God and we follow our own Will For one will covet to become an Attorney Advocate or Counsellour another to be a Merchant Shop-keeper or Tradesman one becomes a Priest another enters into a Religious Order another desires to be a Prebend Bishop Cardinal or Pope And when they have attain'd to all these Pretensions they are only filled with Wind Because all this passes away as the Vapour that vanishes in the Air And very often when we think to take our ease under the Favour of some great Fortune we immediately go down into the Grave where Death puts an End to all our Employs and renders all our Pretensions vain For by following our own Will we can never have acquired any thing for Heaven and God would not be just if he should reward eternally the Works that we do for the Earth or with respect to the Creatures We are deceived if we believe it because all that respects the Earth is recompensed on the Earth The Sixteenth Conference Shews How the Resignation of our Will to that of God is a Continual Prayer that it supplies all particular Doctrines and Practices and that the Gospel directs us only to the removal of the Obstacles which hinder it the discovery of which is necessary I asked her If it was needful to use any longer the Means of Devotion when one is resigned to God If it was any longer needful to Pray to Watch to Fast to go to Church to frequent the Sacraments to procure Indulgences to Honour Images especially that of the Virgin Mary which Devotion they tell us is necessary for Salvation with many other things which seem to be good She said Sir The Resignation of our Will to that of God supplies all Things and when we are arrived at this Resignation we have no longer need of any Means Because God works then in us what pleases him and we have no longer need to Act but to be still and passive Our Devotions are then without ceasing and we pray always when we are always resigned to God For Prayer is nothing else but an Elevation of the Spirit unto him and it is elevated unto him as long as we receive all from his Hands and are pleased every Moment with what he ordains This is the continual Prayer which he demands of Man saying That we must alwayes pray and not faint He who lifts up his Heart to God only when he is in the Church or sayes his Pater Noster's does not pray alwayes Because he cannot be alwayes in the Church nor mutter his Prayers from Morning till Night But he who resigns his Will to that of God prayes continually whether he eat drink walk or take his rest He is alwayes by his Will united to God and has no need of other Means because he is arrived at the End where Means would be a Hindrance to him He still watches when he is ready at all
be to cast Roses before Swine Offer them only to those who will take pleasure to smell them and not to these who will cast them into the Dunghil All good Men will feel in the Bottom of their Souls that this cannot come from the Devil For he is the Father of Lyes and never incites to Self-denial because he is too proud Nor to the Love of God because he hates him And yet less to resign our Will to that of God for he catches all Men by their Self-will All my Discourses have for their Scope all that is contrary to the Devil who is never contrary to himself The Ninteenth Conference Sheweth That the Spirit of Antichrist hinders Men from discovering the saving Truth and that the Heathens are more resigned to God than the Christians at present I said to her That I thought no Body in the World could resist so clear Truths without betraying his own Conscience That all the Things she had told me did speak forth themselves and were attended with such solid Foundations and such firm Reasons that the Learned and Vnlearned might comprehend them and that the Scope of all was the Glory of God and the Salvation of Souls and that there was nothing in them that savoured of the Earth She said If we were not fallen into the Reign of Antichrist no Body could resist so clear Truths All the World would feel them and would discover his Deceits every one would flie to the Desert to do Penitence bewailing his past Life and the Errours wherein he had lived for so long a time But the Michief is that this Antichrist has so great a number of Adherents who take up his Quarrel and resist the Truth that the good themselves have difficulty to receive it For they disfigure it and make it pass for Lyes and Heresies telling those who advance it that they would seduce the People as they said of Jesus Christ when he brought Light into the World calling him a Seducer of the People or one that had a Devil The Power of Darkness is much encreast since the Time that he was upon Earth and nothing is to be look'd for but Outrages from all the Devil's Adherents In this case a Man must count it a Happiness to suffer Persecution for Righteousness sake and believe that there is no more blessed Death than to dye a Martyr for the Truth But he must beware of Men and use the Wisdom of the Serpent and rather part with his Skin than lose his Soul You will find more Welcome Sir among the Jews and Heathens than among the Catholicks who condemn others to Authorize their own Customs despising the Doctrine of Jesus Christ who sayes Judge not and you shall not be judged condemn not and you shall not be condemned These Catholicks condemn all those who do not follow them This is the cause why they are judged and condemned first to be rooted out They condemn so many holy Heathens who will go before them in the Day of Judgment because they were faithful to God though they had not any Laws or Institutions to know Him Nevertheless many resigned their Wills to that of God and obeyed the Truth in their Lives whereas these Christians follow Lyes of which the Devil is the Father and none of them will resign themselves to God nor take notice of the Truth which discovers the shortness of this miserable Life and the certainty of one that shall be Eternal These Heathens knew a God to whom they resigned themselves and seeing the Misery of this Life they bewailed it they laughed when they considered the Stupidity of Men who took pleasure in this Life and judg'd that they ought not to be called Men because they did not use their Reason to discover the Truth of Things For he who went through the City of Athens with his Lantern seeking for a Man in the midst of so many Thousands as were in the Market-place could not be ignorant that they who were about him were all Men But seeing they were all occupied in buying and selling and Trading for the Earth he could not acknowledge them to be Reasonable Men Because he who has Reason ought to use it for his Eternal Happiness else he is nothing but a Beast For Reason only makes a Man without which he does not differ from the Brute Beasts for they are unreasonable Animals and Men are reasonable ones Laying aside which they are as much Brutes as the Beasts This made the Philosopher search for a Man among so great a Number and could not find one because all spent their Lives in Worldly Business instead of employing them in the Study of the Knowledge of God and of the Truth which is the same God And they condemn those Heathens as damned and for my part I look upon them as SAINTS and believe they will come to Reign with Jesus Christ upon Earth to condemn the Christians who besides the Light of the Heathens had Lawes and Commandments from God with the Doctrine of Jesus Christ which obliged them to a farther Knowledge of God and the Immortality of their Souls the Shortness and Misery of this Life that they might despise it and the Vanity of perishing Goods that they might abandon them Nevertheless not one of these Christians does any of these Things I asked her If it was indeed possible that not so much as one Christian should be resigned to God nor have the Vertues of the Heathens She said Yes Sir This is most true that not so much as one Christian is resigned to God nor understands true Vertue as much as the Heathens did Because none apply themselves to it Since they became Idolaters of Men they have left off to know God and abondoned themselves to the Will of their Idols instead of the Will of God They Preach and Teach through all Christendom That we must depend upon Men whom they call the Fathers of the Church That we must believe and follow them even with a blind Obedience In which they prefer themselves to God who demands only of Man that he obey him in what he shall make known to him having given him Eyes to discover this Beautiful Universe that when he sees the Heavens the Earth the Sun the Stars and all the Elements with so many different Creatures so marvellous and so well ordered he might clearly perceive that all those Things must proceed from a God since Men and Nature can make nothing like them Moreover when Man considers himself he discovers evidently by his Understanding that his Soul his Memory his Understanding cannot come but from a God for no such Thing can come from Nature no more than his Body since all the Industry of Men is not capable to make so much as one Hair of our Head This obliges us to acknowledge a God by so many different Operations without being put to know God blindly no more than to love
the Sun the Moon the Stars and all the Heavens he must confess that the Authour of all these Things is perfect and looking on the Earth the Trees the Plants and Elements he must discover an incomprehensible Divinity who had the Skill to make all these admirable Things Which obliges all that are Reasonable to Love him And when Man considers himself and sees the Art there is in the Fabrick of his Body in the Faculties of his Soul in the Subtilty of his Spirit he must confess that there is a God the Authour of all this to whom all Things ought to be ascribed Because no Creature is able to do any such thing By all which things a Man comes more perfectly to the Knowledge of God than by Sciences and the Expositions of all the Doctors of the World who have nothing but Limited Sciences The Twentieth and Third Conference Shews That it is by Faith only that we can be Saved which coming from God works still Resignation Even among the Heathens c. I said to her That all this Knowledge of God was nothing but the Faith of a Heathen that it was not capable to work Salvation that to be saved we must have a Divine Faith She said Sir You are ignorant yet of a great many Things For that Faith which you call Heathen is Divine because it comes immediately from God who has imprinted in the Soul of all Men this Divine Light that leads them to the Knowledge of the true God This is a Grace infused without the Concurrence of any Men which is much more perfect then the Faith we give to the Things they propose to be believed by us in the Roman Church many of which are very absurd and neither respect the Glory of God nor our Salvation They give us for an Article of Faith That there are Three Persons in God Though nevertheless no Creature can comprehend what is in God but by his Operations which we see with our Eyes as that he is Almighty that he is All just all Good and True Because all that we see he operates in us and in other Creatures bear these Three Qualities But to know if there be Three Divine Persons in God this surpasses our Capacity Because God is an incomprehensible Being and was never discovered by any so as to know what there is in his Divinity They propose also to us many Things for Articles of Faith which are not of its true Essence seeing no Body can be saved without Faith and they continually propose to us new Things for Articles of this Faith which our Forefathers never believed as such And if we cannot have true Faith now without believing them it were to be feared that our Forefathers were not Saved since they did not believe those new Things which are now proposed to us as Articles of Faith They never believed that the Virgin Mary was conceived without Original Sin and now they would make this Belief to pass for an Article of Faith Though nevertheless there is no appearance of Truth in it For the Virgin came out of the Masse of Adam as all the rest of Men And she did also undergo the Penitence common to all the Children of Adam having gained her Bread by Bodily Labour and suffered the Malignity of all the Elements and her Son Jesus himself shiver'd for Cold in the Stable of Bethelem shewing that he was a real Man descended from Adam subjecting himself to the same Penitence that our First Father had received and accepted from God in the Remission of his Sin Why should they now lay it before us as an Article of Faith that the Virgin was conceived without Sin since all Humane Creatures which are born of Parents who live under the Dependance of God having accepted the Penitence that God enjoyn'd Adam are all born in the Indulgence that God gave to Adam Wherefore should there be a particular Article of Faith for the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin as also for the Infallibility of the Pope seeing all these Things have no respect to the true Faith which must work out our Salvation For if the Virgins Conception was Immaculate or if the Pope be infallible this makes nothing for our Salvation nor as to the Knowledge we ought to have of a God upon whom all Things depend This Light infused in my Soul is true Faith and the Dependance that I desire to have upon the same God is the Work of my Faith What need is there to add yet to this the believing that the Pope is infallible since I have the same Light of Faith that tells me No Man can be infallible Since Adam created in Innocence and endued with all the Grace and Holiness that can be met with in any Man did fall and by failing so grosly shew that he was not infallible may not a Man who is a Sinner fail or err All these Faiths and Beliefs are not divinely infused by God into our Soul as that Faith is which makes us know a God above all Things All good All-just All-mighty but Incomprehensible This Faith Sir which you call Heathen is the True Faith which is able to work Salvation in all those who in consequence of it do through Love resign themselves to the same God I asked her If she believed the Heathens would be saved since they are not baptized She said Yes Sir All the Heathens who knew God by his Works and resigned their Will to him shall assuredly be saved For they had operating Faith True Faith in believing that there is One Almighty God who created the Heaven the Earth and all Things and they had the Works of Faith when they were resign'd to the Will of the same God Which appeared in all those who despised the Things of this Life for that which is to come They could not have done this but by a Divine Light that God infused into their Souls Because the Brutish Senses cannot despise the Pleasures of this Life For they know no other and Nature cannot betray it self by despising what is good for it to choose what is evil for it When we see one who may have Honours Riches and Pleasures in this Life and who yet quits them to be dispised poor and afflicted we may well believe that he has the Light of Faith infused by God into his Soul Because neither the Devil nor Nature would ever induce him to do such Things For no Body hates his own Flesh and the Devil incites alwayes to satisfie Nature And if we see one whom we call a Heathen quit the Conversation of Men and retire into a Solitude we may well believe that he has the true Light of Faith which makes Nature break off conversing with its like For Society is a most Lovely Thing Man is a Sociable Creature above all the other Animals and if the Beasts are sad when they are alone how much more must Man be so when he Lives according to Nature unless it
be some half-broken spirit who through Melancholly loves rather to be alone to give the more Liberty to its Black Humours This is not to be found in those who despise Conversation the better to wait on God and to be delivered from the Troubles they have to live among those who know not God but offend him every Moment How could I believe Sir that these Souls so excelling in Vertue should not be saved even though they are not Baptized since Baptism is only an outward Sign of the INWARD RESIGNATION which they have made of their Will to that of God That God who tries the Reins would he not save them for not having observed this outward Formality which is done in the sight of Men We have not a Political God who has need of the Testimony of Men when he sees the Essence of Faith living in our Inward Parts I reckon such Heathens to be more SAINTS than many of those who are Canonized by the Roman Church and wish Sir that you had attained to their solid Vertues that you had a perfect Contempt of this Life aspiring after another which will deliver us from so many Miseries and also an entire Resignation of your Will to that of God in which alone our Salvation consists and not in so many sorts of Means which they set before us as necessary Things or a Blind Faith of Things which often respect neither God nor our Salvation For though indeed it be Faith to believe that which we do not see nevertheless that is not to say that we must blindly believe all that they would perswade us For God has given us an Understanding to comprehend what is comprehensible of the Works of our Faith For Example We must believe in God Almighty who created the Heaven and the Earth We do not so see this God in whom we believe but nevertheless we see evidently that there must be an Almighty God when we consider the Works that he has done by his Almighty Power and therefore our Faith is not blind since it gives Light to see the Works of him in whom we believe But diverse of these Things which they propose to us as Articles of Faith are without any appearance of Truth as is the Infallibility of the Pope I asked her If one might be saved without believing all the Articles of Faith in particular She said Yes Sir we may be saved by the General Belief that there is one only God the Creatour of all Things provided that this Belief beget in us the resigning of our Will to God in whom we believe Because in this all Things are comprehended since by being resigned to God we fulfil all the Articles of Faith all the Commandments of the Law and the Evangelical Counsels And whereas it is said that all Christians are obliged to Learn the chief Points of our Belief nevertheless this is not that they must Learn this by Rote or by Words For it is enough to know the substance of them that we may observe them for this observing of them is more than to be able to tell them by Rote it is the same as to all the Articles of our Faith in particular It is of little moment that we have a particular Belief of so many Points if we do not observe them all in general by the resigning of our Will to that of God We have no need of doing any other thing to work out our salvation for if we had not quitted this Dependance upon God we should never have had the other Commandments nor the other Articles of Faith Our sins alone have occasioned all these Articles and all these Commandments and other Means And sin ceasing we should have no need of other Laws So that our sins alone have engendered the Law and the Articles of Faith which were given us only to reduce our Understanding to a DEPENDANCE upon God The first thing that God did to bring back Adam to this Dependance from whence he had withdrawn himself while he would needs become wise in himself he asks him Adam where are thou Not that God could be ignorant where Adam was since he knows all things But it was to recal his Understanding to the Consideration of what he had done in disobeying God that he might consider the miserable state to which he had brought himself while he would needs depend upon himself The first Precept that God gave Man was to make him know the state of his Soul asking him Where art thou To make him re-enter into himself and recollect his Senses that he might see whither he had strayed from a Dependance upon his God in which if he had continued there would have been no need of asking where he was since he would have been still in his presence But since he had withdrawn himself it was needful that God should call him back again by asking him where he was But as soon as Adam acknowledged his fault and offered himself to God saying Here am I Lord all confused and trembling not daring to appear before him but hiding himself as a Criminal before the face of his Judge then God gives him the second Precept saying That he should Till the Ground and gain his Bread in the sweat of his Face This was the Penitence enjoyned to satisfie for his sin which being through Grace remitted to him he ought nevertheless to suffer some temporal Punishments and this in Justice For God had not only bestowed on Man a Divine and Reasonable Soul and a Free-will to love him but also many Natural and material Graces Therefore it was not enough for Man that God had granted him the Remission of his Trespasses against him in restoring him by a second Grace his Reason and his Free-will but he ought also to satisfie for the Natural and material Graces which things have not essentially the goodness of God to pardon this Injury received from Man God who is good pardons him the Offence he had committed against his Majesty and even makes him a garment to cover his Nakedness that he might lessen his Confusion he takes care also to thrust him out of Paradise for fear he should come to eat of the Tree of Life and by this means live alwayes miserable All these Favours come from the Divine Goodness But the Elements the Earth and the other Creatures not having in them this goodness set themselves against Man and make him suffer that by Penitence he might pay for the Rebellion he had committed against their Creator This the Justice of God own'd by ordaining Adam to undergo the Pains that all these Earthly Creatures should give him Because they are justly irritated against Man who was constituted their Lord to whom they ought to be subject and to obey But since he was a Rebel against his God they ought in like manner to rebel against him and being Creatures uncapable of Mercy of necessity Man must satisfie them by a corporeal and
Sir that there is no Salvation without this Dependance let about it quickly without considering whether you have Sciences or any other thing Because God can make all work together for good A Man must not regard himself but the Will of God who desires that all Men of what condition soever keep themselves in a Dependance upon him yielding up their Free-wills under his Power without desiring to use them themselves I said to her That absolutely and irrevocably I resigned my self to God to be a true Child but that I found yet some difficulty to forsake the Church She said Soft soft Sir You must never renounce the Holy Church Rather die than do so You must only renounce the Abomination which is crept into the Roman Church now Do you not see that she has falsified her Faith to her Lawful Husband Jesus Christ and that she has not continued faithful to Him I would be well pleased if you could shew me so much as one Point that she observes of the Doctrine of Jesus Christ or so much as one thing that she practises which is not directly contrary to the Life and Doctrine of her Lawful Husband who came down from Heaven to Earth to teach her them both by Word and Deed All which Things are despised by her who ought to be his Spouse I have often spoke to you of her Excesses and her Adulteries Would you yet hold her for the Holy Church since the Devil has plac'd his Throne in her What Weakness of Spirit is it to feel a Repugnance to renounce a Thing so wicked under frivolous Perswasions that she is Holy When God gave us Understanding and Reason this was for no other end but to make us discern good from evil that we might not perish blindfold And now you would change the Designs of God by stifling your Reason and Understanding that you may follow evil blindly And when you see it so plainly evil you form some foolish Imagination that nevertheless it is good This must needs come from a pure Infatuation of Spirit For even Natural Reason discovers to us manifestly enough that the Roman Church now is not the Spouse of Jesus Christ because she does not follow her Husband in any thing and two so distant Things cannot make an Alliance How can you have a Repugnance to quit her who has abandoned her God If the Beasts and insensible Creatures and all the Elements did rise up against Man when he quitted his Dependance upon his God How should not Man who is so reasonable rise up against that Church who has quitted the Dependance upon her God because she will not depend any longer but upon her self One should rather have a Repugnancy to remain under her than to quit her Or else we have less Resentment of the Offence that is done our Creatour than the Elements and the Beasts or inanimate Things who have still resented the Wrong that was done their Creatour even at the Death of Jesus Christ the Rocks rent and the Sun was darkened Have you less affection Sir for your God than these Stones that you do not resent the continual Injuries which the Church does to God It a beautiful Angel became a Devil for having desired in his Heart to be equal to God what shall she become who prefers her self to the same God without desiring to give deference to him in any thing I do even bewail Sir your Blindness in this Point and I cannot believe that your Repugnancy proceeds from your Reasoning but from some Habitual Concern that you have for the Church For if you applied your Understanding to consider the Original of this Repugnancy you would see clearly that it proceeds from the pious affection that you have for the Church but that you do not take her where she is For we amuse our selves in this as in other Things with Terms and Expressions of Men And when we hear them call the Roman Church the Holy Church this Word begets in us an affection for her without discovering if it be she of whom they speak When they would beguile a Child and make him afraid of his Father they put his Cloak and Hat upon a Stick in some obscure Place which the Infant perceiving believes it is truly he and fears and respects him But if he draw nearer and take by the Cloak he perceives easily that he is beguiled and that what he took for his Father was but a Piece of Wood. Truly Sir in the Darkness in which we live at present they make us see just the like by covering Rome with the Cloak of the Holy Church and muffling her with the Head of Jesus Christ we Fear and Reverence her as if she were our True Mother the Holy Church Authorised by Jesus Christ and his Lawful Bride But when we approach nearer and lift up this Cloak we shall see clearly that 't is nothing but Wood instead of Holiness which can be of no use to us except to warm us in the Winter Season Truly Sir we ought not to be so much Children in what regards our Eternal Salvation We ought not to walk blindly in so important an Affair If Men apply their Minds wholly to make a Stocking or a Shoe why should not we apply them more to save our Souls It is good to have the Simplicity of the Dove with respect to God For he who is resigned to him ought to do nothing but let himself be guided by him as a Little Child But we must have the Prudence of the Serpent to take heed of Men who may deceive or be deceived And when they say Lo the Holy Church we must remark narrowly if she be truly so or if it be a Fagot covered with her Garment It is for this only that God gave us Understanding that we might still discern true Good from what is false precisely in the matter of our Salvation Because all other Things are vain and perishing unworthy of a serious Application of Spirit since it ought to apply it self only to Eternal Things for which we were created And our Misery arises from this that we make more serious Enquiries to discover the Turnings and Windings of the Affairs of the World than those of our Salvation In which the Scripture has reason to say that the Children of this World are wiser than the Children of the Kingdom Because before we engage in any Place Office or Traffick we still search narrowly if it is profitable and advantagious for us And we would take heed not to trust to Mens Words or to believe blindly that a Thing is good without having first made the Experiment of it If we have so much Foresight in what respects the Earth how much more ought we to have it for that which respects Heaven We trust our Salvation blindly to what they tell us that the Roman Church is our Mother the Holy Church and we do not dive into this Affair which concerns us so much
still his Spouse though there were but one Soul only as there was but one when Adam was created alone This Number of many only makes those Blessed who are of the Number For God on his part takes as much delight with one Soul only that is resigned to Him as He would do with a Hundred Millions For there is nothing to do with Quantity when the Business is about Quality If an Hundred Millions of Souls are resigned to God they make altogether but one only Church which could consist as well in one Soul only as in this great Number Because the Spouse of God is One And as in Nature a Man may have as much Contentment in Marrying a Wife who is Little and Tender as one that is Big and Lumpish Without comparison God is as much Honoured though there were but one Soul only in the World that were resigned to him as if all Men in general were so who only can receive themselves the Honour of their Happiness every one for his own particular For nothing can be taken away nor added as to God who is and comprehends all Things His Alliance that he has made with the Soul of Man is not encreas'd or diminished by the great or small Body of his Church He will still have his Spouse with whom he will take his delight in the kind that he created which was but one Man alone She shall still be preserved as the Rose among Thorns How wicked soever the World may become his Church will still remain there in her kind The Church will always have her Beauty and her Qualities as much in one Soul alone as in an Hundred Millions which altogether would make but one no more than if there were but one alone After this manner God in all Ages has had his Church upon Earth But in how many Souls it consisted is known only to God The People of Israel were called the People of God among whom there were assuredly Souls resigned unto him These made up the Church in their Time and no others Even so among the Jewish People and also the Catholicks The Church of God has alwayes been among them since Gods Alliance with Man could never fail But to believe that all that Masse of People who call'd themselves the People of God were the Church is to deceive our selves Because there never will be any other but the Souls which of their Free-will do resign themselves to the Will of God All others are only Carnal and Material Churches I said to her That we strayed much and greatly erred in believing that all who are called the People of God do make up the Church and that at present she consisted of Christendom which Jesus Christ authorised and said that what she did on Earth should be done in Heaven She said Sir Men are blind and walk where they see nothing I believe that the Spouse of God resides among Christian People though it were no more but in one Soul alone But to believe that this Church consists of that great Number of Persons who are called Christians is greatly to deceive our selves Because of them God may say truly My People have forsaken me Which appears by the whole Behaviour of these Christians now who live wholly as if there were no God every one being so wedded to his own Will as if it had only been given him to satisfie himself and using the Authority that God gave his Church as if they were Soveraigns and independent upon him All which things are inconsistent with the Spouse of God which moves not but by the Motion of her Husband of whom she knows she holds all things and she never ascribes any thing to her self How should this Masse of Christians compose the Church since among them we do not observe almost any who will resign their Wills to the Will of God And those who make their Profit of the Authority that Jesus Christ gave his Church are Robbers and take what belongs to another For when Jesus Christ said Whatsoever you shall do here on Earth I will do in Heaven He spoke to his Spouse and not to his Enemies as those Persons are who cleave to their own Wills who do very impertinently usurp the Title of the Church or Spouse of God For his True Spouse is in nothing contrary to her Husband Being united by a Holy and Divine Will So that they cannot disclaim one another and therefore what she shall do on Earth shall be done also in Heaven by their Unity of Wills which are still conformable Though this Will be wrapt up in the Spirit and Body of the Spouse which is yet on Earth it is nevertheless united to that of her Husband which is in Heaven And therefore what the one does the other approves Because one and the same thing cannot be against it self I said to her That this Quality of Vnion of Will to that of God was a Divine Thing and invisible to Bodily Eyes asking her how I might discover and know the True Church and Spouse of God She said Sir You will perceive it sufficiently even by the Eyes of the Body if you seriously apply your Spirit to discover her Qualities For St. John in his Revelation paints out all her Qualities under the Figure of a Woman who sits in the Sun and has the Moon under her Feet and upon her Head Twelve Stars This Woman is the True Church and the only Spouse of God She is first seated in the Sun that is that the Spouse of God reposes alwayes in the Light of Truth and never turns aside from it that she does not walk therein as a Passenger but sits in it as in her Place of Repose Secondly that she has the Moon under her Feet That is that all Things that are mutable and changeable as the Moon such are the Goods the Riches the Honours and Pleasures of this World are all trod under feet by the Church or Spouse of God Thirdly That she bears on her Head Twelve Stars These are the Twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit with which the Spouse of God is still inseparably adorned because the Spirit of God where he resides is never barren There he always brings forth his Fruits and there also he still bestows his Gifts By which Sir you may sufficiently discover in what Soul the Church resides If you do not find all this Furniture never believe blindly that the Church is in those who do not possess these Qualities or Conditions which are the True Marks of the Church without which you can never own that she is the True Spouse of God For these Marks are inseparable from Her and where you shall not find them you must immediately desist from believing that you have found the Church Because there can be nothing but Delusion where they say she is without these Qualities For she never goes without them And therefore be not amused though they say to you This is the Church