deed the which the blissedful Trinity shall do in the last day as to my sight And what the deed shall be and how it shall be done it is unknown of all Creatures which are beneath Christ and shall be till when it shall be done The Goodness and the Love of our Lord God will that we | i e. know wit that it shall be And the Might and the Wisdom of him by the same Love will * i e. conceal hill it and hide it from us what it shall be and how it shall be done And the cause why he will we wit it thus is for he will we be the more eased in our Soul and peaceable in Love leaving the beholding of all Tempests that might | i e. hinder let us of true enjoying in him This is the great deed ordeined of our Lord God fro without beginning treasured and hid in his blessed Breast only known to himself by which deed he shall make all thing well for right as the blessed Trinity made all thing of naught right so the same blessed Trinity shall make well all that is not well And in this sight I marvelled greatly and beheld our Faith meaning thus Our Faith is grounded in Gods Word and it longeth to our Faith that we believe that Gods Word shall be saved in all thing And one point of our Faith is that many Creatures shall be damned as Angels that fell out of Heaven for Pride which be now Fiends and many in Earth that dyeth out of the Faith of Holy Church that is to say tho that be Heathen And also many that hath received Christendome and liveth unchristen Life and so dyeth out of Charity all these shall be damned to Hell without end as Holy Church teacheth me to believe And standing all this methought it was unpossible that all manner of thing should be well as our Lord shewed in this time And as to this I had no other answer in shewing of our Lord but this That that is unpossible to thee is not unpossible to mee I shall save my Word in all thing and I shall make all thing well And in this I was taught by the Grace of God that I should stedfastly hold me in the Faith as I had before understood And therewith that I should stand and | i e firmly sadly believe that all manner thing shall be well as our Lord shewed in the same time for this is the great deed that our Lord God shall do In which deed he shall save his Word in all thing and he shall make well all that is not well But what the deed shall be and how it shall be done there is no Creature beneath Christ that wot it ne shall wit it till it is done as to the understanding that I took of our Lords meaning in this time The xxxiij Chapter ANd yet in this I desired as I durst that I might have some fight of Hell and of Purgatory But it was not my meaning to take proof of any thing that longeth to our Faith for I believed | i e. assuredly sothfastlie that Hell and Purgatory is for the same end that Holy Church teacheth for but my meaning was that I might have seen for Learning in all thing that longeth to my Faith whereby I might live the more to Gods Worship and to my Profit And for ought that I could desire I ne could see of this right nought but as it is before said in the first shewing where that I saw the Devil is reproved of God and endless by damned In which sight I understand that all the Creatures that be of the Devils condition in this Life and therein ending there is no more mention made of them before God and all his Holy Ones then of the Devil notwithstanding that they be of Mankind whether they have be-Christened or not For though the Revelation was shewed of Goodness in which was made litle mention of Evil Yet I was not drawn thereby from any point of the Faith that Holy Church teacheth me to believe For I had sight of the Passion of Christ in divers shewing In the first in the second in the fourth in the eighth as it is before said wherein I had in part feeling of the sorrow of our Lady and of his true Friends that saw his Pains but I saw not so properly specified the Jews that did him to Death but notwithstanding I knew in my Faith that they were Accursed and Damned without end saving those that were Converted by Grace And I was strengthed and learned generally to keep me in the Faith in every Point and in all as I had before understood hoping that I was therein with Mercy and the Grace of God desiring and praying in my meaning that I might continue therein unto my lives end It is Gods will that we have great regard to all the deeds that he hath done for he will thereby that we know trust and believe all that he shall doe But evermore us needeth leave the beholding what the deed shall be and desire we to be like to our Brethren which be the Saints in Heaven that will right nought but Gods will Then shall we only enjoy in God and be well apaid both with hiding and shewing For I saw verily in our Lords meaning the more we busie us to know his privities in that or in any other thing the farther more shall we be from the knowing The xxxjv Chapter OUr Lord shewed two manner of | i e. secrets privities One is this great privity with all the privy Points thereto belonging And these privities he will we know thus hid into the time that he will clearly shew them to us That other are the privities which himself shewed openly in this Revelation for those are privities which he will make open and known to us for he will that we wit that it is his will that we know them They are privities to us but not only for that he will they be privities to us but they are privities to us for our blind-head and our unknowing And therefore hath he great ruth and therefore he will make them open to us himself whereby we may know him and love him and cleave to him For all that is | i e. profitable speedeful for us to wit and for to know full courteously our good Lord will shew us what it is with all the Preaching and Teaching of Holy Church God shewed full great pleasaunce that he hath in all men and women that mightily and wisely take the Preaching and Teaching of Holy Church for he it is Holy Church He is the Ground He is the Substance He is the Teaching He is the Teacher He is the End and He is the Meed Wherefore every kind Soul Traveleth And this is known and shall be known to each Soul to which the Holy Ghost declareth it And I hope truly all those that seek thus they shall speed for they
that should burn us all to death I asked them that were with me if they felt any stench they said nay they felt none I said Blessed be God for then wist I well it was the fiend that was come only to tempt me And anon I took me to that our Lord had shewed me on the same day with all the Faith of Holy Church for I beheld it as both in one and fled thereto as to my Comfort And anon all vanished away and I was brought to great rest and peace without Sickness of body or dread of Conscience The Lxviij Chapter ANd then our good Lord opened my Ghostly eye and shewed me my Soul in the midst of my heart I saw the Soul so large as it were and endless World and also as it were a blessed Kingdom And by the conditions that I saw therein I understood that it is a worshipful City In mids of that City our Lord Jesu very God and very Man a fair Person and of large stature Highest Bishop most Solemne King Worshipful Lord. And I saw him clothed solemnly in Worship he sitteth in the Soul even right in Peace and rest And he ruleth and giveth Heaven and Earth and all that is The Man-hood with the God-head sitteth in rest The God-head ruleth and giveth without any instrument or business And the Soul is all occupied with the blessed God-head that is sovereign Might sovereign Wisdom and severeign Goodness The place that Jesu taketh in our Soul he shall never remove without end as to my sight for in us is his homliest home and his endless dwelling And in this he sheweth the Liking that he hath of the making of mans Soul for as well as the Father might make a Creature and as well as the Son might make a Creature So well would the Holy Ghost that mans Soul were made and so it was done And therefore the blessedful Trinity enjoyeth without end in the making of mans Soul For he saw without beginning what should like him without end All thing that he hath made sheweth his Lordship as understanding was given in the same time by example of a Creature that is led to see great Nobleness and Kingdoms longing to a Lord. And when it had seen all the Nobleness beneath then marvelling it was stirred to seek up above to that high place where the Lord dwelleth knowing by reason that his dwelling is in the worthiest place And thus I understand truly that our Soul may never have rest in things that is beneath it self And when it cometh above all Creatures into it self yet may it not abide in the beholding of it self but all the beholding is blessedfully set in God that is the Maker dwelling therein for in mans Soul is his very dwelling And the highest Light and the brightest Shining of the City is the glorious Love of our Lord God as to my sight And what may make us more enjoy in God than to see in him that he enjoyeth in us highest of all his Works For I saw in the same shewing that if the blessed Trinity might have made mans Soul any better any fairer any nobler than it was made he should not have been full pleased with making of mans Soul But for he made mans Soul as fair as good as precious as he might make it a Creature therefore the blessed Trinity is full pleased without end in the making of mans Soul And he will that our hearts be mightily raised above the deepness of the earth and all vain sorrowes and enjoy in him This was a delectable sight and a restful shewing that is without end And the beholding of this whiles we are here it is full pleasant to God and full great speed to us And the Soul that thus beholdeth it maketh him like to him that is beholden and oned it in rest and in peace by his grace And this was a singular joy and bliss to me that I saw him sitting for the truth of sitting shewed endless dwelling And he gave me knowing truly that it was he that shewed me all before and when I had beholden all this with advisement then shewed our good Lords words full meekly without voice and without opening of lips right as he had done afore and said full sweetly Wit it now well it was no raving that thou sawest to day but take it and believe it and keep thee therein and comfort thee therewith and trust thereto and thou shalt not be overcome These last words were said for learning of full true | i e. assurance sikerness that is our Lord Jesu that shewed me all And right as in the first word that our good Lord shewed meaning his blessed Passion herewith is the fiend overcome right so he said in the last word with full true faithfulness meaning us all Thou shalt not be overcome And all this Learning and this true Comfort is general to all mine even Christen as it is aforesaid and so is Gods will And this word Thou shalt not be overcome was said full sharply and full mightily for sickness and comfort against all Tribulations that may come He said not thou shalt not be troubled thou shalt not be travelled thou shalt not be diseased but he said Thou shalt not be overcome God will that we take heed at this word and that we be ever mighty in faithful trusting in weal and woe for he loveth us and liketh us and so will he that we Love him and Like him and mightily trust in him and all shall be well and soon all was close and I saw no more after this The Lxjx. Chapter THe fiende came again with his heat and with his stench and made me full busie The stench was so vile and so painful and bodily heat also dreadful and travellous Also I heard a bodily talking as it had been of two bodies and both to my thinking talked at one time as they had held a Parliament with great business And all was soft whistering And I understood not what they said And all this was to stir me to dispair as methought seeming to me as they scorned | i e. praying bidding of Beads which are said * i e. hastily boystously with much failing of devout intending and wise diligence the which we owe to God in our prayer And our good Lord God gave me grace mightily to trust in him and to comfort my Soul with bodily speech as I should have done to another Person that had been travelled methought that business might not be likened to no bodily likeness The Lxx. Chapter MY bodily eye I set in the same Cross there I had seen in comfort afore that time My tongue with speech of Christs Passion and rehersing the Faith of Holy Church and my heart to fasten on God with all the trust and the might that I thought to my self meaning Thou hast now great business to keep thee in the Faith for that thou shouldest not be taken of thine enemies Wouldest thou
IN this same time that I sawe this sight of the head bleeding our good Lord shewed a Ghostlie sight of his * i. e friendly homelie loving I saw that he is to us all thing that is good and comfortable to our help He is our Clothing that for Love wrappeth us and windeth us †i. e. embraceth halseth us and all becloseth us hangeth about us for tender Love that he maie never leave us And so in this sight I saw that he is all thing that is good as to my understanding And in this he shewed a litle thing the quantitie of a Hasel-Nutt lying in the palme of my hand as me seemed and it was as round as a Ball. I looked theron with the eie of my understanding and thought What may this be and it was answered generallie thus It is all that is made I marvelled how it might last For me thought it might sodenlie have fallen to naught for litlenes And I was answered in my Understanding It lasteth and ever shall For God loveth it And so hath all thing being by the Love of God In this litle thing I sawe three Propeties The first is that God made it The second is that God loveth it The third is that God keepeth it But What beheld I therein verilie the Maker the Keeper the Lover For till I am substanciallie united to him I maie never have full rest ne verie blisse that is to saie that I be so fastned to him that there be right nought that is made betweene my God and mee This litle thing that is made me thought it might have fallen to nought for litleness Of this needeth us to have knowledge that us liketh naught all thing that is made for to love God and have God that is unmade For this is the cause which we be not all in ease of Heart and Soule For we seeke here rest in this thing that is so litle where no rest is in and we know not our God that is all Mightie all Wise and all Good for he is verie rest God will be known and him liketh that we rest us in him For all that is beneath him sufficeth not us And this is the Cause why that no Soule is in Rest till it is * i. e emptied naughted of all things that are made When she is wilfullie naughted for love to have him that is all then is she able to receave Ghostlie rest And also our good Lord shewed that it is full great pleasure to him that a seelie Soule come to him naked plainlie and homelie For this is the kind dwelling of the Soule by the touching of the Holie Ghost as by the understanding that I have in this shewing God of thy goodnes give me thy self for thou art enough to me And I may aske nothing that is lesse that may be fullie Worship to thee and if I aske any thing that is lesse ever me wanteth But onlie in thee I have all And these wordes of the Goodnes of God be full love-some to the Soule and full nere touching the Will of our Lord for his Goodnes fulfilleth all his Creatures and all his blessed Works without end For he is the endlesse head and he made us onlie to himselfe and restored us by his precious Passion and ever keepeth us in his blessed Love and all this is of his Goodnes The vj. Chapter THis shewing was given to my understanding to learne our Soule wisely to cleave to the Goodnes of God and in that same time the custome of our Praier was brought to my mind how that we use for unknowing of Love to make many meanes Then sawe I verilie that it is more worship to God and more verie delight that we faithfullie pray to himself of his Goodnes and cleave therto by his Grace with true understanding and stedfast beleif then if we made all the meanes that heart may think For if we make all these meanes it is too litle and not full Worship to God But in his Goodnes is all the whole and there faileth right nought For thus as I shall saie came to my minde in the same time We Pray to God for his Holie flesh and for his precious Blood his Holie Passion his deare worthie Death and worshipfull Wounds for all the blessed kindenes and the endles Life that we have of all this it is of the Goodnes of God and we Praie him for his sweet Mothers Love that bare him and all the helpe that we have of her it is of his Goodnes And we Praie for his Holie Crosse that he died on and all the helpe and all the vertue of that we have of that Crosse it is of his Goodnes And on the same wise all the helpe that we have to special Saints and of all the blessed Companie of Heaven the deare worthie Love and the Holy endles Friendship that we have of them it is of his Goodnes For the meanes that the Goodnes of God hath ordeined for to helpe us be full faire and many Of which the chiefe and principall meane is the blessed * i. e. humanity kind that he took of the Maiden with all the meanes that went before and come after which be longing to our Redemption and to our endless Salvation Wherefore it pleaseth him that we seeke him and Worship him by Meanes Understanding and knowing that he is the Goodnes of all For to the Goodnes of God is the highest Praier and it cometh down to us to the lowest partie of our neede it quickneth our Soule and maketh it live and makes it to waxe in Grace and Vertue it is nearest in kind and readiest in Grace For it is the same Grace that the Soule seeketh and ever shall till we know our God verilie that hath us all in himself beclosed A man goeth upright and the Soule of his body is * i. e. Enclosed sparred as a purse full faire and when it is time of his necessity it is opened and sparred againe full | i e. seemly honestlie And that it is he that doth this it is shewed there where he saith He cometh downe to us to the lowest part of our need For he hath no despite of that he made ne hath he no disdaine to serve us at the simplest office that to our bodie longeth in kind for love of the Soule that he made to his own likenes For as the Bodie is cladd in the Cloath and the Flesh in the Skinn and the Bones in the Flesh and the Heart in the bulke so are we Soule and Bodie cladd and enclosed in the Goodnes of God Yea and more * i. e. truely homelie for all they vanish and wast away the Goodnes of God is ever whole and more nere to us without any comparison For truelie our Lover desireth that the Soule cleave to him with all the mightes and that we be evermore cleaving to his Goodnes for of all thing that heart can thinke it pleaseth
most God and soonest speedeth For our Soule is so preciouslie loved of him that is highest that it over-passeth the knowing of all Creatures That is to saie There is no Creature that is made that may wit how much and how sweetly and how tenderlie that our Maker loveth us And therefore we may with his Grace and his helpe stand in Ghostlie beholding with everlasting marvailing in this high over-passing unmeasurable Love that our Lord hath to us of his Goodnes And therefore we may aske of our Lover with Reverence all that we will for our * i. e. naturall kindlie Will is to have God and the Good-will of God is to have us And we may never cease of willing ne of loving till we have him in fulhead of joy And then we may no more will for he will that we be occupied in knowing and loving till the time cometh that we shall be fulfilled in Heaven And therefore was this Lesson of Love shewed with all that followeth as you shall see for the strength and the ground of all was shewed in the first sight for of all things the beholding and the loving of the Maker maketh the Soul to seem least in his own sight and most filleth it with reverent dread and true meekness and with plenty of Charity to his even Christian The vij Chapter ANd to learn us this as to my understanding our good Lord shewed our Lady Mary in the same time that is to mean the high Wisdom and Truth that she had in beholding her Maker This Wisdom and Truth made her to behold her God so Great so High so Mighty and so Good This greatness and this | i. e. nobleness Noblety of her beholding of God fulfilled her of reverend deed And with this she saw her self so litle and so low so simple and so poor in regard of her God that this reverend Dread fulfilled her of meekness And thus by this ground she was fulfilled of Grace and of all manner of Vertues and passeth all Creatures And in all the time that he shewed this that I have now said in Ghostly sight I saw the bodily sight lasting of the plentuous bleeding of the head the great drops of Blood fell down from under the Garland like Pellots seeming as it had come out of the Veins And in the coming out they were brown red for the blood was full thick and in the spreading abroad they were bright red and when it came at the | i. e. forehead Brows there they vanished And notwithstanding the bleeding continued till many things were seen and understanded nevertheless the fair head and the lively head continued in the same beauty and liveliness The plentuous head is like to the drops of Water that fall off the evesing of an House after a great shower of Rain that fall so thick that no man may number them with any bodily Wit And for the roundness they were like to the Seal of her Ring in the spreading of the forehead These three things came to my mind in the time Pellets for the roundhead in the comming out of the blood the Scale of Herring for the round-head in the spreading the dropps of the evesing of an House for the plentuous head unnumerable This shewing was quick and lively and hideous and dreadful and sweet and lovely And of all the sight that I saw this was most comfort to me that our good Lord that is so reverent and dreadful is so homely and so courteous And this most fulfilled me with liking and sickness * i. e. in of Soul And to the understanding of this he shewed this open example It is the most worship that a solemn King or a great Lord may do to a poor Servant if he will be homely with him and namely if he shew it himself of a full true meaning and with a glad chere both in private and openly Then thinketh this poor Creature thus Lo what might this Noble Lord do more Worship and Joy to me than to shew to me that am so little This marvelous himeliness verily it is more joy and liking to me than if he gave me great gifts and were himself strange in manner This bodily example was shewed so high that this mans heart might be ravished and almost forget himself for Joy of this great homeliness Thus it faireth by our Lord Jesu and by us for verily it is the most joy that may be as to my sight that he that is highest and mightest nobliest and worthiest is lowest and meekest homliest and courtesiest And truly and verily this marvellous joy shall he shew us all when we shall see him And this will our good Lord that we believe and trust joy and like comfort us and make solace as we may with his Grace and with his Help into the time that we see it verily for the most fulhed of joy that we shall have as to my sight is this marvellous courtesie and homeliness of our Father that is our Maker in our Lord Jesu Christ that is our Brother and our Saviour But this marvelous Homlliness may no man know in this Life but if he have it by special shewing of our Lord or of great plenty of Grace inwardly given of the Holy Ghost but Faith and Belief with Charity deserve the meed and so it is had by Grace For in Faith with Hope and Charity our Life is grounded the shewing is made to whom that God will plainly teach the same opened and declared with many privy Points belonging to our Faith and Belief which be worshipful to be known And when the shewing which is given for a time is passed and hid then Faith keepeth it by Grace of the Holy Ghost unto our Lives end And thus by the shewing it is none other than Faith no less no more as it may be seen by our Lords meaning in the same matter by than it come to the last end The viij Chapter ANd as long as I saw this sight of the plentuousness of bleeding of the Head I might never stint of these Words Benedicite Dominis In which shewing I understood six things The first is the Tokens of the blessedful Passion and the plentuous shedding of his precious Blood The second is the Maiden that is his dear worthy Mother The third is the blessedful God-head that ever was and shall be all Mighty all Wisdom and all Love The fourth is all thing that he hath made for well I wote that Heaven and Earth and all that is made is great large fair and good but the cause why it sheweth so litle to my sight was for I saw it in the presence of him that is the Maker for a Soul that seeth the Maker of all thing all that is made seemeth full litle The fifth is that he that made all thing that is made for Love and by the same Love it is kept and shall be without end as it is before said The sixth is that God is all
Wilderness And I understood not all what this Example meant and therefore I marvelled from whence the Servant came In the Servant is comprehended the second Person of the Trinity and in the Servant is comprehended Adam that is to say all men And therefore when I say the Son it meaneth the God-head which is even with the Father And when I saw the Servant it meaneth Christs Manhood which is rightful Adam By the nearhood of the Servant is understood the Son And by the standing on the left side is understood Adam The Lord is God the Father The Servant is the Son Jesu Christ The Holy Ghost is the even Love that is in them both When Adam fell Gods Son fell for the right oning which was made in Heaven Gods Son might not be separate from Adam for by Adam I understand all man Adam fell fro Life to Death into the slade of this wretched World and after that into Hell Gods Son fell with Adam into the slade of the Maidens Womb which was the fairest Daughter of Adam and that was for to excuse Adam from blame in Heaven and in Earth And mightily he fetched him out of Hell By the Wisdom and the Goodness that was in the Servant is understood Gods Son by the poor cloathing as a Labourer standing near the left side is understood the manhood of Adam with all the mischief and feebleness that followeth For in all this our good Lord shewed his own Son and Adam but one man The Vertue and the Goodness that we have is of Jesu Christ The feebleness and blindness that we have is of Adam which two were shewed in the Servant And thus hath our good Lord Jesu taken upon him all our blame And therefore our Father may nor will no more blame assigne to us than to his own dear worthy Son Jesu Christ Thus was he the Servant before his coming into the Earth standing ready before the Father in purpose till what time he would send him to do the worshipful deed by which Mankind was brought again into Heaven that is to say notwithstanding that he is God even with the Father as anenst the God-head But in his fore-seeing purpose that he would be Man to save Man in fulfilling of the Will of his Father so he stood before his Father as a Servant wilfully taking upon him all our charge And then he start full readily at the Fathers Will and anon he fell full low in the Maidens Womb having no regard to himself ne to his hard Pains The white Kirtle is the flesh The single-head is that there was right nought between the God-head and the Man-hood The straitness is Poverty the old is of Adams Wearing the defaulting is the sweat of Adams travel the shortness sheweth the Servant-Labourer And thus I saw the Son stand saying in his meaning Loe my dear Father I stand before thee in Adams Kirtle all ready to start and to run I would be in the Earth to thy Worship when it is thy Will to send me how long shall I desire it Full truly | i e. knew wist the Son when it was the Fathers Will and how long he should desire that is to say as anenst the God-head for he is the Wisdom of the Father Wherefore this meaning was shewed in understanding of the Manhood of Christ For all Mankind that shall be saved by the sweet Incarnation and Passion of Christ all is the Manhood of Christ for he is the Head and we be his Members To which Members the day and the time is unknown when every passing Woe and Sorrow shall have an end and the everlasting Joy and Bliss shall be fulfilled Which day and time for to see all the company of Heaven longeth and desireth and all that be under Heaven which shall come thither their way is by longing and desiring Which desiring and longing was shewed in the Servant standing before the Lord or else thus in the Son standing before the Father in Adams Kirtle For the longing and desiring of all Mankind that shall be safe appeared in Jesu for Jesu is in all that may be safe and all that be saved is in Jesu And all of the Charity of God with obedience meekness and patience and vertues that longeth to us Also in this marvellous Example I have teaching within me as it were the beginning of an A. B. C. whereby I may have some understanding of our Lords meaning For the privities of the Revelation be hid therein notwithstanding that all the shewings be full of privities The sitting of the Father betokeneth the God-head that is to say for shewing of Rest and Peace For in the God-head may be no travel And that he sheweth himself as Lord betokeneth to our Manhood The standing of the Servant betokeneth travel and on the left side betokeneth that he was not all worthy to stand even right before the Lord. His starting was the God-head and the running was the Man-head for the God-head start fro the Father into the Maidens Womb falling into the taking of our kind And in this falling he took great sore The sore that he took was our flesh in which as soon as he took it he had feeling of deadly Pains By that he stood dreadfull before the Lord and not even right betokeneth that his cloathing was not honest to stand even right before the Lord nor that might not nor should not be his Office whiles he was a Labourer nor also he might not sit with the Lord in rest and peace till he had won his peace rightfully with his hard travel And by the left side that the Father left his own Son wilfully in the manhood to suffer all mans pain without sparing of him By that his Kirtle was at the point to be ragged and rent is understood the Roddes and Scourges the Thornes and the Nails the drawing and the dragging his tender flesh renting as I saw in some part the tender flesh was rent from the head-pann falling on pieces unto the time the bleeding failed And then it began to dry again cleaving to the bone And by the wallowing and writhing groaning and mourning is understood that he might never rise all mightily fro that time that he was fallen into the Maidens Womb till his body was slain and dead he yielding the Soul into the Fathers hand with all mankind for whom he was sent And at this point he began first to shew his might for then he went into Hell And when he was there then he raised up the great root out of the deep deepness which rightfully was knit to him in high Heaven The body lay in the Grave till Easter morrow and fro that time he lay never more for there was rightfully ended the wallowing and the writhing the groaning and the mourning And our foul deadly flesh that Gods Son took upon him which was Adams old Kirtle strait bare and short then by our Saviour was made fair new white and bright and
a Light kindly coming of our endless day that is our Father God In which Light our Mother Christ and our good Lord the Holy Ghost leadeth us in this passing Life This Light is measured discreetly needfully standeth to us in the Night the Light is cause of our Life the Night is cause of our Pain and all our Woe In which Woe we desire endless meed and thank of God for we with mercy and grace wilfully know and believe our Light going therein wisely and mightily And at the end of Woe suddenly our eye shall be opened and in clearness of sight our Light shall be full Which Light is God our Maker Father and Holy Ghost in Christ Jesu our Saviour Thus I saw and understood that our Faith is our Light in our night which Light is God our endless day The Lxxxiij Chapter THis light is Charity and the measuring of this Light is done to us profitably by the Wisdom of God For neither the Light is so large that we may see clearly our blessedful day ne it is all * i e. shut up speered from us but it is such a Light in which we may live | i e. meritoriously meedfully with travel reserving the worshipful thanks of God And this was seen in the vjth Shewing where he saith I thank thee of thy service and of thy travel Thus Charity keepeth us in Faith and in Hope And Faith and Hope leadeth us in Charity and at the end all shall be Charity I had three manner of understandings in this Light of Charity The first is Charity unmade The second is Charity made The third is Charity given Charity unmade is God Charity made is our Soul in God Charity given is vertue and that is a gracious gift of working In which we Love God for himself and our self in God and all that God Loveth for God The Lxxxjv. Chapter ANd in this sight I marvelled highly for notwithstanding our simple Living and our blindness here yet endlesly our courteous Lord beholdeth us in this Working enjoying And of all thing we may please him best wisely and truly to believe it and to enjoy with him and in him for as verily as we shall be in bliss of God without end him praising and thanking as verily we have been in the foresight of God Loved and known in his endless purpose fro without beginning In which unbegun Love he made us in the same Love he keepeth us and never suffereth us to be hurt by which our bliss might be lessed And therefore when the doome is given we be all brought up above then shall we clearly see in God the privities which now be hid to us And then shall none of us be stirred to say in any thing Lord if it had been thus it had been well But we shall all say with one voyce Lord blessed mote thou be for it is thus Thus it is well And now we see verily that all thing is done as it was thine Ordinance * i e before or any thing was made The Lxxxv. Chapter THis Book is begun by Gods gift and his grace but it is not yet performed as to my sight For Charity pray we all together with Gods working thanking trusting enjoying For this will our good Lord be praid by the understanding that I took in all his own meaning And in the sweet words where he saith full merrily I am ground of thy beseeching For truly I saw and understood in our Lords meaning that he shewed it for he will have it knowing more then it is In which knowing he will give us grace to Love him and cleave to him For he beholds his heavenly Treasure and Solace in heavenly Joy in drawing of our hearts from sorrow and darkness which we are in And fro the time that it was shewed I de-desired oftentimes to wit in what was our Lords meaning And fifteen Year after and more I was answered in Ghostly understanding saying thus What wouldest thou wit thy Lords meaning in this thing Wit it well Love was his meaning Who sheweth it thee Love Wherefore sheweth he it thee For Love Hold thee therein thou shalt wit more in the same But thou shalt never wit therein other without end Thus was I Learned that love is our Lords meaning And I saw full surely in this and in all that our God made us he Loved us which Love was never slacked ne never shall And in this Love he hath done all his Works And in this Love he hath made all thing profitable to us And in this Love our Life is everlasting in our making we had beginning But the Love wherein he made us was in him fro without beginning In which Love we have our beginning And all this shall we see in God without end Deo Gratias Explicit liber Revelationum Juliane Anachorite Norwic. cujus anime propicietur Deus FINIS
them to which Grace alone all Good in us is to be ascribed XVI REVELATIONS OF LOVE Here beginneth the First Chapter THis is a Revelation of Love that Jesu Christ our endless Blisse made in xvi Shewings of which The first is of his precious Crowning of Thornes and therein was conteined and specified the Blessed Trinity with the Incarnation and the uniting between God and mans Soul with manie faire Shewings and Teachings of endless Wisdom and Love in which all the Shewings that follow be grounded and joyned The second is of the discolouring of his faire Face in tokening of his dear worthie Passion The third is that our Lord God Almighty all Wisdom and all Love right also verilie as he hath made all thinges that are right also verilie he doth and worketh all things that are done The fourth is scourging of his tender Bodie with plenteous Shedding of his precious Blood The fifth is that the fiend is overcome by the precious Passion of Christ The sixth is the Worshipfull Thanking of our Lord God in which he rewardeth all his blessed Servants in Heaven The seventh is oftentimes feeling of weale and woe feeling of weale is gracious touching and lightning with true * i e. security sikernes of endeles joy The feeling of Woe is of Temptation by Heavines and Wearines of our fleshlie living with Ghostelie understanding that we be kept also verelie in love in woe as in weal by the goodnes of God The eighth is the last paines of Christ and his cruell dying The ninth is of the * i. e. pleasure liking which is in the Blessed Trinity of the hard Passion of Christ after his rufull and sorrowful dying in which joy and liking he will that we be in solace and Mirth with him till that we come to the Glorie in Heaven The tenth is our Lord Jesu Christ by Love his blessed Heart even cloven in two The eleventh is an high Ghostlie shewing of his deare worthie Mother The twelfth is that our Lord God is all Soveraign being The thirteenth is that our Lord God will that we have great regard to all the Deedes which he hath done in the great Nobletie of all things making and of the Excellency of Mans making the which is above all his Works and of the precious amends that he hath made for Mans sin turning all our blame into endeles Worship Than meaneth he thus Beholde and see for by the same Might Wisdome and Goodness that I have done all this by the same Might Wisdome and Goodness I shall make well all that is not well and thou shalt see it And in this he will that we keep us in the Faith and Truth of Holie Church not willing to * i e. know wit his privities not but as it longeth to us in this Life The fourteenth is that our Lord God is the Ground of our | i. e. desire beseekinge Herein was seen two fair properties that one is rightful praier that other is verie trust which he will both be one like large and thus our Praier liketh him and he of his Goodness fulfilleth it The fifteenth is that we should soudeinlie be taken from all our Paine and from all our Woe and of his Goodnes we shall come up above where we shall have our Lord Jesu to our * i. e. reward meed and for to be fulfilled with joy and blisse in Heaven The sixteenth is that the blessed Trinitie our Maker in Christ Jesu our Saviour endleslie dwelleth in our Soule worshipfullie rewarding and commanding all things us mightilie and wiselie saving and keeping for Love and we shall not be over-come of our Enemy The Second Chapter THis Revelation was made to a simple Creature unlettered living in deadlie Flesh the Year of our Lord a Thousand three Hundreth lxxiij the xiiij th daie of Maie Which Creature desired before three Gifts by the Grace of God The first was * i. e. feeling mind of the Passion The second was bodilie Sickness The third was to have of Gods gift three Woundes For the first me thought I had some deale feeling in the Passion of Christ but yet I desired to have more by the Grace of God Me thought I would have been that time with Magdalen and with other that were Christs Lovers that I might have seen bodilie the Passion that our Lord suffered for me that I might have suffered with him as others did that loved him and therefore I desired a bodilie sight wherein I might have more knowledge of the bodilie paines of our Saviour and of the Compassion of Our Lady and of all his true Lovers that were living that time and saw his Paines For I would have bene one of them and have suffered with them Other sight nor shewing of God desired I never none till when the Soule were departed from the body for I believed to be saved by the Mercy of God This was my meaning for I would after because of that shewing have the more true mind in the Passion of Christ For the second came to my mind with Contrition freelie without anie seeking a | i. e. earnest wilfull desire to have of Gods Gift a bodilie sicknes I would that that sicknes were so hard as to the death that I might in that sicknes have undertaken all the Rights of Holie Church my self weening that I should have died and that all Creatures might suppose the same that saw me For I would have no manner of Comfort of fleshly ne earthly Life in that sicknes I desired to have all manner of Paines Bodilie and Ghostlie that I should have if I should have died All the Dreads and Temptations of fiends and all manner of other Paines saving the out-passing of the Soule And this meant I for I would be purged by the Mercy of God and after live more to the Worship of God because of that sicknes For I hoped that it might have bene to my reward when I should have died for I desired to have bene soone with my God and Maker These two desires of the Passion and of the sicknes that I desired of him was with a Condition For me thought this was not the common use of Praier Therefore I said Lord thou knowest what I would and if that it be thy will that I might have it and if it be not thy will Good Lord be not displeased for I will not but as thou wilt This siicknes I desired in my Youth that I might have it when I were thirtie Years Old For the third by the Grace of God and teaching of Holie Church I conceived a mightie desire to receive three Wounds in my Life that is to say the Wound of verie Contrition the Wound of kind Compassion and the Wound of willful Longing to God Right as I asked the other twaine with a Condition so asked I this third mightilie without any Condition These twaine desires before said passed from my mind and the third dwelled
thing that is good as to my sight and the goodness that all thing hath it is he And all this our Lord shewed in the first sight And gave me space and time to behold it and the Bodily sight stinted and the Ghostly sight dwelleth in my understanding And I abode with reverent dread joying in that I saw and desiring as I durst to see more if it were his will or longer time the same sight In all this I was much stirred in Charity to mine even Christian that they might all see and know the same that I saw for I would that it were comfort to them for all this sight was shewed in general Then said I to them that were with me It is this Day Dooms-day with me And this I said for I went to have died for that day that Man or Woman dieth is he deemed particularly as he shall be without end as to my understanding This I said for I would they should love God the better for to make them to have mind that this Life is short as they might see in example for in all this time I weened to have dyed and that was marvaile to me and wonder in party for methought this vision was shewed for them that should live All that I say of me I mean in person of all my even Christian for I am learned in the Ghostly shewing of our Lord God that he meaneth so And therefore I pray you all for God's sake and counsel you for your own profit that you leave the beholding of a Wretch that it was shewed to and mightily wisely and meekly behold in God that of his courtesie love and endless Goodness would shew it generally in Comfort of us all for it is Gods will that ye take it with a great joy and liking as Jesu Christ hath shewed it to you The ix Chapter FOr the shewing I am not good but if I love God the better and in asmuch as ye love God the better it is more to you than to me I say not this to them that be wise for they | i e. know wit it well but I say it to you that be simple for ease and comfort for we be all one in Love for verily it was not shewed to me for that God loveth me better than the least Soul that is in Grace for I am sure there be many that never hath shewing ne sight but of the common teaching of Holy Church that love God better than I for if I look singularly to my self I am right nought but in general I am I hope in | i e. unity one-head of Charity with all my even Christian for in this one head standeth the life of all mankind that shall be saved for God is all that is good as to my sight And God hath made all that is made and God loveth all that he hath made and he that generally loveth all his even Christen for God he loveth all that is For in mankind that shall be saved is comprehended all that is to say all that is made and the Maker of all for in Man is God and in God is all and he that loveth thus he loveth all And I hope by the Grace of God he that beholdeth it thus shall be truly taught and mightily comforted if him needeth comfort I speak of them that shall be saved for in this time God shewed me none other But in all thing I believe as Holy Church Preacheth and Teacheth for the Faith of Holy Church which I had before hand understanding and as I hope by the Grace of God will fully keep it in use and custome stood continually in my sight willing and meaning never to receive any thing that might be contrary thereto And with this intent and with this meaning I beheld the shewing with all my diligence for in all this blessed shewing I beheld it as in Gods meaning All this was shewed by three parts that is to say by bodily sight and by words formed in my understanding and by Ghostly sight but the Ghostly sight I cannot ne may shew it as openly ne as fully as I would but I trust in our Lord God Almighty that he shall of his Goodness and for your Love make you to take it more Ghostly and more sweetly than I can or may tell it The Second Revelation The x. Chapter ANd after this I saw with bodily sight in the face of the Crucifix that hung before me In the which I beheld continually a part of his Passion despite spitting sulloing and buffeting and many languring Pains more than I can tell and often changing of Colour and one time I saw how half the face beginning at the Ear over | i e. covered yede with dry Blood till it closed into the mid-face And after that the other half be closed in the same wise And the whiles it vanished in this party even as it came This saw I bodily | i e. obscurely sweinly and darkly and I desired more bodily light to have seen more clearly and I was answered in my reason If God will shew thee more he shall be thy light thou need none but him For I saw him and sought him for we be now so blind and so unwise that we can never seek God till what time that he of his Goodness sheweth him to us And when we see ought of him graciously then are we stirred by the same Grace to seek with great desire to see him more blessedfully And thus I saw him and sought him and I had him and wanted him And this is and should be our common working in this life as to my sight One time my Understanding was litle down into the Sea-ground and there saw I Hills and Dales green seeming as it were most begrowing with Wrake and Gravel Then I understood thus that if a Man or Woman were there under the broad Water and he might have sight of God so as God is with a man continually he should be safe in Soul and Body and take no harm and | i e. exceedingly over-passing he should have more solace and comfort than all this World may or can tell For he will that we believe that we see him continually though that us think that it be but litle and in the belief he maketh us evermore to get Grace for he will be seen and he will be sought and he will be abiden and he will be trusted This second shewing was so low and so litle and so simple that my Spirits were in great Travail in the beholding mourning dreadful and longing for I was sometime in a fear whether it was a shewing or none and then divers times our Lord gave me more sight whereby that I understood truly that it was a shewing It was a Figure and a Likeness of our foul black deeds which our fair bright blessed Lord bare for our sin It made me to think of the Holy †i e. Veronica Vernacle of Rome
endless knowing in God which we might never have without that and the harder our Pains have been with him in his Cross the more shall our Worship be with him in his Kingdom The Ninth Revelation The xxij Chapter THen said our good Lord asking Art thou * i. e. content well apaid that I suffered for thee I said yea good Lord gramercy yea good Lord blessed mote thou be Then said Jesu our good Lord If thou art apaid I am apaid It is a joy a bliss an endless liking to me that ever I suffered Passion for thee And if I might have suffered more I would have suffered more In this feeling my understanding was lifted up into Heaven And there I saw three Heavens Of which sight I was greatly marvelled and thought I see three Heavens and all of the blissedful Man-head of Christ and none is more none is less none is higher none is lower but even like of bliss For the first Heaven Christ shewed me his Father in no bodily likeness but in his property and in his working that is to say I saw in Christ that the Father is The Working of the Father is this that he giveth * i e. reward meed to his Son Jesu Christ This Gift and this meed is so blissedful to Jesuâ— that his Father might have given him no meed that might have been liked to him better For the first Heaven that is the pleasing of the Father shewed to me as in Heaven and it was full blissedfully for he is well pleased with all the deeds that Jesu hath done about our Salvation Wherefore we be not only his by his * i e. redeeming buying but also by the courteous Gifts of his Father we be his bliss we be his meed we be his Worship we be his Crown and this was a singuler marvaile and a full delectable beholding that we be his Crown This that I say is so great bliss to Jesu that he setteth at naught his Travel and his Passion and his cruel and shameful Death And in these words If I might suffer more I would suffer more I saw truly that as often as he might die as often as he would and Love should never let him have rest till he had done it And I beheld with great diligence for to wit how often he would die if he might And truly the number passed my understanding and my Wits so far that my reason might not nor could not comprehend it ne take it And when he had thus oft died or should die yet he would set it at naught for Love for all thinketh him but litle in regard of his Love for though the sweet manhood of Christ might suffer but once the goodness of him may never cease of profer every day he is ready to the same if it might be for if he said he would for my Love make new Heavens and new Earths it were but litle in regard For this might he do each day if he would without any Travel But for to die for my Love so often that the number passeth Creatures reason this is the highest profer that our Lord God might make to mans Soul as to my sight Then meaneth he thus How should it then be that I should not for thy Love do all that I might which deed grieveth me nought sithen that I would for thy Love dye so often having no regard to my hard Pains And here saw I for the second beholding in his blessed Passion the Love that made him to suffer it passeth as far all his Pains as Heaven is above Earth for the Pain was a noble precious and Worshipful deed done in a time by the working of Love And Love was without beginning is and shall be without end for which Love he said full sweetly this Word If I might suffer more I would suffer more He said not if it were needful to suffer more but If I might suffer more For though it were not needful and he might suffer more he would This Deed and this Work about our Salvation was ordained as well as God might ordaine it It was done as worshipfully as Christ might do it And herein I saw a full bliss in Christ for his bliss should not have been full if it might any better have been done than it was done The xxiij Chapter ANd in these three Words It is a Joy a Bliss and endless liking to me were shewed three Heavens as thus For the joy I understood the pleasaunce of the Father and for the bliss the Worship of the Son and for the endless liking of the Holy Ghost The Father is pleased the Son is worshipped and the Holy Ghost liketh And here saw I for the third beholding in his blessedful Passion that is to say the joy and the bliss that maketh him to like it For our courteous Lord shewed his Passion to me in five manners Of which the first is the Bleeding of the Head The second Discolouring of his blessed Face The third is the plentuous Bleeding of the Body in seeming of scourging The fourth is the deep drying These four as it is before said for the Pains of the Passion And the fifth is that was shewed for the joy and the bliss of the Passion for it is Gods will that we have true liking with him in our Salvation And therein he will that we be mightily comforted and strengthened And thus will hee merely with his Grace that our Soul be occupied for we be his bliss for in us he liketh without end And so shall we in him with his Grace all that he doth for us and hath done and ever shall was never cost ne charge to him ne might be but only that he died in our manhead beginning at the sweet Incarnation and lasting to the blessed Uprising on Easter morrow so long dured the cost and charge about our Redemption in deed In which deed he ever joyeth endlesly as it is before said Ah Jesu will we take heed to this bliss that is in the blissedful Trinity of our Salvation and that we desire to have asmuch Ghostly liking with his Grace as it is before said that is to say that the liking of our Salvation be like to the joy that Christ hath of our Salvation as it may be while we be here All the Trinity wrought in the Passion of Christ ministering abundance of Vertue and Plenty of Grace to us by him but only the Maidens Son suffered whereof all the blessed Trinity enjoyeth And this was shewed in this Word Art thou well apaid By that other Word Christ said If thou art well apaid I am well apaid as if he had said It is joy and liking enough to me and I ask not else of thee of my Travel but that I might appay thee And in this he brought to my mind the property of a glad Giver ever a glad Giver taketh but litle heed at the thing that he giveth but all his desire and all his intent is to
letted me but sin And so I beheld generally in us all and methought if sin had not been we should all have been clean and like to our Lord as he made us And thus in my folly before this time often I wondred why by the great foresaid Wisdom of God the beginning of sin was not letted for then thought me that all should have been well This stirring was much to be forsaken and nevertheless Mourning and Sorrow I made therefore without Reason and Discretion but Jesu that in this Vision Informed me of all that me needed answered by this Word and said Sin is * i. e. behoveful behovely but all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well In this naked Word sin our Lord brought to my mind generally all that is not good and the shameful despite and the uttermost Tribulation that he bear for us in this Life and his dying and all his Pains and Passion Bodily and Ghostly and the Pains of all his Creatures Ghostly and Bodily For we be all in part troubled and we shall be troubled following our Master Jesu till we be full purged of our deadly Flesh and of all our inward Affections which be not very good And the beholding of this with all the Pains that ever were or ever shall be And with all this I understood the Passion of Christ for the most Pain and over-passing And all this was shewed in a touch and readily passed over into Comfort for our good Lord would not that the Soul were afraid of this ugly sight but I saw not sin for I be-believe it had no manner of substance ne no part of being ne it might not be known but by the Pain that is caused thereof And this Pain is something as to my sight for a time for it purgeth and maketh us to know our self and ask Mercy for the Passion of our Lord is Comfort to us against all this and so is his blessed Will and for the tender Love that our good Lord hath to all that shall be saved he comforteth readily and sweetly meaning thus It is true that sin is cause of all this Pain but all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well These Words were shewed full tenderly shewing no manner of blame to me ne to none that shall be safe Then were it great unkindness of me to blame or wonder on God of my sin sithen he blameth not me for sin And in these same Words I saw an high marvellous privity hid in God Which privity he shall openly make and shall be known to us in Heaven In which knowing we shall verily see the cause why he suffered sin to come In which sight we shall endlesly have joy The xxxiij Chapter THus I saw how Christ hath Compassion on us for the cause of sin And right as I was before in the Passion of Christ fulfilled with Pain and Compassion like in this I was in party fulfilled with Compassion of all my even Christen for full well he loveth people that shall be saved that is to say Gods Servants Holy Church shall be shaked in Sorrow and Anguish and Tribulation in this World as men shaketh a Cloath in the Wind And as to this our Lord answered shewing on this manner Ah A great thing shall I make hereof in Heaven of endless Worship and of everlasting Joy Ye so far forth I saw that our Lord enjoyeth of the Tribulation of his Servants with Pity and Compassion and to each person that he loveth to his Bliss for to bring he layeth on him something that is no * i e. impediment lack in in his sight whereby they be | i e. humbled lowed and despised in this World scorned and mocked and cast out And this he doth for to * i e. hinder let the harm that they should take of the Pomp and of the Pride and of the vain Glory of this wretched Life and make their way ready to come to Heaven in bliss without end Everlasting For he saith I shall all to break you from your vain Affections and your vicious Pride and after that I shall gather you and make you meek and mild clean and Holy by | i e. uniting oning to me And then saw I that each kind Compassion that man hath on his even Christian with Charity it is Christ in him that each manner naughting that was shewed in his Passion it was shewed again here in this Compassion Wherein were two manner of understandings in our Lords meaning that one was the bliss that we be brought to wherein he will that we * i e. rejoyce enjoy That other is for Comfort in our Pain for he will that we | i e. know wit that all shall turn us to Worship and to profit by the vertue of his Passion And that we wit that we suffered right naught alone but with him and see him our ground And that we see his Pains and his Tribulation pass so far all that we may suffer that it may not be full thought And the well-beholding of this will save us from grudging and dispair in the feeling of our Pains And if we see verily that our sin deserveth it yet his Love excuseth us and of his great courtesse he doth away all our blame and beholdeth us with ruth and pitty as Children Innocents and * i e. unspotted unloathful The xxjx. Chapter BUt in this I stood beholding generally | ie darkly sweinly and mourningly saying thus to our Lord in my meaning with full great dreed Ah good Lord How might all be well for the great harm that is to come by sin to thy Creatures And here I desired as I durst to have some more open declaring wherewith that I might be eased in this And to this our blessed Lord answered full meekly and with full lovely cheir and shewed that Adams sin was the most harm that ever was done or ever shall be into the Worlds end And also he shewed that this is openly known in all Holy Church in Earth Furthermore he learned that I should behold the glorious * i e. satisfaction Asseethe for this Asseeth-making is more pleasing to the blessed God-head and more Worshipful for mans Salvation without Comparison than ever was the sin of Adams harmful Then meaneth our blessed Lord thus and in this Teaching that we should take heed to this For sithen that I have made well by the most harm then it is my will that thou know thereby that I shall make well all that is less The xxx Chapter HE gave understanding of two parties that one party is our Saviour and our Salvation This blessed part is open clear fair and light and plenteous for all Mankind that is of good will and that shall be is comprehended in this part Hereto we be bound of God and drawn and counselled and learned inwardly by the Holy Ghost and outward by
seek God All this that I have now said and more as I shall say hereafter is comforting against sin For in the third shewing when I saw that God doth all that is done I saw not sin and then I saw that all is well but when God shewed me for sin then said he All shall be well The xxxv Chapter ANd when God Almighty had shewed so plenteously and so fully of his Goodness I desired to wit of a certain Creature that I loved if it should continue in good Living which I hoped by the Grace of God was begun And in this singular desire it seemed that I letted my self for I was not taught in this time And then was I answered in my Reason as it were by a friendful mean Take it generally and behold the courtesie of thy Lord God as he shewed to thee for it is more Worship to God to behold him in all than in any special thing I assented and therewith I learned that it is more Worship to God to know all thing in general than to like in any thing in special and if I should do wisely after this Teaching I hold not be glad for any thing in special ne greatly diseased for any manner thing for All shall be well For the full-head of joy is to behold God in all for by the same blessed Might Wisdom and Love that he made all thing to the same end our good Lord leadeth it continually and there to himself shall bring it and when it is time we shall see it And the ground of this was shewed in the first and more openly in the third where it saith I saw God in a Point All that our Lord doth is rightfully and all that he suffereth is Worshipful And in these two is comprehended Good and Evil for all that is Good our Lord doth and that is Evil our Lord suffereth I say not that Evil is Worshipful but I say the sufferance of our Lord God is Worshipful whereby his Goodness shall be known without end and his marvellous Meekness and Mild-head by this working of Mercy and Grace Right | i e Plenitude full-head is that thing that is so good that it may not be better than it is For God himself is very rightful head and all his Works be done rightfully as they be ordained fro without beginning by his high Might his high Wisdom his high Goodness And right as he hath ordained it to the best right so he worketh continually and leadeth it to the same end And he is ever full pleased with himself and with all his Works And the beholding of this blessed Accord is full sweet to the Soul that seeth it by Grace All the Souls that shall be saved in Heaven without end be made rightful in the sight of God and by his own Goodness In which rightfullness we be endlesly kept and marvellously above all Creatures And Mercy is a Working that cometh of the Goodness of God And it shall last working as long as sin is suffered to pursue rightful Souls And when sin hath no longer leave to pursue then shall the Working of Mercy cease And then shall all be brought into rightfulness and therein stand without end By his sufferance we fall and in his blessed Love with his Might and his Wisdom we are kept and by Mercy and Grace we be raised to manifold more Joy And thus in Rightfulness and in Mercy he will be known and Loved now and without end And the Soul that wisely beholdeth in Grace is | i e. wel contented well paid with both and endlesly enjoyeth The xxxvj Chapter OUr Lord God shewed that a deed shall be done and himself shall do it and it shall be Worshipful and marvellous and plentuous and by him it shall be done and himself shall do it And this is the highest joy that the Soul understood that God himself shall do it And I shall do right nought but sin and my sin shall not | i e. hinder let his Goodness Working And I saw that the beholding of this is a Heavenly Joy in a * i e. fearful dreadful Soul which evermore Godly by Grace desireth Gods Will This deed shall by begun here and it shall be Worshipful to God and plentuously profitable to all his Lovers in Earth And ever as we come to Heaven we shall see it in marvellous Joy And it shall last thus in Working to the last Day and the Worship and the Bliss of that shall last in Heaven before God and all his Holy Saints without end Thus was this deed seen and understand in our Lords meaning and the cause why he shewed it is to make us to enjoy in him and in all his Works When I saw the shewing continued I understood it was shewed for a great thing that was then for to come Which thing God shewed that himself should do it Which deed hath the Properties before said And this shewed he full blessedfully meaning that I should take it wistly faithfully and trustfully but what the Deed should be it was kept privy to me And in this I saw he will not we dread to know the things that he sheweth He sheweth them for he will we know them By which knowing he will we Love him and like in him and endlesly enjoy in him And for the great Love that he hath to us he sheweth us all that is Worshipful and Profitable for the time And those things that he will now have privy yet of his great Goodness he shewed them * i e. secretly close In which shewing he will we believe and understand that we should see it verily in his endless Bliss Then ought we to enjoy in him for all that he sheweth and all that he hideth And if we | i e. willingly wilfully and meekly do this we shall find therein great ease and endless thanking we shall have of him therefore And this is the understanding of this Word That it shall be done by me that is to say the general Man that is to say all that shall be safe it shall be Worshipful Marvellous and Plentuous and By me it shall be done and God himself shall do it And this shall be highest Joy that may be beholden of the Deed that God himself shall do it and Man shall do right nought but sin Then meaneth our Lord God thus as if he said Behold and see here hast thou matter of Meekness Here hast thou matter of Love Here hast thou matter of Knowing thy self Here hast thou matter of Enjoying in me And for my Love enjoy in me for of all thing therewith might thou most please mee And as long as we be in this Life what time that we by our Folly turn us to the beholding of the reproved tenderly our Lord toucheth us and blissedfully calleth us saying in our Soul Let me alone my dear worthy Child intend to me I am enough to thee and enjoy in thy Saviour and in thy
thou seekest it How should it then be that thou shouldest not have thy seeking And thus in the first Reason with the three that follow our good Lord sheweth a mighty Comfort as it may be seen in the same Words and in the first Reason there he saith And thou beseek it There he sheweth full great pleasance and endless meed that he will give us for our beseeking And in the sixth Reason there he saith How should it then be This was said for an unpossible thing for it is the most unpossible that may that we should seek Mercy and Grace and not have it For of all thing that our good Lord maketh us to beseek himself he hath ordained it to us from without beginning Here may we then see that our beseeking is not the cause of the Goodness and Grace that he doth to us but his proper Goodness And that shewed he verily in all these sweet Words there he saith I am Ground And our good Lord will that this be known of his Lovers in Earth and the more that we know the more shall we beseech if it be wisely take and so is our Lords meaning Beseeching is a true and gracious lasting will of the Soul owned and fastened into the Will of our Lord by the sweet privy Working of the Holy Ghost Our Lord himself he is the first Receiver of our Prayer as to my sight and he taketh it full thankfully and highly enjoying he sendeth it up above and setteth it in Treasure where it shall never perish It is there before God with all his Holy Saints continually received ever speeding our needs And when we shall undertake our bliss it shall be given us for a degree of Joy with endless Worshipful thanking of him full glad and merry is our Lord of our Prayer and he looketh thereafter and he will have it for with his Grace it maketh us like to himself in condition as we be in kind and so is his blessed Will For he saith thus Pray intirely inwardly though thee think it savour thee not yet it is profitable enough though thou feel it nought Pray intirely inwardly though thou feel nought though thou see nought yea though thou think thou might not for in Dryness and Barrenness in Sickness and in Feebleness then is thy Prayer full pleasant to mee though thou think at savor thee not but litle and so is all thy Living Prayer in my sight For the meed and the endless thank that he will give us therefore he is covetuous to have us Praying continually in his sight God accepteth the good Will and the Travel of his Servants howsoever we feel Wherefore it pleaseth him that we work in Prayer and in good Living by his Help and his Grace reasonably with Discretion keeping our Mights to him till when we have him that we seek in fulhead of joy that is Jesu And that shewed he in the xvth Revelation where he saith Thou shalt have me to thy meed Also to Prayer longeth thanking Thanking is a true inward knowing with great Reverence and lovely Dreed turning our self with all our Mights into the Working that our Lord stirred us to enjoying and thanking inwardly and sometime for plentuousness it breaketh out with Voyce and saith Good Lord grant Mercy Blessed mote thou be And sometime when the Earth is dry and feeleth naught or else by Temptation of our Enemy then it is driven by Reason and by Grace to cry upon our Lord with Voyce rehearsing his blessed Passion and his great Goodness And so the vertue of our Lords Word turneth into the Soul and quickeneth the heart and entreth by his Grace into true Working and maketh it to Pray full blessed fully and truly to enjoy in our Lord is a full lovely thanking in his sight The xlij Chapter OUr Lord will that we have true understanding and namely in three things that longeth to our Prayer The first is by whom and how that our Prayer Springeth by whom he sheweth when he saith I am Ground and how by his Goodness For he saith First it is my Will For the second in what manner and how that we should use our Prayers and that is that our Will be turned into the Will of our Lord enjoying And so he meaneth when he saith I make thee to will it For the third that we know the Fruit and end of our Prayer that is to be oned and like to our Lord in all thing and to this meaning and for this end was all this lovely Lesson shewed And he will help us and he shall make it so as he seeth himself blessed mote he be For this is our Lords Will that our Prayer and our trust be both alike large for if we trust not as * much mickle as we Pray we do not full Worship to our Lord in our Prayer And also we tarry and Pain our self and the cause is as I believe for we know not truly that our Lord is Ground in whom that our Prayer springeth And also that we know not that it is given us by Grace of his Love for if we knew this it would make us to trust to have of our Lords gift all that we desire for I am sure that no man asketh Mercy and Grace with true meaning but if Mercy and Grace be first given to him But sometime it cometh to our mind that we have prayed long time and yet it thinketh us that we have not our asking but herefore should we not be heavy for I am sure by our Lords meaning that either we abide a better time or more Grace or a better Gift He will that we have true knowing in himself that he is being And in this knowing he will that our understanding be grounded with all our Mights and all our Intents and all our Meanings And in this Ground he will that we take our * i e. resting place steeds and our dwelling And by the gracious Light of himself he will that we have understanding of three things that follow The first is our Noble and Excellent making The second our precious and dear worthy * i e redemption again being The third all thing that he hath made beneath us to serve us and for our Love keepeth it Then meaneth he thus as if he said Behold and see that I have done all this before thy Prayer and now thou art and prayest me And thus he meaneth that it longeth to us to wit that the greatest Deeds be done as Holy Church teacheth And in the beholding of this with thanking we owe to Pray for the Deed that is now in doing and that is that he rule us and guide us to his Worship in this Life and bring us to his Bliss and therefore he hath done all Then meaneth he thus that we see that he doth it and we pray therefore for that one is not enough for if we pray and see not that he doth it it maketh us heavy and doubtful and that
clearness of Truth and Wisdom maketh him to see and to know that he is made for Love in which Love God endlesly keepeth him The xlv Chapter GOD deemeth us upon our kindly substance which is ever kept one in him whole and safe without end And this Doome is of his rightful-head And man deemeth upon our Changeable sensuality which seemeth now one now another | i e. according as after that it taketh of the parties and shewed outward And this Doome is * i e. mingled or twofold meddled for sometimes it is good and easie and sometime it is hard and grievous And in as much as it is good and easie it longeth to the rightfulness and in as much as it is hard and grievous our good Lord Jesu reformeth it by Mercy and Grace through vertue of his blessed Passion and so bringeth into the rightfulness And though these two be thus accorded and oned yet it shall be known both in Heaven without end The first Doome which is of Gods rightfulness and that is of his own high endless Love and that is that fair sweet Doome that was shewed in all the fair Revelation in which I saw him assigne to us no manner of blame And though these were sweet and delectable yet only in the beholding of this I could not be full eased And that was for the Doome of Holy Church which I had before understanding and was continually in my sight And therefore by this Doome methought that me behooveth needs to know my self a sinner And by the same Doome I understood that sinners be sometimes worthy blame and Wrath and these two could I not see in God And therefore my advise and desire was more than I can or may tell for the higher Doome God sheweth himself in the same time And therefore me behooved needs to take it And the lower Doome was learned me before time in Holy Church and therefore I might not by no way leave the lower Doome Then was this my desire that I might see in God in what manner that the Doome of Holy Church here in Earth is true in his sight and how it longeth to me verily to know it whereby they might both be saved so as it were Worshipful to God and right way to me And to all this I ne had no other answer but a marvellous Example of a Lord and of a Servant as I shall say after and that full mistely shewed And yet I stood in Desire and Will into my lives end that I might by Grace know these two Dooms as it longeth to me For all Heavenly things and all Earthly things that long to Heaven be comprehended in these two Dooms And the more knowing and understanding by the gracious leading of the Holy Ghost that we have of these two Dooms the more we shall see and know our feelings and Workings of Grace and ever the more that we see them the more kindly by Grace we shall long to be fulfilled of endless Joy and Bliss for we be made thereto And our kindly substance is now blessedfully in God and hath been sithens it was made and shall be without end The xlvj Chapter BUt our passing living that we have here in our sensuality knoweth not what our self is but in our Faith And when we know and see verily and clearly what our self is then shall we verily and clearly see and know our Lord God in fulhead of joy And therefore it behoveth needs to be that the nearer we be our bliss the more we shall long and that both by Kind and by Grace We may have knowing of our self in this Life by continual help and vertue of our high kind in which knowing we may encrease and wax by furthering and speeding of Mercy and Grace But we may never full know our self into the last point In which Point this passing Life and all manner of Woe and Paine shall have an end And therefore it longeth properly to us both by Grace and by Kind to long and desire with all our Mights to know our self In which full knowing we shall verily and clearly know our God in fulhead of endless joy And yet in all this time fro the beginning to the end I had two manner of beholdings The one was endless continuant Love with sureness of keeping and blissful Salvation for of this was all the shewing That other was the common teaching of Holy Church of which I was before enformed and grounded and wilfully having in use and understanding And the beholding of this came not from me for by the shewing I was not stirred nor led therefro in no manner Point But I had therein teaching to love it and like it whereby I might with the help of our Lord and his Grace increase and rise to more Heavenly knowing and higher loving And thus in all this beholding methought it behoved needs to see and to know that we be sinners and do many Evils that we ought to leave and leave many good Deeds undone that we ought to do Wherefore we deserve pain blame and Wrath. And notwithstanding all this I saw verily that our Lord was never Wrath ne never shall For he is God he is Good he is Truth he is Love and he is Peace and his Might his Wisdom his Charity and his Unity suffereth him not to be Wrath For I saw truly that it is against the property of his Might to be Wrath and against the property of his Wisdom and against the property of his Goodness God is that Goodness that may not be Wrath for God is not but Goodness Our Soul is oned to him unchangeable Goodness And between God and our Soul is neither Wrath nor Forgiveness in his sight for our Soul is so | i e. fully fulsomely oned to God of his own Goodness that between God and our Soul may be right naught And to this understanding was the Soul led by Love and drawn by Might in every shewing That it is thus our good Lord shewed and how it is thus verily of his great Goodness and that he will we desire to wit that is to say as it longeth to his Creatures to wit it for all thing that the simple Soul understood God will that it be shewed and known for those things that he will have privy mightily and wisely himself hideth them for Love for I saw in the same shewing that much privity is hid which may never be known into the time that God of his Goodness hath made us worthy to see it And therewith I am well | i e. content apaid abiding our Lords Will in this high marvel And now I yield me to our Mother Holy Church as a simple Child oweth The xlvij Chapter TWo Points belonging to our Soul are debt One is that we Reverently marvel That ‑ i. e. duties other is that we meekly suffer every enjoying in God for he will that we know that we shall in short time see clearly in himself all
that we desire And notwithstanding all this I beheld and marvelled greatly what is the Mercy and Forgiveness of God For by the Teaching that I had before I understood that the Mercy of God shall be Forgiveness of his Wrath after the time that we have sinned For methought that to a Soul whose meaning and desire is to Love that the Wrath of God were harder than any other Pain And therefore I took that the Forgiveness of his Wrath should be one of the principal Points of his Mercy But for ought that I might behold and desire I could not see this Point in all the shewing But how I saw and understood of the Working of Mercy I shall say some deal as God will give me Grace I understood thus Man is changeable in this Life and by simpleness and uncunning falleth into sin He is unmighty and unwise of himself and also his Will is over-laid In this time he is in Tempest and in Sorrow and in Woe And the cause is blindness for he seeth not God for if he saw God continually he should have no mischievous feeling ne no manner stirring nor sorrowing that serveth to sin Thus saw I and felt in the same time and methought that the sight and the feeling was high and plentuous and gracious in regard that our common feeling is in this Life but yet methought it was but low and small in regard of the great desire that the Soul hath to see God For I felt in me five manner of workings which be these Enjoying Mourning Desire Dreed and true Hope Enjoying for God gave me understanding and knowing that it was himself that I saw Mourning and that was for feeling desire that was that I might see him for ever more and more understanding and knowing that we shall never have full rest till we see him clearly and verily in Heaven Dreed was for it seemed to me in all that time that sight should fail and I to be left to my self True hope was in the endless Love that I saw that I should be kept by his Mercy and brought to the bliss And the joying in his sight with this true Hope of his merciful keeping made me to have Feeling and Comfort So that Mourning and dreed were not greatly painful And yet in all this I beheld in the shewing of God that this manner sight of him may not be continuant in this Life and that for his own Worship and for increase of our endless joy And therefore we fail oftentimes of the sight of him And anon we fall into our self and then find we feeling of right naught but the contrarious that is in our self And that of the old Root of our first sin with all that followeth of our own continuance And in this we be travelled and tempted with feeling of sin and of pain in many diverse manner Ghostly and Bodily as it is known to us in this Life The xlviij Chapter BUt our good Lord the Holy Ghost which is endless Life dwelling in our Soul full truly keepeth us and worketh therein a Peace and bringeth it to ease by Grace and maketh it | i e. complyant buxom and accordeth it to God And this is the Mercy and the Way that our good Lord continually leadeth us in as long as we be in this Life which is changeable For I saw no Wrath but on mans party and that forgiveth he in us For Wrath is not else but a frowardness and a contrariousness to Peace and Love And either it cometh of feeling of Might or of feeling of Wisdom or of feeling of Goodness which feeling is not of God but it is in our party for we by sin and wretchedness have in us a Wrath and a continuant contrariousness to Peace and to Love And that shewed he full oft in his lovely Chear of ruth and pity For the ground of Mercy is in Love and the working of Mercy is our keeping in Love And this was shewed in such a manner that I could not perceive of the property of Mercy otherwise but as it were all Love in Love that is to say as to my sight Mercy is a sweet gracious working in Love * ie mingled medled with plenteous pitty for Mercy worketh us keeping and Mercy worketh turning to us all thing to good Mercy for Love suffereth us to fail by measure and in as much as we fail in so much we fall and in as much as we fall in so much we die For us behooveth needs to die in as much as we fail sight and feeling of God that is our life Our failing is dreadful our falling is shameful and our dying is sorrowful But yet in all this the sweet eye of pity and love departeth never from us ne the working of Mercy ceaseth not For I beheld the property of Mercy and I beheld the property of Grace which have two manner of Working in one Love Mercy is a pitiful property which longeth to Mother-hood in tender Love And Grace is a Worshipful property which longeth to Royal Lordship in the same Love Mercy worketh keeping suffering quickening and healing and all is of tenderness of Love And Grace worketh with Mercy raising rewarding endlesly over-passing that our Loving and our Travel deserveth spreading abroad and shewing the high plenteousness largeness of Gods Royal Lordship in his marvellous courtesie And this is of the abundance of Love for Grace worketh our dreadful failing into plenteous and endless solace And Grace worketh our shameful falling into high Worshipful rising and Grace worketh our sorrowful dying into Holy blissful Life For I saw full truly that ever as our contrariousness worketh to us here in Earth pain shame and sorrow Right so on the contrariwise Grace worketh to us in Heaven Solace Worship and Bliss and over-passing so far forth that when we come up and receive that sweet Reward which Grace hath wrought to us there we shall thank and bless our Lord endlesly enjoying that ever we suffered Woe and that shall be for a property of blessed Love that we shall know in God which we might never have known without Woe going before And when I saw all this me behooved needs to grant that the Mercy of God and the Forgiveness slacketh and wasteth our Wrath. The xljx Chapter FOr it was an high marvel to the Soul which was continuantly shewed in all and with great diligence beholding that our Lord God aneynst himself may not forgive for he may not be Wrath. It were unpossible for this was shewed that our Life is all grounded and rooted in Love and without Love we may not live And therefore to the Soul that of his special Grace seeth so far forth of the high marvellous goodness of God that we be endlesly oned to him in Love It is the most unpossible that may be that God should be Wrath for Wrath and Friendship be two Contraries for he that wasteth and destroyeth our Wrath and maketh us meek and mild it
behooveth us needs to believe that he be ever in one Love meek and mild Which is contrary to Wrath for I saw full truly that where our Lord appeareth Peace is taken and Wrath hath no * i e place steede For I saw no manner of Wrath in God neither for short time nor for long for truly as so my sight if God might be Wrath a while we should neither have Life ne steede ne being for as verily as we have our being of the endless Might of God and of the endless Wisdom and of the endless Goodness Also verily we have our keeping in the endless Might of God in the endless Wisdom and in the endless Goodness For though we feel in us Wrath Debate and Strife yet we be all mercifully beclosed in the midhead of God and in his meekhead in his benignity and in his * i e. kindness buxomness For I saw full truly that all our endless Friendship our steed our life and our being is in God for that same endless Goodness that keepeth us when we sin that we perish not That same endless Goodness continually treateth in us a Peace against our Wrath and our contrarious falling and maketh us to see our need with a true dread mightily to seek unto God to have Forgiveness with a gracious desire of our Salvation for we may not be blissfully saved till we be verily in Peace and in Love for that is our Salvation And though we be Wrath and the contrariousness that is in us be now in Tribulation Disease and Woe as falling into our blindness and our pronity Yet be we sure and safe by the merciful keeping of God that we perish not but we be not blissfully safe in having of our endless joy till we be all in Peace and in Love that is to say full pleased with God and with all his Works and with all his Dooms and loving and pleasable with our selves and with our even Christen and with all that God loveth as love liketh And this doth Gods Goodness in us Thus saw I that God is our very Peace and he is our sure Keeper when we be our self at unpeace and he continually worketh to bring us into endless Peace And thus when by the working of mercy and grace we be made meek and mild than we be full safe Suddenly is the Soul oned to God when she is truly peaced in her self for in him is found no Wrath. And thus I saw when we be all in Peace and in Love we find no contrariousness in no manner of letting And that contrariousness which is now in us our Lord God of his goodness maketh it to us full profitable For contrariousness is cause of all our Tribulation and all our Woe And our Lord Jesu taketh them and sendeth them up to Heaven and then they are made more sweet and delectable than Heart may think or Tongue can tell And when we come thither we shall find them ready all turned into very fairness and endless Worship Thus is God our stedfast ground and shall be our full bliss and make us unchangeable as he is when we be there The L. Chapter ANd in this deadly Life Mercy and Forgiveness is our way that evermore leadeth us to grace And by the tempest and the sorrow that we fall in on our party we be often dead as to mans Doome in Earth but in the sight of God the Soul that shall be safe was never dead ne never shall be But yet here I wondred and marvelled with all the diligence of my Soul meaning thus Good Lord I see that thou art the very Truth and I know truly that we sin grievously all day and be much blame-worthy And I may neither leave the knowing of this | i e. truth sooth nor I see not the shewing to us no manner of blame How may this be For I know by the common teaching of Holy Church and by mine own feeling that the blame of our sins continually hangeth upon us fro the first man into the time that we come up into Heaven Then was this my marvel that I saw our Lord God shewing to us no more blame than if we were as clean and as holy as Angels be in Heaven And between these two contraries my Reason was greatly travelled by my blindness and could have no rest for dread that his blessed Presence should pass from my sight and I to be left in unknowing how he behold us in our sin for either me behooved to see in God that sin were all done away or else me behooved to see in God how he seeth it whereby I might truly know how it longeth to mee to see sin and the manner of our blame My longing endured him continually beholding and yet I could have no patience for great fear and perplexity thinking if I take it thus that we be no sinners nor no blame worthy it seemeth as I should Erre and fail of knowing of this sooth And if it be true that we be sinners and blame worthy good Lord how may it then be that I cannot see this truth in thee which art my God my Maker in whom I desire to see all truth For three Points make me hardy to ask it The first is for it is so low a thing for if it were an high I should be | i e. fear adred The second is that it is so common for if it were special and privy also I should be adred The third is that it needeth me to wit as me thinketh if I shall live here for knowing of Good and Evil whereby I may by reason and by grace the more depart them asunder and love Goodness and hate Evil as Holy Church teacheth I cried inwardly with all my Might seeking unto God for help meaning thus Ah Lord Jesu King of Bliss How shall I be eased Who shall tell me and teach me that me needeth to wit if I may not at this time see it in thee The lj Chapter ANd then our courteous Lord answered in shewing full | i e. darkly mistely by a wonderful Example of a Lord that hath a Servant and gave me sight to my understanding of both which sight was shewed double in the Lord and the sight was shewed double in the Servant That one party was shewed Ghostly in bodily likeness That other party was shewed more Ghostly without bodily likeness For the first thus I saw two Persons in bodily likeness that is to say a Lord and a Servant And therewith God gave me Ghostly understanding The Lord sitteth solemnly in rest and in peace the Servant standeth before his Lord reverently ready to do his Lords Will The Lord looketh upon his Servant full lovely and sweetly and meekly he sendeth him into a certain place to do his Will The Servant not only he goeth but suddenly he starteth and runneth in great haste for Love to do his Lords Will. And anon he falleth in a * i e. precipice
of endless cleanness wide and side fairer and richer than was the cloathing which I saw on the Father for that cloathing was blew And Christs cloathing is now of fair seemly | i e. mixture medelour which is so marvellous that I can it no descrie for it is all of very Worship Now sitteth not the Lord on Earth in Wilderness but he sitteth on his rich and noble Seat which he made in Heaven most to his liking Now standeth not the Son before the Father as a Servant before the Lord dreadfully cloathed in party naked but he standeth before the Father even right richly cloathed in blissful largeness with a Crown upon his head of precious richness For it was shewed that we be his Crown Which Crown is the Fathers joy the Sons Worship the Holy Ghosts liking And endless marvellous bliss to all that be in Heaven Now standeth not the Son before the Father on the left side as a Labourer but he sitteth on the Fathers right hand in endless rest and peace But it is not meant that the Son sitteth on the right hand beside as one man sitteth by another in this Life For there is no such sitting as to my sight in the Trinity but he sitteth on his Fathers right hand that is to say right in the highest nobility of the Fathers joy Now is the Spouse Gods Son in peace with his loved Wife Which is the fair Maiden of endless joy Now sitteth the Son very God and very Man in his City in rest and in peace which his Father hath dight to him of endless purpose And the Father in the Son And the Holy Ghost in the Father and in the Son The Lij Chapter ANd thus I saw that God | i e. rejoyce enjoyeth that he is our Father and God enjoyeth that he is our Mother And God enjoyeth that he is our very Spouse and our Soul his loved Wife And Christ enjoyeth that he is our Brother And Jesu enjoyeth that he is our Saviour These be five high joyes as I understand in which he will that we enjoy him praising him thanking him loving him endlesly blessing all that shall be saved for the time of this Life we have in us a marvellous | i e. mixture medelour both of weal and of woe We have in us our Lord Jesu Christ up-risen and we have in us the wretchedness and the mischief of Adams falling dying By Christ we be lastingly kept and by his gracious touching we be raised into very trust of Salvation And by Adams falling we be so briken in our feeling on diverse manners by sin and by sundry pains In which we be made dark and so blind that unneths we can take any Comfort But in our meaning we abide God and faithfully trust to have Mercy and Grace And this is his own working in us and of his Goodness openeth the eye of our understanding by which we have sight some time more and sometime less | i e. according as after that God giveth ability to take And now we be raised into that one and now we are suffered to fall into that other And thus is that medle so marvellous in us that unneths we know of our self or of our even Christen in what way we stand for the marvellousness of this sundry feeling But that each holy assent that we assent to God when we feel him truly willing to be with him with all our heart with all our Soul and with all our might And then we hate and despise our evil stirring and all that might be occasion of sin Ghostly and Bodily And yet nevertheless when this sweetness is hid we fall again into blindness and so into Woe and Tribulation on diverse manners But then is this our comfort that we know in our Faith that by the vertue of Christ which is our Keeper we assent never thereto But we grudge there against and endure in pain and in woe praying into that time that he shewed him again to us And thus we stand in this medelour all the dayes of our Life But he will we trust that he is lastingly with us and that in three manners He is with us Heaven very man in his own person us up-drawing And that was shewed in the Ghostly thirst And he is with us in Earth us leading and that was shewed in the third where I saw God in a point And he is with us in our Soul endlesly | ie dwelling wonning ruling and guiding us And that was shewed in the xvjth as I shall say And thus in the Servant was shewed the blindness and the mischief of Adams falling And in the Servant was shewed the Wisdom and the Goodness of Gods Son And in the Lord was shewed the rewth and the pity of Adams Woe And in the Lord was shewed the high nobility and endless Worship that mankind is come to by the vertue of the Passion and the Death of his dear worthy Son And therefore mightily he enjoyeth in his falling for the high raising and fulhead of bliss that mankind is come to over-passing that we should have had if he had not fallen And thus to see this over-passing nobility was my understanding led into God in the same time that I saw the Servant fall And thus we have matter of mourning for our sin is cause of Christs pains and we have lastingly matter of joy for endless Love made him to suffer And therefore the Creature that seeth and feeleth the working of Love by Grace hateth nought but sin for of all thing as to my sight Love and Hate be hardest and most unmeasurable contraries And notwithstanding all this I saw and understood this in our Lords meaning that we | i e. can may not in this Life keep us from sin all holy in full cleanness as we shall be in Heaven But we may well by Grace keep us fro the sins which would lead us to endless pain as Holy Church teacheth us and eschew Venial reasonably * i e. according to up our might And if we by our blindness and our wretchedness any time fall that we readily rise knowing the sweet touching of Grace and wilfully amend us upon teaching of Holy Church after that the sin is grievous and go forth with God in Love And neither on that one side fall over low enclining to despair ne on that other side be over richless as we | i e. cared not give no force But meekly know our feebleness witting that we may not stand the twinkling of an eye but with keeping of Grace and reverently cleave to God in him only trusting For otherwise is the beholding of God and otherwise is the beholding of Man For it longeth to man meekly to accuse himself and it longeth to the proper Goodness of our Lord God courteously to excuse man And these be two parties that were shewed in the double chear in which the Lord beheld the falling of his loved Servant That
God in substance Of which substance by God we be that we be And I saw no difference between God and our substance but as it were all God And yet my understanding took that our substance is in God that is to say that God is God and our substance is a Creature in God For the almighty Truth of the Trinity is our Father For he made us and keepeth us in him And the deep Wisdom of the Trinity is our Mother in whom we be closed And the high Goodness of the Trinity is our Lord and in him we be closed and he in us We be closed in the Father and we be closed in the Son and we be closed in the Holy Ghost And the Father is beclosed in us the Son is beclosed in us and the Holy Ghost is beclosed in us All Might all Wisdom and all Goodness one God one Lord. And our Faith is a vertue that cometh of our kind substance into our sensual Soul by the Holy Ghost In which vertue all our vertues come into us for without that no man may receive vertues for it is naught else but a right understanding with true belief and sure trust of our being that we be in God and he in us which we see not And this vertue with all others that God hath ordained to us coming therein worketh in us great things for Christ mercifully is working in us And we graciously according to him through the gift and the vertue of the Holy Ghost This working maketh that we be Christs Children and Christen in Lyving The lv Chapter ANd thus Christ is our way us surely leading in his Laws And Christ in his body mightily beareth as up into Heaven For I saw that Christ us all having in him that shall be saved by him Worshipfully presenteth his Father in Heaven with us which present full thankfully his Father receiveth and courteously giveth it unto his Son Jesu Christ Which Gift and Working is joy to the Father and bliss to the Son and liking to the Holy Ghost And of all thing that to us longeth it is most liking to our Lord that we enjoy in this joy which is in the blessed Trinity of our Salvation And this was seen in the Ninth Shewing where it speaketh more of this matter And notwithstanding all our feeling woe or weal God will we understand and believe that we we more verily in Heaven than in Earth Our Faith cometh of the kind Love of our Soul and of the clear light of our Reason and of the stedfast mind which we have of God in our first making And what time our Soul is inspired in our body in which we be made sensual assoon Mercy and Grace begin to work having of us cure and keeping with pity and love In which Working the the Holy Ghost formeth in our Faith hope that we shall come again up above to our substance into the vertue of Christ encreased and fulfilled through the Holy Ghost Thus I understood that the sensuality is grounded in kind in Mercy and in Grace Which ground ableth us to receive Gifts that lead us to endless Life for I saw full surely that our substance is in God And also I saw that in our sensuality God is for in the same point that our Soul is made sensual in the same point is the City of God ordained to him from without beginning In which City he cometh and never shall remove it For God is never out of the Soul in which he shall dwell blessedly without end And this was said in the xvjth shewing where it saith The place that Jesu taketh in our Soul he shall never remove it And all the Gifts that God may give to the Creature he hath given to his Son Jesu for us Which Gifts he * ie dwelling wonning in us hath beclosed in him into the time that we be waxen and grown our Soul with our Body and our Body with our Soul either of them take help of other till we be brought up into stature as kind worketh And then in the ground of kind with working of Mercy the Holy Ghost graciously enspireth into us Gifts leading to endless Life And thus was my understanding led of God to see in him and to wit to understand and to know that our Soul is a made Trinity like to the unmade blessed Trinity known and loved from without beginning and in the making oned to the Maker as it is before said This sight was full sweet and marvellous to behold peaceable and restful sure and delectable And for the worshipful oning that was thus made of God between the Soul and the Body it behooved needs to be that mankind should be restored fro double death Which restoring might never be into the time that the second Person in the Trinity had taken the lower party of mankind to whom that highest was oned in the first making And these two parties were in Christ the higher and the lower which is but one Soul The higher party was ever in peace with God in full joy and bliss The lower party which is sensuality suffered for the Salvation of mankind And these two parties were seen and felt in the viijth Shewing in which my body was fulfilled of feeling and mind of Christs Passion and his dying And furthermore with this was a subtile feeling and a privy inward sight of the high parts And that was shewed in the same time where I might not for the mean profer look up into Heaven And that was for that each mighty beholding of the inward Life Which inward Life is that high substance that precious Soul which is endless enjoying in the God-head The lvj Chapter ANd thus I saw full surely that it is ready to us and more easie to come to the knowing of God than to know our own Soul For our Soul is so deep grounded in God and so endlesly treasured that we may not come to the knowing thereof till we have first knowing of God which is the Maker to whom it is oned But notwithstanding I saw that we have kindly of fulhead to desire wisely and truly to know our own Soul whereby we be learned to seek it * i e. where there it is and that is into God And thus by the gracious leading of the Holy Ghost we shall know him both in one Whether we be stirred to know God or our Soul it is both good and true God is more nearer to us than our own Soul for he is ground in whom our Soul standeth and he is mean that keepeth the substance and the sensuality together so that it shall never depart For our Soul sitteth in God in very rest and our Soul standeth in God in sure strength And our Soul is kindly rooted in God in endless Love And therefore if we will have knowing of our Soul and commoning and daliance therewith it behooveth to seek into our Lord God in whom it is inclosed And of this enclosing I saw
blessedful Trinity which is everlasting being right as he is endless from without beginning right so it was in his purpose endless to make mankind Which fair kind first was dight to his own Son the second Person and when he would by full accord of all the Trinity he made us all at ones And in our making he knit us and oned us to himself By which oning we be kept as clean and as noble as we were made by the vertue of that each precious oning we love our Maker and like him praise him and thank him and endlesly enjoy in him And this is the working which is wrought continually in each Soul that shall be saved which is the godly Will before said And thus in our making God Almighty is our kindly Father And God all Wisdom is our kindly Mother with the Love and the Goodness of the Holy Ghost which is all one God one Lord. And in the knitting and in the oning he is our very true Spouse and we his loved Wife and his fair Maiden with which Wife he was never displeased for he saith I love thee and thou lovest me and our love shall never part in two I beheld the working of all the blessed Trinity In which beholding I saw and understood these three properties the property of the Father-head and the property of the Mother-head and the property of the Lordship in one God In our Father Almighty we have our keeping and our bliss And aneynst our kindly substance which is to us by our making fro without beginning And in the second Person in Wit and Wisdom we have our keeping And aneynst our sensuality our restoring and our saving for he is our Mother Brother and Saviour And in our good Lord the Holy Ghost we have our rewarding and our yielding for our living and our travel and endlesly over-passing all that we desire in his marvellous courtesie of his high plentuous Grace for all our Life is in three In the first our being And in the second we have our encreasing And in the third we have our fulfilling The first is kind the second is Mercy the third is Grace For the first I saw and understood that the high might of the Trinity is our Father and the deep Wisdom of the Trinity is our Mother and the great Love of the Trinity is our Lord. And all these have we in kind and in our substantial making And furthermore I saw that the second Person which is our Mother substancially the same deer worthy Person is now become our Mother sensual for we be double of Gods making that is to say substancial and sensual Our substance is the higher party which we have in our Father God Almighty And the second Person of the Trinity is our Mother in kind in our substancial making in whom we be grounded and rooted And he is our Mother of Mercy in our sensuality taking And thus our Mother is to us diverse manner working in whom our parts be kept undeparted For in our Mother Christ we profit and encrease and in Mercy he reformeth us and restoreth And by the vertue of his Passion his Death and his Uprising oned us to our substance This worketh our Mother in mercy to all his beloved Children which be to him buxom and obedient And grace worketh with mercy and namely in two properties as it was shewed Which working longeth to the third Person the Holy Ghost he worketh rewarding and giving Rewarding is a gift of trust that the Lord doth to them that hath traveled And giving is a courteous Working which he doth freely of grace fulfilling and over-passing all that is deserved of Creatures Thus in our Father God Almighty we have our being And in our Mother of mercy Jesu Christ we have our reforming and our restoring in whom our parts be oned and all made perfect man And by yielding and giving in grace of the Holy Ghost we be fulfilled and our substance is in our Father God Almighty And our substance is in our Mother God all Wisdom And our substance is in our Lord God the Holy Ghost all goodness for our substance is whole in each person of the Trinity which is one God And our sensuality is only in the second Person Christ Jesu in whom is the Father and the Holy Ghost And in him and by him we be mightily taken out of Hell and out of the wretchedness in Earth and worshipfully brought up into Heaven and blessedfully oned to our substance encreased in Riches and Nobly by all the vertue of Christ and by the grace and working of the Holy Ghost The Ljx. Chapter ANd all this bliss we have by mercy and grace Which manner bliss we might never have had and known but if that property and goodness which is in God had been contraried whereby we have this bliss For wickedness hath been suffered to rise contrary to that goodness and the goodness of mercy and grace contraried against that wickedness and turned all to goodness and worship to all that shall be saved For it is that property in God which doth good against evil Thus Jesu Christ that doth good against evil is our very Mother We have our being of him where the ground of Mother-head beginneth with all the sweet keeping of Love that endlesly followeth As verily as God is our Father as verily is God our Mother and that shewed he in all and namely in these sweet words there he saith I it am that is to say I it am the Might and the Goodness of the Father-head I it am the Wisdom and the Kindness of the Mother-head I it am the Light and the Grace that is all blessed Love I it am the Trinity I it am the Vnity I it am the high Sovereign Goodness of all manner thing I it am that maketh thee to long I it am the endless fulfilling of all true desires For there the Soul is highest noblest and worshipfullest yet it is lowest meekest and mildest And of this substancioal ground we have all our Vertues in our sensuality by gift of kind and by helping and speeding of mercy and grace without which we may not profit Our high Father Almighty God which is being he knoweth us and loved us fro before any time Of which knowing in his full marvellous deep Charity by the fore-seeing endless counsel of all the blessed Trinity he would that the second Person should become our Mother our Brother and our Saviour Whereof it followeth that as verily as God is our Father verily God is our Mother Our Father willeth our Mother worketh Our good Lord the Holy Ghost confirmeth and therefore it longeth to us to love our God in whom we have our being him reverently thanking and praising of our making mightily praying to our Mother of mercy and pity and to our Lord the Holy Ghost of help and grace for in these three is all our Life Kind Mercy and grace Whereof we have mild-head patience and pity and hating of
we may take them And also he will that we take our abidings and our diseases as lightly as we may take them and set them at naught For the lightlier that we take them and the less price that we set at them for love less pain shall we have in the feeling of them and the more thank and meed shall we have for them The Lxv. Chapter ANd thus I understood that what man or woman wilfully choseth God in this Life for Love he may be sure that he is loved without end with endless Love that worketh in him that grace for he will we keep this trustily that we be as sicker in hope of the bliss of Heaven whiles we are here as we shall be in surety when we are there And ever the more liking and joy that we take in this sickerness with reverence and meekness the better liketh him For as it was shewed this reverence that I mean is a holy courteous dread of our Lord to which meekness is knit and that is that a creature see the Lord marvellous great and her self marvellous litle For these vertues are had endlesly to the Loved of God And it may now be seen and felt in measure by the gracious presence of our Lord when it is Which presence in all thing is most desired for it worketh that marvellous sickerness in true Faith and siker hope by greatness of Charity in dread that is sweet and delectable It is Gods will that I see my self as much bound to him in Love as if he had done for me all that he hath done And thus should every Soul think in regard of his Love that is to say the Charity of God maketh in us such a unity that when it is truly seen no man can part them self from other And thus ought each Soul to think that God hath done for him all that he hath done And this sheweth he to make us to love him and liken him and nothing dread but him for it is his will we know that all the might of our enemies is locked in our Friends hands And therefore the Soul that knoweth this sickerly he shall not dread but him that she loveth All other dreads she set them among passions and bodily sickness and imaginations And therefore though we been in so much pain woe and disease that us thinketh we can think right naught but that we are in or that we feel assoon as we may we pass it lightly over and set we it at naught And why for God will be known for if we know him and Love him and reverently dread him we shall have patience and be in great rest And it should been great liking to us all that he doth And this shewed our Lord in these words What should it then agrieve thee to suffer a while seeing it is my Will and my Worship Now have I told you of xv Shewings as God witsafe to minister them to my mind renewed by Lightnings and Touchings I hope of the same Spirit that sheweth them all Of which xv Shewings the first began early in the morning about the hour of four and it lasted shewing by process full fair and soberly each following other till it was noon of the day or past The Sixteenth Revelation The Lxvj. Chapter ANd after this the good Lord shewed the xvjth Revelation on the night following as I shall say after Which xvjth was conclusion and confirmation to all the xv But first me behooveth to tell you as anenst my feebleness wretchedness and blindness I have said at the beginning where it saith And in this suddenly all my pain was taken from me Of which pain I had no grief ne no disease as long as the xv Shewings lasted in shewing And at the end all was close and I saw no more and soon I felt that I should live longer And anon my sickness came again first in my head with a sound and a noise And suddenly all my body was fulfilled with sickness like as it was before And I was as barren and as dry as I had never had comfort but litle and as a wretch mourned heavily for feeling of my bodily pains and for faulting of comfort Ghostly and Bodily Then came a Religious person unto me and asked me how I fared and I said I had raved to day and he laught lowd and inwardly And I said The Cross that stood before my face methought it bled fast And with this word the Person that I spake to waxed all sad and marvelled And anon I was sore ashamed and astonished for my retchlesness And I thought this man taketh sadly the least word that I may say that saw no more thereof And when I saw that he took it so sadly and with so great reverence I waxed full greatly ashamed and would have been * i e. confessed and absolved shriven but I could tell it to no Priest for I thought How should a Priest believe me when I by saying I raved I shewed my self not to believe our Lord God Notwithstanding I believed him truly for the time that I saw him And so was then my will and my meaning ever for to doe without end But as a Fool I let it pass out of my mind Ah Loe how wretched I was this was a great sin and a great unkindness that I for folly of feeling of a litle bodily pain so unwisely left for the time the comfort of all this blessed shewing of our Lord God Here may you see what I am of my self But herein would our courteous Lord not leave me And I lay still till night trusting in his mercy and then I began to sleep The Lxvij. Chapter ANd in my sleep at the beginning methought the fiend set him in my throat putting forth a visage full near my face like a young man And it was long and wonder lean I saw never none such The colour was red like the Tile stone when it is new brent with black spots therein like frackles fouler than the Tile-stone his hair was red as rust not scoured afore with side Locks hanging down in flakes he grinned upon me with a shrowd look and shewed me white teeth And so | i e. much my kill me thought it the more ugly body ne hands had he none shapely but with his paws he held me in the throat and would have stopped my breath and kild me but he might not This ugly shewing was made sleeping and so was none other And in all this time I trusted to be saved and kept by the mercy of God And our courteous Lord gave me grace to wake and | i e. scarcely unnethes had any Life The persons that were with me beheld me and wet my temples and my heart began to comfort And anon a litle smoke came in at the door with a great heat and a foul stinch and then I said Benedicite dominus Is it all on fire that is here And I went it had been a bodily fire
now fro this time evermore be so busie to keep thee from sin this were a good and a soveraign occupation For I thought faithfully were I safe from sin I were full safe from all the fiends in Hell and enemies of my Soul And thus he occupied me all that night and on the morrow till it was about prime day And anon they were all gone and passed and there left nothing but stink and lasted still a while and I scorned him And thus was I delivered of him by the vertue of Christs Passion for therewith is the fiend overcome as our Lord Jesu Christ said afore In all this blessed shewing our good Lord gave understanding that the sight should pass Which blessed shewing the Faith keepeth with his own good will and his grace for he left with me neither signe ne token whereby I might know it But he left with me his own blessed word in true understanding bidding me full mightily that I should believe it and so I do Blessed mote he be I believe that he is our Saviour that shewed it and that it is in the Faith that he shewed And therefore I love it ever joying and thereto I am bound by all his own meaning with the next words that follow Keep thee therein and comfort thee therewith and trust thereto Thus I am beholding to keep it in my Faith For on the same day that it was shewed what time the sight was passed as a wretch I forsook it and openly I said that I had raved Then our Lord Jesu of his mercy would not let it perish but he shewed it all again within my Soul with more fulhead with the blessed Light of his precious Love saying these Words full mightily and full meekly Wit it now well it was no raving that thou saw this day as if he had said for the sight was passed from thee thou lost it and could or might not keep it But wit it now that is to say now thou seest it This was said not only for the same time but also to set thereupon the ground of my Faith where he saith anon following But take it and learn it and keep thee therein and comfort thee therewith and trust thereto and thou shalt not be overcome The Lxxj. Chapter IN these six Words that followeth where he saith Take it his meaning is to fasten it faithfully in our Heart for he will it dwell with us in Faith into our Lives end and after in fulhead of joy willing that we have ever faithful trust of his blessedful promises knowing his goodness For our Faith is contraried in diverse manner by our own blindness and our Ghostly Enemies within and without And therefore our precious Lover helpeth us with Ghostly Light and true Teaching on diverse manner within and without whereby that we may know him And therefore in what manner that he teacheth us he will that we perceive him wisely receiving him sweetly and keep us in him faithfully For above the Faith is no goodness kept in this Life as to my sight And beneath the Faith is no Health of Soul But in the Faith there will our Lord we keep us For we have by his goodness and his own working to keep us in the Faith And by his sufferance through Ghostly enmity we are | i e. tryed assaid in the Faith and made mighty For if our Faith had not enmity it should deserve no meed as by the understanding that I have in our Lords meaning Glad and merry and sweet is the blessedful Lovely Chear of our Lord to our Souls for he beheld us ever living in Love-Longing And he will our Soul be in glad chear to him to yield him his meed And thus I hope with his grace he hath and more shall draw the * i. e. outward utter chear to the inner and make us all at one with him and each of us with other in true lasting joy that is Jesu I have meaning of three manner of chears of our Lord The first is chear of Passion as he shewed whiles he was with us in this Life dying And though this beholding be mourning and | i. e. dark swemful yet it is glad and merry for he is God The second manner of chear it is pitty and ruth and compassion and this sheweth he to all his Lovers with * sikerness of keeping that hath ‑ i. e. sureness need to his mercy The third is the blissedful chear as it shall be without end And this was oftenest shewed longest continued And thus in the time of our Pain and our Woe he sheweth to us chear of his Passion and his Cross helping us to bear it by his own blessed vertue And in time of our sinning he sheweth to us chear of ruth and pity mightily keeping us and defending against all our Enemies And these two be the common chears which he sheweth to us in this Life therewith medling the third And that is his blessed chear like in party as it shall be in Heaven and that is by gracious touching of sweet Lightning of Ghostly Life whereby that we are kept in true Faith Hope and Charity with Contrition and Devotion and also with Contemplation and all manner of true joyes and sweet Comforts The blessedful chear of our Lord God worketh it in us by Grace But now me behooveth to tell in what manner that I saw sin deadly in the Creatures which should not die for sin but live in the joy of God without end I saw that two contraries should not be together in one steed The most contrarious that are is the highest bliss and the deepest pain The highest bliss that is is to have God in clerity of endless Light him verily seeing him sweetly feeling him all peaceable having in fulhead of joy And thus was the blessedful chear of our Lord God shewed in party In which shewing I saw that sin was the most contrary so far forth that as long as we be medled with any part of sin we shall never see clearly the blessed chear of God And the horriblier and the grievouser that our sins be the deeper are we for that time fro this blessed sight And therefore it seemeth to us ostentimes as we were in peril of Death and in a party of Hell for the sorrow and the pain that sin is to us And thus we are dead for the time fro the very sight of our blessedful Life But in all this I saw faithfully that we be not dead in the sight of God ne he passeth never from us but he shall never have his full bless in us till we have our full bless in him verily seeing his fair blessedful chear for we are ordained thereto in kind and getten thereto by grace Thus I saw how sin is deadly for a short time to the blessed Creatures of endless Life and ever the more clearly that the Soul seeth the blissful chear by grace of Loving the more it longeth to see it
in fulhead that is to say in his own Likeness For notwithstanding that our Lord God dwelleth now in us and is here with us and * i e. embraceth colleth us and becloseth us for tender Love that he may never leave us and is more near to us than Tongue may tell or Heart may think Yet may we never stint of mourning ne of weeping nor of seeking nor of Longing till when we see him clear in his blessedful chear For in that precious sight there may no Woe abide nor Weal fail And in this I saw matter of Mirth and matter of Mourning Matter of Mirth that our Lordour Maker is so near to us and in us and we in him by faithfulness of keeping of his great goodness Matter of Mourning for our Ghostly eye is so blind and we so boarn down with Weight of our deadly flesh and Darkness of sin that we may not see our Lord God clearly in his blessedful chear No and because of this Darkness scarce we can believe or * i e. think trowe his great Love and our Faithfulness of keeping And therefore it is that I say we may never leave off Mourning ne Weeping This Weeping meaneth not all in pouring out of tears by our bodily eye but also to more Ghostly understanding for the | i e. natural kindly desire of our Soul is so great and so unmeasurable that if it were given us to our joy and our comfort all the * i e. nobleness nobly that ever God made in Heaven and in Earth and we saw not the fair blessedful chear of himself yet should we never leave mourning ne of Ghostly Weeping that is to say of painful Longing till when we see verily the fair blessedful chear of our Maker And if we were in all the pain that heart may think or tongue may tell and we might in that time see his blessedful chear all this pain should us not grieve Thus is that blessedful sight end of all manner of pain to Loving Souls and fulfilling of all manner of joy and bliss And that shewed he in the high marvellous Words where he saith I it am that is highest I it am that thou lovest I it am that is all It longeth to us to have three manner of knowings The first is that we know our Lord God The second is that we know our self what we are by him in kind and in grace The third is that we know meekly that our self is against our sin and against our feebleness And for these three was all this shewing made as to my understanding The Lxxij Chapter ALL this blessed teaching of our Lord God was shewed by three parts that is to say By bodily sight and by Word formed in my understanding and by Ghostly sight For the bodily sight I have said as I saw as truly as I can And for the Words I have said them right as our Lord shewed them me And for the Ghostly sight I have said some deal but I may never full tell it And therefore of this Ghostly sight I am stirred to say more as God will give me grace God shewed two manner of sickness that we have That one is unpatience or slouth for we bear our travel and our pain heavily That other is despair or doubtful dreed as I shall say after Generally he shewed sin wherein all is comprehended but in special he shewed none but these two And these two are it that most travelleth and troubleth us as by that our Lord shewed me Of which he will we be amended I speak of such men and women that for Gods Love hate sin and dispose them to do Gods Will Then by our Ghostly blind-head and bodily heaviness we are most enclining to this And therefore it is Gods will that they be known and then should we refuse them as we do other sins And for help against this full meekly our Lord shewed the patience that he had in this hard Passion And also the joy and the liking that he hath of that Passion for Love And this he shewed in Example that we should gladly and easily bear our pains for that is great pleasing to him and endless profit to us And the cause why we are travelled with them is for unknowing of Love Though the Three Persons of the blessed Trinity be all even in the self The Soul took most understanding in Love yea and he will in all thing that we have our beholding and our enjoying in Love And of this knowing are we most blind For some of us believe that God is All mighty and may do all and that he is All wisdom and can do all But that he is All Love and will do all there we fail And this unknowing it is that most letteth Gods Lovers as to my sight For when we begin to hate sin and amend us by the ordinance of Holy Church yet there dwelleth a dread that letteth us by the beholding of our self and of our sin afore done And some of us for our every day sins for we hold not our promise nor keep our cleanness that our Lord setteth us in but fall oft-times into so much wretchedness that shame it is to say it And the beholding of this maketh us so sorry and so heavy that unneths we can see any comfort And this dread we take sometime for a meekness but it is a foul blindness and a wickedness And we cannot despise it as we do another sin that we know which cometh through lack of true Judgment and it is again truth For of all the properties of the blissedful Trinity it is Gods will that we have most Faithfulness and Liking in Love for Love maketh Might and Wisdom full meek to us For right as by the courtesie of God he forgetteth our sin after the time that we repent us So will he that we forget our sin as against our unskillful heaviness and our doubtful dreads The Lxxiij Chapter FOr I understood four manner of Dreads One is dread of a | i e. fright fray that cometh to man suddenly by frailty This dread doth good for it helpeth to purge man as doth bodily sickness or such other pain that is not sin for all such pains help man if they be patiently taken The second is dread of pain whereby man is stirred and waked fro sleep of sin For man that is hard of sleep of sin he is not able for the time to receive the soft comfort of the Holy Ghost till he hath undertaken this dread of pain of bodily death and of Ghostly Enemies And this dread stirreth us to seek Comfort and Mercy of God And thus this dread helpeth us as an entry and ableth us to have contrition by the blissedful touching of the Holy Ghost The third is doubtful dread Doubtful dread is as much as it draweth to despair God will have it turned in us into Love by true knowing of Love that is to say that the bitterness of doubts
be turned into sweetness of kind Love by grace for it may never please our Lord that his Servants doubt in his goodness The fourth is Reverent Dread for there is no dread that fully pleaseth God in us but reverent dread and that is soft For the more it is had the less it is felt for sweetness of Love Love and Dread are Brethren and they are rooted in us by the goodness of our Maker and they shall never be taken from us without end We have of kind to Love and we have of grace to Love and have we of kind to dread and we have of grace to dread It longeth to the Lordship and to the Father-head to be dread as it longeth to the goodness to be Loved and it longeth to us that are his Servants and his Children to dread him for Lordship and Father-head as it longeth to us to Love him for God-head And though this reverent Dread and Love be not both in one but are two in property and in working and neither of them may be had without other And therefore I am sure he that Loveth he dreadeth though he feel it but little All dreads other than reverend dread that are proferred to us though they come under colour of Holiness they are not so true And hereby may they be known asunder That dread that maketh us hastily to flee fro all that is not good and fall into our Lords breast as the Child into the Mothers arme with all our intent and with all our mind knowing our feebleness and our great need knowing his everlasting Goodness and his blessed Love only seeking into him for Salvation cleaving to with faithful trust That dread that bringeth us into this Working it is kind and gracious and good and true And all that is contrarious to this either it is wrong or it is medled with wrong Then is this the remedy to know them both and refuse the wrong For the kind property of dread which we have in this Life by the gracious Working of the Holy Ghost the same shall be in Heaven afore God gentle courteous full sweet And thus we shall in Love be homely and near to God And we in dread be gentle and curteous to God and both in one manner like * i e. equal even Desire we then of our Lord God to dread him reverently and Love him meekly and to trust in him mightily For when we dread him reverently and love him meekly our trust is never in vain for the more that we trust and the mightilier that we trust the more we please and worship our Lord that we trust in And if us fail this reverent dread and meek Love as God forbid we should our trust shall soon be mis-ruled for that time And therefore us needeth much to pray our Lord of grace that we may have this reverent dread and make Love of his Gift in Heart and in Work for without this no man may please God The Lxxjv. Chapter I Saw that God may do all that us deedeth And these three that I shall say Need Love Longing Pitty and Love keepeth us in the time of our need And Longing in the some Love draweth us into Heaven for the thirst of God is to have the general man into him In which thirst he hath drawn his Holy Souls that be now in bliss And so * i e. taâ—â—ng getting his lively Members ever he draweth and drinketh and yet him Thirsteth and Longeth I saw three manner of Longings in God and all to one end The first is for that he Longeth to learn us to know him and to Love him ever more and more as it is convenient and speedful to us The second is that he longeth to have us up into bliss as Souls are when they be taken out of pain into Heaven The third is to fulfill us of bliss and that shall be on the last day fulfilled ever to last For I saw as it is known in our Faith that then pain and sorrow shall be ended to all that shall be saved And not only we shall receive the same bliss that Souls afore have had in Heaven but also we shall receive a new which plentuously shall flie out of God into us and fulfill us And those be the goods which he hath ordained to give us from without beginning These goods are treasured and hid in himself for into that time Creature is not mighty ne worthy to receive them In this we should see verily the cause of all the Deeds that God hath done And over-more we should see the cause of all thing that he hath suffered And the bliss and the fulfilling shall be so deep and so high that for Wonder and Marvel all Creatures should have to God so great reverent and dread over-passing that hath been seen and felt before that the Pillars of Heaven shall travel and quake But this manner of trembling and dread shall have no manner of pain but it longeth to the worthy majesty of God thus to be beholden of his Creatures dreadfully trembling and quaking For much more of joy endlesly marvelling of the greatness of God the Maker and of the least part of all that is made For the beholding of this maketh Creature marvellous meek and mild Wherefore God will and also it longeth to us both in kind and in grace to will to have knowing of this desiring the sight and the working For it leadeth us in right way and keepeth us in true Life and oneth us to God And as good as God is as great he is And as much as it longeth to his God-head to be Loved so much it longeth to his great highness to be dread For this reverent dread is the fairer courtesie that is in Heaven before Gods face And as much as he shall be known and Loved over-passing that he is now In so much he shall be dread over-passing that he is now Wherefore it behooveth needs to be that all Heaven all Earth shall tremble and quake when the Pillars shall tremble and quake The Lxxv. Chapter I Speak but little of this reverent dread For I hope it may be seen in this matter aforesaid But well I wote that our Lord shewed me no Souls but those that dread him for well I wote the Soul that truly taketh the teaching of the Holy Ghost it hateth more sin for the vileness and the horribility than it doth all the pain that is in Hell For the Soul that beholdeth the kindness of our Lord Jesu it hateth no Hell but Hell is sin as to my sight And therefore it is Gods will that we know sin and pray busily and travel wilfully and seek teaching meekly that we fall not blindly therein and if we fall that we rise readily for it is the most pain that the Soul may have to turn from God any time by sin The Soul that will be in rest when other mens sins come to mind he should flee it as the pain of Hell
seeking into God for help again that for the beholding of other mens sin it maketh as it were a thick mist afore the eye of the Soul And we may not for the time see the Fair-head of God but if we may behold them with Contrition with him with Compassion on him and with Holy desire to God for him For without this it noieth and troubleth and letteth the Soul that behold them for this I understand in the shewing of the Compassion In this blessedful shewing of our Lord I have understanding of two Contrarious That one is the most Wisdom that any Creature may do in this Life That other is the most folly The most Wisdom is a Creature to do after the Will and the Counsel of his highest sovereign Friend This blessed Friend is Jesu and it is his Will and Counsel that we hold us with him and fasten us homely to him evermore in what state soever we bene For whether we be foul or clean we are ever one in his Loving For weal ne for woe he will never we flee him but for the change-ability that we are in our self we fall often into sin than have we this by the stirring of our Enemy and by our own Folly and Blindness For they say thus Thou wotest well thou art a Wretch a Sinner and also untrue for thou keepest not thy Covenant Thou promisest oftentimes our Lord that thou shalt do better and anon thou fallest again in the same namely in slouth and leesing of time For that is the beginning of sin as to my sight and namely to the Creatures that have given themself to serve our Lord with inward beholding of his blessedful goodness And this maketh us adread to appear afore our courteous Lord. Than is it our Enemy that will put us a back with his false dread of our Wretchedness for pain that he threateth us by for it is his meaning to make us so heavy and so sorry in this that we should let out of mind the blessedful beholding of our everlasting Friend The Lxxvj. Chapter OUr good Lord shewed the enmity of the fiend whereby I understood that all that is contrarious to Love and to Peace it is of the fiend and of his party And we have of our feebleness and our folly to fall And we have of mercy and of grace of the Holy Ghost to rise to more joy And if our enemy ought winneth of us by our falling for it is his likeness he leeseth many times more in our rising by charity and meekness And this glorious rising it is so great sorrow and pain to him for the hate that he hath to our Soul that he brenneth continually in envy And all this sorrow that he would make us to have it shall turn into himself And for this it was that our Lord scorned him and shewed that he shall be scorned and this made me mightily to Laugh Then is this the remedy that we be a known of our Wretchedness and flie to our Lord For ever the more needier that we be the more speedful it is to us to touch him and say we thus in our meaning I know well that I have deserved pain but our Lord is Almighty and may punish me mightily and he is all Wisdom and can punish me wisely and he is all Goodness and loveth me tenderly And in this beholding it is speedful to us to abide for it is a full Lovely meekness of a sinful Soul wrought by Mercy and Grace of the Holy Ghost When we will wilfully and gladly take the scourging and the chastising that our Lord himself will give us and it shall be full tender and full easie if we will only hold us pleased with him and with all his Works For that Penance that man taketh upon himself it was not shewed me That is to say it was not shewed me specified but this was shewed specially and highly and with full lovely chear that we should meekly and patiently bear and suffer that Penance that God himself giveth us with mind of his blessed Passion for when we have mind of his blessed Passion with Pitty and Love Then we suffer with him like as his Friends did that saw it And this was shewed in the xiijth neer at the beginning where it speaketh of Pity for he saith Accuse not thy self that thy Tribulation and thy Woe is all thy default For I will not that thou be heavy ne sorrowful undiscreetly for I tell thee howsoever thou do thou shalt have Woe And therefore I will that thou wisely know thy Penance which thou art in continually and that thou meekly take it for thy Penance And then shalt thou truly see that all this living is Penance profitable This Place is Prison This Life is Penance and in the remedy he will that we enjoy The Remedy is that our Lord is with us keeping us and leading into fulhead of joy for this is an endless joy to us in our Lords meaning that he that shall be our bliss when we are there he is our Keeper while we are here our Way and our Heaven in true Love and faithful trust And of this he gave understanding in all and namely in shewing of his Passion where he made me mightily to choose him for my Heaven Flee we to our Lord and we shall be comforted touch we him and we shall be made clean cleave we to him and we shall be sure and safe from all manner of perils for our courteous Lord will that we be as homely with him as heart may think or Soul may desire But be we ware that we take not so retchesly this homely-head for to leave courtesie for our Lord himself is sovereign homely-head and so homely as he is as courteous he is for he is very courteous And the blessed Creatures that shall be in Heaven with him without end he will have them like to himself in all thing and to be like to our Lord perfectly it is our very Salvation and our full bliss And if we wote not how we shall do all this desire we of our Lord and he shall Learn us for it is his own liking and his Worship Blessed mote he be The Lxxvij Chapter OUr Lord of his mercy sheweth us our sin and our feebleness by the sweet gracious sight of himself For our sin is so foul and so horrible that he of his curtesie will not shew it us but by the Light of his Mercy Of four things it is his Will that we have knowing The first is that he is the ground of whom we have all our Life and our Being The second is that he keepeth us mightily and mercifully in the time that we are in our sin among all our Enemies that are full fell upon us And somuch we are in the more peril for we give them occasion thereto and we know not our own need The third is how curteously he keepeth us and maketh us to know that we go amiss The fourth is how