general Destruction of the World which shall not be recalled because the Will of Man is not inclin'd to return to God but rather to be the more estrang'd from him if the Plagues should yet be delayed That therefore the irrevocable Sentence is given to purge the whole World by divers Plagues of War Pestilence and Famine which are framed of the Three Means which have caused Men to abandon God Their Want of True Love to one another their Love of this present Life and their being addicted to their sensual Appetites the Pleasures of the Mouth and Belly She shews that many Signs have appeared in the Heavens fearful Comets menacing great Evils Fire has burnt many Cities many have been swallowed up by Earthquakes That these 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 Natural things he has made the fear of all these Threatnings of God sent as the Forerunners of his Justice to evanish out of Mens Minds so that no Body is converted to God nor embraces the Spirit of Penitence but they mock at God's Warnings saying These are but Natural things She asks 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 alâ— the Elements must he not make use of them to chastise the Offences which we commit against him Is there not need of Natural things to make our Bodies suffer which are likewise Natural The Deludge was made by a Natural Rain and the last Plagues will be made 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 c. I have transcrib'd all this because I think the present Age ought to lay these things deeply to Heart It is a most Remarkable Providence that a simple illiterate Maid should give Warning to the World of the Approaching of the last general and dreadful Judgments of God and give such clear Grounds for it from the Word of God and the State of the World and declare that she is commanded by God so to do and that now since her Removal both the Wickedness of Men and the Signs and Judgments of God have been still encreasing There have been such signal and dreadful Earthquakes in many Places swallowing up many Thousands such universal Wars destroying there Hundreds of Thousands the Fire of which seems only to be covered a while to break out into a greater Flame such pestilential Diseases in many Places particularly in France Scotland America sweeping off vast Numbers and now most grievous Dearth and Famine which for One Year scourged France but for these Three last Years has most signally visited Scotland and now this present Year being the Fourth is like to come to so great a heighth as to threaten an utter Desolation Mens Hearts failing them for fear all observe such a general Change of Seasons that the Heavens the Air the Earth and all the Elements do frown upon us and deny their wonted kindly Influences and Means of Life so that this last Plague threatens to visit other Nations likewise yet the rest of Men which are not killed of these Plagues do not repent of the Works of their Hands so that we have just ground to apprehend that these are but the beginnings of Sorrows It is high time for us then to awake out of our Stupidity to repent and do works meet for Repentance that we may not be found among the Scoffers in the last Days who say Where is the promise of his coming For tho' these were not the last Plagues and Judgments yet as A. B. says as if I remember rightly Vincentius of Terrara preached in his time to one City That within a few Years the last Judgment would be and tho' it was not yet many thereby were led to Repentance so tho' these were not the last general Judgments yet they will be the last particular Judgments to many Thousands and it is a good Office to awaken Men thereby to Repentance 14. That the Works of God shall not perish but endure for ever and shall be wholly renew'd and freed from all Corruption is expresly declared in the Holy Scriptures where we are told that the Creature itself also shall be delivered from the Bondage of Corruption into the glorious Liberty of the Children of Gâ—d And that according to his Promise we look for new Heavens and a new Earth wherein dwelleth Righteousness And it is said I John saw a new Heaven and a new Earth for the first Heaven and the first Earth were passed away And we are told that the Heavens must receive Jesus Christ until the time â— the Restitution of all things which God hath spoken by he Mouth of all his holy Prophets since the World began See Is 65. 17. 66. 22. 15. That Jesus Christ will come and Reign in Glory with the Saints and Blessed for ever upon Earth appears from many express Testimonies of Holy Scripture Thus David invites all Creatures to rejoice and be glad before the Lord for he comes to judge the Earth the World shall be established that it shall not be removed with Righteousness shall he judge the World and the People with his Truth Thus it is said that the Kingdom and Dominion and the Greatness of the Kingdom under the whole Heaven shall be given to the People of the Saints of the most High whose Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom and all Dominions shall serve and obey him Thus it is said The Lord my God shall come and all the Saints with him And it shall come to pass in that Day that the Light shall not be clear nor dark But it shall be one Day which shall be known to the Lord not Day nor Night And the Lord shall be King over all the Earth In that day shall there be one Lord and his Name one Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy Blood out of every Kindred and Tongue and People and Nation and hast made us unto our God Kings and Priests and we shall reign on the Earth And The Kingdoms of this World are become the Kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign for ever and ever And I John saw the Holy City New Jerusalem coming down from God out of Heaven prepared as a Bride adorned for her Husband and I heard a great Voice out of Heaven saying Behold the Tabernacle of God is with Men and he will dwell with them and they shall be his People and God himself shall be with them and be their God c. see all that and the next Chapter And there shall be no Night there and they need no Candle neither Light of the Sun for the Lord
it I take Cant for a multitude of Words without any True and Divine Sence and not flowing from an inward Life and Spirit and of this there is but too much in the World But the Writings of A. B. are of another Temper and no Body will nauseate them upon this Head but they who have a secret Disgust for the Holy Scriptures God's Ways are not as our ways When we write we seek our selves we strive to discover our Reason and our Learning and study what may please the Curiosity the Fancy and the Niceness of others The Holy Writings are most unlike to ours both as to Matter and Manner and Method and Stile they are not written to please the Learned the Orator the Philosopher the Critick the Curious but to bring down every lofty Imagination and to mortifie our Self-conceit to Comfort the Humble and the Afflicted to give Light and Knowledge to the Poor and Simple and to send the Rich away empty They repeat again and again the great and necessary things of God's Law to mortifie our Niceness and Curiosity and to beat them in upon us by all means while we think it enough to know these things tho' we are not so happy as to do them Now Writings that partake so much of this Spirit will not be despis'd on this Head by any sincere Christian XXVII Some endeavour to render her Sentiments ridiculous concerning the State of the Blessed in the Life to come and they say she establishes a Mahumetan Paradise Eating and Drinking and Generation in the Kingdom of Heaven making the Earth to become that Heaven and that it shall be a Place of all sensitive Delights Vnto the pure all things are pure but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure but even their Mind and Conscience is defiled I would gladly ask such if Adam had continued always in the State of Innocence perfectly Pure and Holy whether they would have called his State a Mahumetan Paradise and a sensual Life If there were no Concupiscence in Man's Nature but a most ardent pure and habitual Love of God the Beauties and Delights of all the Creatures would serve to enflame the Soul still the more with the Love of God There needs no more but to understand her Sentiments to be convinced of the impudent Falshood of their Reproaches She says then That the Earth and all this visible World being wholly renewed and restored to that glorious State in which it was at first formed of which in the First Part shall be the Seat of the Kingdom of God with Men for ever where Jesus Christ God-Man will reign with the Blessed both as to his Divinity and Humanity That Heaven as to the Soul is the Presence of God and we are in Heaven when we are in God and God is in Heaven as he is in the Souls of his Saints as Augustin interprets Our Father which art in the Heavens but as God has given us both a Body and Soul he has given us also a Paradise of both the Soul can have its compleat Paradise in the Presence of God but the Body must have a material and bodily one like it self For this end the Earth and all this visible World and all that therein is were created and for the same Reason God would have become Man tho' Man had never sinn'd that he might live with him both bodily and spiritually and to make his Happiness compleat And therefore he being unchangeable in his infinitely Wise and Good Designs he will certainly make not an imaginary but a real divine and corporeal Reparation of all things to last for ever for his Recompences are Eternal and will purge away from all the Creatures the Malignity and Corruption that Sin has brought upon them And in this State every individual Saint being restored in Body and Soul to the State in which Adam was in his greatest purity before the Woman was formed out of him shall produce his like of himself alone through all Eternity from a Principle of the Love of God and by an ardent Desire that there may be still more Creatures to love and praise the Divine Majesty This then shall not be a corrupt lustful and shameful Propagation like to that of this corrupt World but altogether Pure Holy and Glorious as we see in a manner an earthly Figure of it still in all the Plants and Trees In the Resurrection they neither marry nor are given in Marriage but are as the Angels of God in Heaven Now what is there in all this unworthy of God or unsutable to the State of the Blessed or contrary to the Holy Scriptures or to the Nature of things It is certain none of the Works of God shall perish but all shall be restored to their primitive Perfection The Scripture tells us there shall be a new Heaven and a new Earth Whose Habitation would the Earth have been if Man had never sinn'd and if the Earth had never been accursed And whose Habitation shall it be when it is renewed and made a new Earth When Men fancied all the Works of God to be shut up as it were in a round Sphere and the Earth to be its Centre and the Planetary and Starry Heavens so many firm and solid Orbs moving round about it and the Empyreal Heaven above all this Sentiment about the Earth might have been thought absurd But in the Age we live in wherein is made known the vastness of the Universe and that all the fix'd Stars are probably Suns and Centres of different Systems of the whole and all the other Planets as well as our Earth among which it moves replenish'd no doubt with variety of living and intelligent Beings we have reason to admire the Providence of God in giving Discoveries to a simple unlearned Woman of the State and Habitation of the Blessed sutable to what is now known of the Frame of the Universe which is also fully confirmed from the Holy Scriptures as was shewn in the First Part and does so clearly demonstrate the unchangeable Wisdom and Goodness of God who having created Man in a Pure and Happy State and the Delights and Beauties of this World for his Accessory Felicity and the Devil by his Craft and Subtilty having perverted both and made this Earth for many Ages nothing but Scenes of Wickedness and Misery yet God by his infinitely Wise Conduct and Providence brings about at last the perfect Renovation of Man and of his Habitation the Earth and of all the Creatures and makes it an Eternal Paradise of unspotted Purity and Bliss Whereas on the other Hand it is most unaccountable how infinite Wisdom and Goodness who changes not after he had form'd Man and this World in so excellent a State and both are corrupted by the Devils should continue the Earth for so many Ages to be the Theatre of their Wickedness and then entirely destroy it Might it not then be said as she expresses it That God
came near their Principles She told them their Malady was that they would needs comprehend all by the activity of Humane Reason without giving place to the Light of Divine Faith which requires a Cessation of the activity of our Reason that God may shed or revive therein that Divine Light without which not only God is not well known but even he and the true Knowledge of him are banish'd out of the Soul by this activity of our corrupt Mind and Reason which is a real kind of Atheism and rejecting of God They were so full of their Idea's that they mock'd at her Remonstrances But one of them being a little after seiz'd with a mortal Sickness in the Flower of his Age and God opening his Eyes to let him see his Error he began to lament and cry Night and Day My Vnderstanding my Vnderstanding to what hast thou brought me Alas my Reason in which I so much trusted what assistance canst thou give me now Now thou canst give me neither Salvation nor the hope of it I must be damned There can be no Mercy for me A Friend of A. B. going to see him in that State endeavour'd to comfort him but the other finding no Quiet ask'd him still If he thought there was yet any Mercy to be hop'd for his Soul And then casting again his Eyes and Arms from one side to another began again his Complaints My Vnderstanding my Vnderstanding Whether hast thou guided me Some of his Friends amongst others Steno and Swammerdam came often to visit and comfort him but nothing could calm him At last he turns to the Friend of A. B. saying Go tell that good Soul meaning A. B. to pray to God for me that I may obtain the Pardon of this Sin otherwise I am damned or must suffer a very long Purgatory O if I could recover of this Sickness I would turn wholly unto God and would follow quite another Way But when this was told to A. B. She answered He shall not rise again but he will die for if he should recover he would fall again more profoundly into this pernicious Errour He died his Judgment being sound and good but with Great Repentance and Contrition adoring with great Fervency Jesus Christ crucified to the Greeks and to the Philosophers Foolishness A. B. had such an Horrour for this wicked Disposition of the Philosophers that she could not suffer it affirming that God had declared to her expresly That this Errour of Cartesianism was the worst and most cursed of all the Heresies in the World and a formal Atheism or a rejecting of God in whose Place corrupt Reason did set up it self Not that this Idol of corrupt Reason is not a thing common to all the Learned and to all sorts of Philosophers as well as the Cartesians but these are incomparably more wedded to it they think they are in Possession of it above all and they will admit of nothing but by this Way After she had been visited by all sorts of Persons who reaped not that Profit they might have done God sent her two or three sincere and well disposed Men who finding in her Life and Conversation the Means to approach unto God and to advance the Perfection of their Souls left the World their Business and Friends and continued with her all the time of her Life and theirs All others withdrew to her great Satisfaction She said God had made her see by this Converse with People of all Sorts whom she had admitted indifferently by his Divine Order how few are to be gained in the World even among the best and those who seek the Truth and that after these Visits God would never more engage her to such a Distraction and that she should lead a retir'd Life all the rest of her Days Which fell out and she begun it then in Amsterdam and did not give access as formerly LII She employ'd most of this Time to compose many Books Of which these are the Principal The Funeral of False Divinity in 4 Parts Upon Occasion of some Conferences with the Cartesian Philosophers she wrote the Holy Perspective There she wrote also her Outward Life and the New Heaven and the New Earth In the writing of which she was so ravished that she often forgot her necessary Food She designed to have continued these Wonders But God said unto her Leave that Work Men are not worthy nor capable of it they will imagine that they have the Dispositions requisite for that glorious State but they are very far from them Shew them rather the miserable State they are brought into by Sin under the Dominion of corrupt Nature and under the Empire of Antichrist who now rules over them without their apprehending it Write to them of the Reign of Antichrist So she laid by her Pen and that Work saying to God I shall do it Lord and wrote afterwards the Treatise of Antichrist discovered in Three Parts She began another Treatise called The last Mercy of God but did not finish it for the Reasons told in the Conclusion of it and the Traverses she met with in the Imprisonment of M. de Cort and her own Persecutions and Flights kept her from the Pursuing that and other Works which she had begun LIII Had M. de Cort followed her Counsel he might have avoided all the Mischief he fell into but the Sincerity and Goodness of his Nature would not let him think that he had such cruel Enemies especially amongst his Brethren and Friends the Priests Churchmen and his own Disciples whom he had brought up and to whom he had hitherto left and given all he could not believe that they would seek to imprison him or endeavour to poison him as she forewarn'd him of both and still bid him take heed of them The true Cause of this Imprisonment was that God having touched his Heart to hearken to the Divine Truths declared unto him by A. B. he resolved not only to embrace them but to publish them also to others designing to retire to the Isle of Noordstrand of which he was Director and had the best Part of it at his Disposal and to invite good Men thither who desir'd to lead a Christian Life This seem'd to his Brethren an Apostacy and the setting up a new Heresie they resolve therefore to ruin him But this Pretext would not do at Amsterdam or Holstein and therefore they must devise another At Amsterdam there is a Dungeon where at the Instance of Creditors they arrest and shut up Strangers who are in Debt till they have satisfied it There are usually ten or twelve Prisoners there living in Despair as mad passing the time in swearing blaspheming and committing a thousand Impieties and sometimes killing one another having no Food but a piece of brown Bread and a little small Beer and there some of them die in Misery They thought this Place would do as well as one of the Prisons of the Roman Inquisition and to
small or great But let the Love of pure Truth draw thee to read Do not enquire who said these things but consider well what is said III. It is no less unjust to take the Sentiments of others only upon Trust from a declar'd Enemy to the Person whose Sentiments they are such you know are sure to set them always in a false Light so as to make them hateful and ridiculous If you will take the Doctrine of Jesus Christ himself from the Scribes and Pharisees they shall make him to speak Blasphemy and to be in Compact with the Devil Now this is the unjust Measure given by many to A. B. They take her Sentiments from those only who design to render them hateful and ridiculous who after the manner that they represent them may as easily expose the most Sacred Writings It is just then to hear her self and not to judge of her Sentiments by some Expressions or Passages of her Writings which separately may seem harsh but to compare such with the whole Context and with the main Scope and Substance of all her Writings and this will lead you to interpret them aright I do not desire that you should take her Sentiments upon Trust from me more than from others I aim only to set them in a True Light in opposition to the False Representations made of them And as to my Sincerity and fair Dealing in it I appeal to the Writings themselves IV. Neither is it just to weigh Sentiments by the Doctrines of Men and to despise and reject them if they do not agree exactly with the commonly receivâ—d Systems and Opinions The Doctrine of Jesus Christ is the Rule we are to walk by Men in forming of their Systems are ready to flatter Corrupt Nature It is certain in our practice we all do so and we are well pleas'd with Doctrines that may favour us in this If then her Sentiments be the same in Substance with the Doctrine of Jesus Christ and do not at all tend to sooth and flatter our Corrupt Nature but on the contrary to lead us to mortifie and subdue it we ought not to reject them tho' they do not in all things agree with the Systems of Men. V. Before we set down her Sentiments it is to be considered that as she owns the written Word of God to be the Test whereby we are to examine all Doctrines pretended to be come from God and that none contrary thereunto ought to be receiv'd and desires that hers may be tried thereby So she declares that the Doctrine of Jesus Christ is the last Doctrine that is to come into the World and contains the necessary means of Salvation and that there is no other way to Salvation but what he has chalk'd out to us by his Life Precepts and Counsels So that all her Writings and Sentiments aim at nothing but to convince Men that they do not follow the Life and Doctrine of Jesus Christ and to perswade them to do it as being indispensably necessary to Salvation VI. As to her Sentiments she makes appear that the Truths of Religion may be considered under two Heads 1. There are some Truths and Doctrines in which the Essence of Christianity does consist the Living Knowledge and Practice of which is necessary to Salvation 2. There are other accessory Truths without the express Knowledge and Belief of which one may be Saved VII First As to the Essential Truths of Christianity she supposes before all the Truth of the Holy Scriptures and of the Apostles Creed and that all that is contrary thereunto ought to be anathematiz'd and the Soundness of her Faith in these appears by her Profession of Faith and Religion which she presented publickly at the Court of Gottorp in Holstein which is prefix'd to all her Books and the Tenour of it is as follows VIII Her Profession of Faith 1. I Am a Christian and I believe all that a True Christian ought to believe 2. I am baptised in the Catholick Church in the Name of the Father in the Name of the Son in the Name of the Holy Ghost 3. I believe the Twelve Articles of the Apostolick Symbol or Creed and I do not doubt of one Article of it 4. I believe that Jesus Christ is True God and that he is also True Man as that he is the Saviour and the Redeemer of the World 5. I believe in the Gospel in the Holy Prophets and in all the Holy Scriptures 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 whom it shall concern In Testimony of which I have sign'd this my Confession with my Hand and seal'd it with my Seal At Sleeswick the 11th of March 1675. L. S. Anthoinette Bourignon IX Now this short Confession is the Abridgement and Foundation of all her Doctrine and of her Life and they who are not willing to be impos'd upon will be so just as to measure and judge of her Sentiments according to this Sincere and Publick Confession of her Faith and not according to the False and Calumnious Representations which some designedly make of them whereby they would have her to pass in the World for the Inventer of a New and Fantastical Religion and so raise in the Hearts of the People an Abhorrence of her and her Writings which aim at nothing but to perswade them to be truly Followers of Jesus Christ This being presuppos'd here follows 1. Her Accounts of the Essentials of Religion in her own Words 1. GOd created Man only to be lov'd by him and for no other End He had no need of Man nor of any other Creature being in himself alone Holy and Perfect Independent upon all things yea whom all obey in Heaven and Earth who is yet able to Create a Thousand Worlds and an Hundred Thousand kinds of Creatures according to his Good Pleasure But his Good Pleasure was to Create Man after his own Likeness that he might take his Delight with him and as there cannot be perfect Love if it be not reciprocal it was God's Will that Man should love his God with all his Power in Requital of the Love which God bear to him and that he should delight in him only since God would needs take his Delight with Man which obliged Man to place all his Affections upon God alone Seeing he was created for no other End he neither could nor ought in justice to turn his Affections towards any other thing than his God but to love him only with all his Heart and with all his Strength 2. God creating Man thus to take his Delight with him and that he might voluntarily love his God he gave him for this End Divine Qualities capable of loving him he created him altogether Free and Perfect he would not bound nor limit the Will of Man whom he would needs make
that the latter Christians shall live in greater Perfection than those of the Primitive Church did That he will send his Holy Spirit to lay before us those means of Salvation which Jesus Christ taught us while on Earth that we may clearly see how far we are estranged from them and to give us the Light of the Truth that we may see the way to return and to take up again the same Gospel-Means and recover the Dependance of our Will on God without which none can be saved And God will give the full Understanding of all that has been delivered in his Name from the Beginning of the World both by the Holy Prophets and by Jesus Christ and his Apostles or other Saints his Disciples 2. The Original Design of God in the creating of Man being to take his Delight with him for which End he not only made Man after his own likeness but he also became Man that he might live with him in perfect Resemblance to all Eternity and this being now suspended unto Man because of his Sin until that he have accomplished his Penitence to which he is subjected by Sin yet since God does not change nor will ever alter his Designs this time of Penitence being finished Man will enter again into Communion with God as if he had never offended him He will speak to God Face to Face by his Humanity which will be rendred immortal as well as is that of Jesus Christ that they may delight themselves perfectly together upon Earth which will then be rendred Paradice by the lovely Presence of God who for this End became Man and in the End of the World will come in Glory upon Earth to Live and Reign for ever with Men which is as it were The Sum of all the Designs that God has over Men and the Alliance he has often promised to make with Man 3. All the Works of God are Eternal and nothing that he has made shall ever perish And in the End of this World at the Coming of Jesus Christ in Glory all things shall be renewed and restored into that primitive Integrity in which they were at first created All the Evil that is in the Creatures the Fruit of Man's Sins shall be wholly taken away All Nature shall then put off the Corruption Darkness and all the Disorders with which it had been tainted since Adam's Sin All shall become Bright Glorious and Luminous all Corruption shall be removed from the Body of Man and it shall be re-establish'd in that glorious perfect State in which it was at first created And the Soul become perfectly pure shall take its Delights with God and the Body with Heaven and Earth and all the other Creatures For God 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 shall 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 4. After the Judgment when God shall take all Malignity from the Earth and from all the Creatures the Venom from Serpents Scorpions and other poysonous Beasts Maladies and Infirmities from the Bodies of Men and Beasts and Weaknesses from Spirits All this shall be reduced into some corner of the Earth all in a mass that these Malignities may act together upon the Bodies of the damned and that the Works of their hands be rendered unto them For God never made any of all these Evils He created all things Good Men only by their Wickedness have given Malignity unto all created things and therefore it ought to appertain to them and to be rendered to them by the Right of Justice which will come to pass at the Judgment when the Bodies of the Wicked shall rise also that none of the Works of God may perish and shall be sent into that miserable Corner with all the Evils which shall be removed from the Blessed and from the Earth from Plants Beasts and all the Elements that all these things may serve them only for Delight and Pleasure without being able to do any more Evil as they were in the Beginning of their Creation and all their Malignities which they have contracted by the Sins of Men shall be rendered unto their Authors 5. God having at the First Creation endued all living Creatures with a Power of producing their like and Man in his perfect State being endued with the same Power of producing his like without the help of another he shall be re-establish'd into the same State again So that in the Kingdom of Heaven there will be eternal Propagation but altogether Holy altogether Pure and Deified without concupiscible Appetite but by pure Acts of Love to God which will extend it self to the Production of New Creatures to the Glory of their Creator There there is not Male and Female they neither marry nor are given in Marriage but are as the Angels in Heaven XXXVIII This as a Sum of her Accessory Sentiments and they who shall consider them without prejudice will hardly think that for them she deserves to be treated either as an Heritick or as a Mad Whimsical Woman It has been already said that she does not propose them as Articles of Faith necessary to be believed by all that according to St. Augustine these only are damnable Doctrines which tend to destroy Charity the Love of God and our Neighbour which it is evident those Sentiments do not and it were easie to make appear that many other Doctrines and Practices do which pass among many for very Christian XXXIX Besides it is evident that these Sentiments tend to clear and confirm all the Truths and Doctrines of Christianity and to endear them to us They shew us the great Designs of God's Love in the Creation of Man the excellent State in which he made him and the Happiness to which he design'd him They make appear evidently that all our Evil is from our selves and all our Good from God They shew us the Ground and Reason why Man's Redemption was set about and not the fallen Angels why Jesus Christ took such Interest in Man became Intercessor and Surety for him and why his Mediation was accepted by God his Father and why after other means essay'd he at last cloath'd himself with Man's Mortality why the following of his Counsels and Example is indispensibly necessary to Salvation They represent to us the horrid Corruption that Man is fallen into by Sin both as to Soul and Body and all the Creation by him and how mad we are to gratifie our corrupt Inclinations and to love this present World They direct us to a right use of the Rods and Judgments of God and awaken us to a sence of our present State wherein all the World lies in Wickedness They give us a prospect
founded upon this that there was nothing more just than to bewail the Fault of ceasing to love so Lovely a God Yet she confest that she had run too far to an Extremity in her Mortifications and that so great that she would never tell it but to one and would never advise any to do as she had done but only to yield up themselves to God and suffer themselves to be exercis'd by him and by the Events which he sends them X. Thus she spent whole Nights in Prayer oft repeating Lord what wilt thou have me to do And being one Night in a most profound Penitence she said from the bottom of her Heart O my Lord What must I do to please thee For I have no body to teach me Speak to my Soul and it will hear thee At that Instant she heard as if another had spoke within her Forsake all earthly things Separate thy self from the Love of the Creatures Deny thy self XI She was quite astonish'd not understanding this Language and mus'd long on these Three Points thinking how she could fulfil them She thought she could not live without earthly things nor without loving the Creatures nor without loving her self Yet she said By thy Grace I will do it Lord. But when she would perform her Promise she knew not where to begin finding her self strongly engag'd in the Love of all earthly things which she did not observe before and knew not how to be disengaged Having thought on the Religious in Monasteries that they forsook all earthly things and the Conversation of the Creatures by being shut up in a Cloyster and the Love of themselves by subjecting of their Wills She ask'd leave of her Father to enter into a Cloyster of the discalceated Carmelites but he would not permit it saying He had rather see her laid in her Grave This seem'd to her a great Cruelty for she thought to find in the Cloysters the True Christians she had been seeking but she found afterwards that he knew the Cloysters better than she for after he had forbidden her and told her he would never permit her to be a Religious nor give her any Mony to enter there yet she went to Father Laurens the Director and offered to serve in the Monastery and work hard for her Bread and be content with little if he would receive her At which he smiled and said That cannot be we must have Money to build we take no Maids without Money you must find the way to get it else there is no entry here This astonish'd her greatly and she was thereby undeceiv'd as to the Cloysters resolving to forsake all Company and live alone till it should please God to shew her what she ought to do and whither to go XII The more she entered into her self the more she was enclin'd to abandon all and to retire somewhere without knowing whether her Heart was disengag'd from temporal Goods from worldly Pleasures from all Creatures Yet she did not find her self altogether free nor entirely united unto God for she was apt sometimes to turn again to what she had left She ask'd always earnestly When shall I be perfectly thine O my God And she thought he still answered her When thou shalt no longer possess any thing and shalt die to thy self And where shall I do that Lord He answered her In the Desart This made so strong an Impression on her Soul that she aspired after this but being a Maid of Eighteen Years only she was afraid of unlucky chances and was never us'd to travel and knew no way She laid aside all these Doubts and said Lord thou wilt guide me how and where it shall please thee It is for thee that I do it I will lay aside my Habit of a Maid and will take that of a Hermit that I may pass unknown XIII Having then secretly made ready this Habit while her Parents thought to have married her her Father having promis'd her to a rich French Merchant she prevented the time and on Easter Evening having cut her Hair put on the Habit and slept a little she went out of her Chamber about Four in the Morning taking nothing but One Penny to buy Bread for that Day and it being said to her in the going out Where is thy Faith in a Penny She threw it a way begging pardon of God for her Fault and saying No Lord my Faith is not in a Penny but in thee alone Thus she went away wholly delivered from the heavy Burthen of the Cares and good Things of this World and found her Soul so satisfied that she no longer wish'd for any thing upon Earth resting entirely upon God with this only fear least she should be discovered and be oblig'd to return home for she felt already more Content in this Poverty than she had done for all her Life in all the Delights of the World XIV She knew no way nor whither to go She went out at the Gate that leads to Tournay and came thither about Ten a Clock then past into the Province of Hainault and coming through a Village called Bassec where were arriv'd that Day a Company of Soldiers who were playing in the Market-Place when she had past by them and come to the end of the Village she met a number of Children at their Play who looking on her began to say it was a Maid and crying this so loud to one another the Soldiers ran to know the Fray and then taking Horse they overtook her in the Fields and stopt her asking who she was and whither she went She was surpriz'd but looking before her she saw a Church and hoping there might be some good Pastor there to deliver her she said she was going to the Pastor who would satisfie them The Commander brought her to the next Village Blatton to the old Mayor's House promising to have her to the Pastor's when once his Men were lodged There he thought to have abus'd her by force or enticement but she told him resolutely that he should first kill her or she him and that she believ'd the Earth would open to swallow him up The old Mayor and his Wife defended her and he threatned to burn the House and call'd his Men to Arms about it The Maid of the House got out at a Window and told the Pastor who coming into the Chamber where the Captain was raging like one mad gravely rebuked him and taking her by the Hand he with his Chaplain led her through the Soldiers into his Lodging the Captain sinking into an Astonishment against the Wall without stirring for the Pastor was a grave and vertuous Man of great Age whose Words had struck the Captain and taken away all his Strength and Spirit But when this was over he came with his Men to the Pastour's House to search for her and not finding her and being made believe she was gone they gallop'd toward Mons thinking to overtake her XV. The
according to his Perswasion I got at a publick Auction that Copy of the Works of A. B. which the Author of the Censure made use of and with great wonder I observed the Weakness of Man The Author was a wise Man of great Judgment and Sincerity but what cannot Prejudices do that grow up with us I found many Places marked with a little Line on the Margent which if you consider them alone cannot but make the Doctrine of A. B. look suspicious yea blasphemous but if you join them with what goes before and follows after in her Writings they have an excellent and pious Sence The Author who while he liv'd was most dear to me and whom I am bound to honour now he is dead had such Prudence Judgment and Sincerity that he would never have made such Exceptions if the preconceiv'd Opinion of a Sect as it daily happens tâ— others had not bewitch'd him nevertheless I am perswaded that if he had lived till now he would have come to see his Errour This is the Judgment of Dr. Christianus Thomasius Counsellor to the Elector of Brandenbourg and Professor of the Law in the University of Hale in Saxony and is published in one of his Discourses before the Treatise De Eruditione solida c. which he caused to be reprinted in Germany and I wish with all my heart that Doctor Cockbourn and his Friend may impartially consider it and it may please God to open their Eyes and let them see their Mistakes 3. So zealous is the Doctor to blacken her that to compleat the Extravagancy of the Character he ventures to translate their Words falsly and even of those False Translations will tack together two half Sentences that are more than a Page distant in the Original as if they had been written in the blasphemous Way that he represents them in one Breath Thus Narr 1. p. 4. lin 7 8 9. he makes the Author of the Continuation of her Life say of her She is the divine Sun of Righteousness and with the same Breath She is pure Truth and the only Truth that can guide one to Heaven and eternal Life As if he had affirm'd both of her and both in one Period whereas they are in two different Paragraphs and neither of them spoken of her The first is a Petition put up to Almighty God by the Author of the Vie Continuée p. 599. That he would please to fix him in the Heaven of his Truth that the Dragon might not be able to cast him upon the Earth by his Violence nor by his Artifice That says he I may then always receive the Light of the Divine Sun of Righteousness in which thou hast placed thine Handmaid And then in the next Section when he had appealed unto God the Searcher of Hearts concerning his Integrity in seeking after Truth and his Impartiality in examining the Life and Writings of A. B. concerning his Readiness to disprove if he could with all the Application of his Mind have found any thing in them favouring Corruption or Sin or contrary to the Glory of God c. he continues his Appeal in these Words Is it not with the utmost Sincerity of my Heart that I protest openly that the Words of eternal Life have been with an incomparable Purity Clearness and Solidity in this Soul which thou hast sanctified and are yet in her Writings Certainly the Way that is recommended there as necessary to Salvation is the only and true Way this is the Life and Doctrine of Jesus Christ and there is no Danger to give up our selves to it entirely for this is Truth it self This is the Truth This is the pure Truth Thus we see there cannot be a more palpable Disingenuity in citing and translating than this is which can bear no Apology bâ—t an ingenuous Acknowledgment of the Pevarication Again Nar. 1. p. 9. lin 18. he makes M. de Cort complain that no body makes Prayers to her in the Times of Universal Scourges The Oâ—iginal is ni la point faire prier and the true Translation is they do not desire her to pray I shall not enquire what Sence the Doctor would have the Reader put upon his Translation but must say that he himself should not have aggravated his Guilt by calling that a close and literal Translation Art XIII of his Letter when he cannot be ignorant that it is both a false and a foul one Again Nar. 1. p. 17. he makes the Author of the Preface Apologet. prefix'd to her Life pag. 97. say that A. B. was the purest most disinterested and self denied Soul and the most resigned to God that ever was upon Earth The Words in the Original are Or je puis dire avec verite que M. Bour. estoit une ame des plus pures des plus degagées c. and the true Translation thus that she was one among the Souls which have been most pure c. his false Translation would have him to exalt her above all humane Creature the true lists her only among the Saints of the first Form among the hundred forty four thousand which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goes Again Nar. 1. p. 74. forming an Argument against her Chastity from a Passage of her Life and her own Account of it La Parole de Dieu n. 158. and by the way I must say that no Lover of Purity would have perverted this Passage to the Sence that he has done nor is there any thing in the Embraces of Parents and Children that can be supposed to defile the Imagination of a Soul such as hers was in a truly regenerate State and in a profound Recollection and Communion with God he falsely translates theâ— last Part of it The Original is Je pensay de concevor cinque Personnages que je tiens gens de bien The true Version I thought I conceived Five Persons whom I reckon to be good Men. But the Doctor must render it Five comely Persons that it might serve his Design and afford Matter for impure Jest 4. It is no fair dealing in a Narrater to affirm things as spoken or written by others in his own Words without giving Evidence for them But the Doctor in his own Words tells us That if she may be believed Christ only laid the Foundation for her Works and did no more but prepare the way for her Design That the last and greatest Manifestation of the Divine Wisdom Power Love and Goodness was reserved to her and therefore she is and must be a greater Person than Jesus Christ himself And says he if we will take the Words of the Anonymous Author of La vie Continuee and some others this Woman was above all that 's Humane That God designed she should be the greatest Blessing that ever was conferr'd on Mankind That they set her on the same Level with Jesus Christ That they draw a Parallel betwixt him and her and do make him the Type of her
they will not be reduced from their supposed Errors by Noise and Banter All to the best of my Understanding that A. B. pretends to is only to be an Instrument in Christ's Hands and that no otherwise than by publishing these Truths that he by his Spirit communicated to her and which his Power and Grace alone was afterwards to make effectual Now let it be supposed but not granted that it was so What Disparagement is it to our Redeemer to make use of a poor contemptible Creature in order to accomplish great Designs Was it any Dishonour to him that his Apostles in his Name and Power converted more to the Christian Religion and wrought more Miracles than he did himself when he dwelt in mortal Flesh V. Perhaps it may be thought I am byassed in Favours of A. B. and therefore not so capable to discern that Latet Anguis in Herba I am sure if I am so my Prejudices are of no old Date they are not yet so rooted but sober and just Reasonings might discuss them and reclaim me from my Mistakes neither I think can it be said that they have been fortified from any prospect of Reputation or worldly Interest But whatever my Prejudices may be I can sincerely declare that what determined me to have an Esteem for this Person 's Writings was a Conviction that they not only recommended the great and essential Duties of the Gospel distinguished them from the Accessories discovered the Mischief of Sects and Parties and the Vanity of laying Stress on nice and airy Speculations but also because they suggested solid Principles which might serve as an Antidote against the Infusions of Atheists and Deists Pelagians and Socinians Antinomians and Fatalists and false Pretences to Inspiration And tho' I met with some things in them that seem'd a little odd and startling yet I choosed rather to suspend my Judgment since even her self does not impose them on any than forego what appear'd to me so very solid and useful Some LETTERS OF M. ANT. BOVRIGNON Whereby her True Christian Spirit and Sentiments are farther justified and vindicated particularly as to the Doctrine of the Merits and Satisfaction of Jesus Christ as is to be seen in the Third and Fourth Letters All of them are most worthy to be perused by those who sincerely love and impartially seek after the Truth and the Salvation of their Souls LETTER I. Concerning the Love of God Written to a Pastor at Mechlin and is the 15th of La lum nec en tenebr Part I. SIR I. I Know not how one of sound Judgment can love any other thing but God seeing there is no created thing that is worthy of our Love as he is being the Fountain of all Good Wisdom the Giver of all Wisdom the Beauty that creates all Beauty the Righteousness of the Righteous the Goodness of all Goodness the Accomplishment of all Perfections in short the only Object worthy of our Love without whom nothing is Lovely neither in Heaven nor in Earth Nothing without him can satisfie our Soul nothing can content it nothing can give it Perfect Pleasure nothing can make it happy neither now nor hereafter It is he who created us it is he who preserves us it is he who will judge us If Good of its own Nature is always Lovely why then does not the Soul employ all its Powers to love the Original the Perfection and the Consummation of all Good which is God II. If Likeness beget Love how can your Soul which was made after the Similitude of God live without loving him What other Lovely Object can it find without God whom only it resembles What Original or Pattern is there among all perishing Things to this Divine and Immortal Soul which cannot find its like but in God himself III. If Benefits do oblige even Nature it self to love its Benefactors how ought the Soul to love its God when he has given it all that it posseseth and has promised infinite and eternal Goods beyond Comparison in the Life to come He has given the Soul which he created of nothing He not only made it after the Similitude of the Angels of Heaven but after the likeness of God himself so that all Souls are by Creation made little Gods Could this God of Love give unto Man greater Goods and Gifts to make himself be loved by him than this Divine Creation of his Soul Immortal as himself The Body which he formed to be the Keeper and Sheath of this Soul could it have more Perfections Is there any thing in Nature more Admirable than the Body of Man animated with all the Powers of the Soul with an Understanding to conceive with a Memory to remember with a Will to act so that the very Body is in some manner an Image or Resemblance of the HOLY TRINITY IV. Could God give unto Man more and greater Gifts than he has done to oblige him to love him For after having given him a Being and Life he upholds and maintains it with all necessary things which he has likewise created for the Entertainment of this Man to whom he has subjected so many Creatures under his Power having made him Superiour over all the living Creatures and given him Authority as the Master-piece of the Works of God the Earth for his Foot-stool the Air to breath in the Fire to warm him the Water to refresh him the Fruits to nourish him the Flowers to recreate him in short all the visible and material things that God created were only for the Body of Man What must he have laid up for his Soul which is beyond all Comparison more valuable as being Divine created after the Image of God If he has made so many admirable Things for the entertainment of the Body which must die and remain for so short a time upon Earth Should not all those Gifts all those Benefits oblige Man to love such a Benefactor Seeing he has not received and can never receive any true Good without this Giver of all Good V. How can he be without loving him when he considers his Love which was not satisfied with having freely imparted unto us so many Gifts but after that this ungrateful Man had abused so many favours by turning away from his Creator to join himself to the Creature valuing the Gifts more than the Giver presuming to merit yet more he rebels against his Orders will needs out of Ambition of Spirit know more than it pleas'd his Creator and breaks his Commandment that he might equal himself unto him This God of Love who in a Moment could have punished all these Ingratitudes by an eternal Damnation unto which he had banish'd the fallen Angels lov'd Man more than the Angels and having more regard to the Love he bear him than to his Disobedience he pardons his Sin and forgives his Fault upon Condition of a temporal Penitence VI. This Testimony of Affection from a God towards his Creature
to it by his Free-will So that if one at present did submit his Will to that of God as Jesus Christ did he would certainly feel the same Operations of Divine Vertues that he felt in his Soul and would likewise do the outward Miracles that he did if there were need for them for the Spirit of God is not lessened and his Power was not limited to the Person of Jesus Christ only seeing he says that his Delight is to be with the Children of Men. He does not speak of one singular Man but of all Men who submit their Wills to his and renounce the Corruption of the old Adam to be cloathed with the new which is Jesus Christ 11. Those will find sufficiently by Experience that it is very possible to imitate Jesus Christ yea that it is easie and agreeable when they are denuded of that old Adam For Jesus Christ himself says that his Yoke is easie and his Burthen light This Truth it self cannot lye that it should be true that it is impossible to bear this Yoke But carnal Persons do certainly lye while they say that it is impossible to imitate him since he did nothing as Man but that which another Man may do being posses'd with the Holy Spirit for Gâ—d is impassible and cannot have endur'd the Sufferings of 〈◊〉 Christ It was his Humanity only that suffered assiâ—â— by the Grace of God which will not be denied to thoâ—â— that ask it seeing God is the common Father of all Men and promises to give his Holy Spirit to them that ask it His Promises are infallible the Scripture assures us of this saying Heaven and Earth shall pass away but my Words shall not pass away bringing the Comparison of an evil Father who would not give his Son a Stone instead of Bread nor a Serpent for a high Fish asking them How then shall not your heaâ—â—â— Father give his Holy Spirit to him who asks him 12. Truly my dear Child I can scarce reason more to make appear those Truths which are so clear I have spoken of them several times and they still bring me new Arguments to maintain the Corruption of our miserable Times wherein Men have invented so much silly Stuff whereby to flatter such as themselves and to make them live and die in the Sentiments of corrupt Nature falsly perswading them that they cannot attain to the Perfection of Jesus Christ that they may not use any Endeavours to attain to it for it would be in vain to endeavour that which is impossible Therefore we see Men to the Eâ—â—y of one another give up themselves to Pastimes take their Pleasures and heap up Riches as if they were created for this looking for Salvation as it were in Recompence for their Sins Which is very sad and will make many to be deceiv'd at Death who in this Life think that they are good Christians because they have not committed the gross Sins of Theft Whoredom or Drunkenness and have frequented Churches and Sacraments prayer much and given much Alms All this will avail nothing before God if we are not animated with the Spirit of Jesus Christ 13. For God will know no Men but those who at Death shall be cloathed with the Spirit of Jesus Christ which is Charitable Humble poor in Spirit in short adorned with all his Vertues and to be a Christian one must imitate him as he himself has said For his Doctrine is not a History to be read or heard out of Curiosity but is all Lessons which we must retain to put them in practice else we shall falsly bear the Name of Christian which signifies no other thing but a Person dead to the Flesh to live unto the Spirit or one who has renounced the Corruption of the old Adam to live renewed into the Spirit of Jesus Christ 14. It is far more safe to believe that Jesus Christ by his Death and Sufferings has merited for us the Grace of dying to our selves that we may live unto him than to believe that he has satisfied all for us while we rest upon this false Pillow abiding in the Sentiments of our Nature eating drinking and doing all other things according to our Sensualities This is the broad Way that leads to Peâ—dition and many there are who walk in it but you my dear Child take the narrow Way that leads to Life even tho' there be few that walk in it Every one will bear his own Burthen If your Friends will not walk in it leave them rather than follow them seeing Jesus Christ says that we must can off the Member or pluck out the Eye that offends us and that he who leaves not Father and Mother Wife and Children for his Names sake is not worthy of him I do not require of you the Perfection that Jesus Christ had but that you tend to it and aspire after it as much as is possible for you In doing of which you will oblige her to love you who subscribes her self Yours wholly in God Antho. Bourignon Amsterdam July 1â—th 1670. LETTER IV. That God does not pardon Sin without Penitence To the same Wherein is declared that Men fall every Day of new into Adam's Sin turning away from God to love the Creature and that they can never be saved without being revived into the Spirit of Jesus Christ who has merited for us the Grace to imitate him This Letter is the Eighth of La lum nèe en tenebr Part iii. My dear Child 1. I Wonder how it is possible that your Friends should say that I reject the Merits of Jesus Christ and that I do not look upon them as the Means of our Salvation seeing that I do not look for Salvation for my self but by the Merits of Jesus Christ who came into the World to redeem us after that we had been all lost by Sin and by it sold and delivered up into the Power of the Devil 2. For Sin is no other thing but a turning away from God to turn towards the Creature The Angels did first thus turn away when they saw themselves so Beautiful and so Perfect they were pleased in themselves desiring to be like unto God And thus they became Devils Enemies of God and of all his Works looking on them with Envy and Jealousie labouring as much as was possible to destroy and corrupt them Therefore the Devil tempted Man as soon as he perceived his Creation that he might hinder the Designs which God had of taking his Delight with him and Man by the Instinct of the Devil turn'd away from his God to regard the Creatures in regarding of which he coveted and lov'd them against the Prohibition of his God thus withdrawing himself by his Will to cleave to the Satisfaction of his humane Nature which we do yet daily 3. And this turning away from God is call'd Sin which brought forth Death to the Soul of Adam and to all Men in him seeing Adam had in his Loins all the Men that are