“After this comes another mode of contemplation.
“Those who have raised themselves into the absolute purity of their
spirits by the love and reverence which they have for God, stand in
His presence, with open and unveiled faces. And from the splendour of
the Father a direct light shines on those spirits in which the thought
is naked and free from similitudes, raised above the senses, above
similitudes, above reason and without reason, in the lofty purity of
the spirit.
“This light is not God, but is a mediator between the seeing thought
and God. It is a light-ray from God or from the Spirit of the Father.
In it God shows Himself immediately, not according to the distinction
and the mode of His persons, but in the simplicity of His nature and
His substance; and in it also the Spirit of the Father speaks in
thought, lofty, naked, and without similitude, ‘Behold me as I behold
you.’ At the same time the keenness of the pure eyes is revealed,
when the direct brightness of the Father falls upon them, and they
behold the splendour of the Father--that is to say, the substance or
the nature of God in an immediate vision, above reason and without
distinction.
“This brightness and this manifestation of God give to the
contemplative spirit a real knowledge of the vision of God, as far
as it can be enjoyed in this mortal state. In order that you may
understand me clearly, I will give you an image from the senses. When
you stand in the dazzling radiance of the sun, and turn away your eyes
from all colour, from attending to and distinguishing all the various
things which the sun illuminates, if then you simply follow with your
eyes the brightness of the rays which flow from the sun, you shall be
led into the sun’s very essence; and so likewise, if you follow with a
direct vision the dazzling rays which stream from the splendour of God,
they will lead you to the source of your creation, and there you will
find nothing else but God alone.”
I come now to the second of the works enumerated above. _The Mirror
of Eternal Salvation_ (_Die Spieghel der Ewigher Salicheit_) is, like
all the writings of the mystic, a study of the joys of introversion,
or of the return of man into himself, until he comes into touch with
God. It was sent by the admirable doctor and eminent contemplator of
the Green Valley “To the dear Sister Margaret van Meerbeke, of the
convent of the Clares at Brussels, in the year of our Lord 1359.” In
some manuscripts the work is entitled “Book of the Sacraments,” and it
is indeed the poem of eucharistic love, above all distinctions and in
the midst of the blinding effluence of God, where the soul seems to
shake the pollen from its essence and to have an eternal foreknowledge.
Here, as elsewhere, we would need, in order to realise even slightly
these terrors of love, a language which has the intrinsic omnipotence
of tongues which are almost immemorial. The Flemish dialect possesses
this omnipotence, and it is possible that several of its words still
contain images dating from the glacial epochs. Our author then had at
his disposal one of the very oldest modes of speech, in which words
are really lamps behind ideas, while with us ideas must give light to
words. I am also disposed to believe that every language thinks always
more than the man, even the man of genius, who employs it, and who is
only its heart for the time being, and that this is the reason why an
ignorant monk like this mysterious Ruysbroeck, was able, by gathering
up his scanty forces in prayers so many centuries ago, to write works
which hardly correspond to our senses in the present day. I translate
from this book the following fragment:--
“See now, here must our reason and all definite actions give way; for
our powers become simple in love, and are silent and bend low before
the manifestation of the Father; for the manifestation of the Father
raises the soul above reason, into nakedness without similitudes.
There the soul is simple, pure, and emptied of everything, and in
that pure emptiness the Father shows His divine brightness. Into that
brightness there can enter neither reason nor the senses, observation
nor distinction. All these things must remain underneath it, for that
measureless brightness dazzles the eyes of the spirit, so that their
lids must close under its inconceivable radiance. But the naked eye,
above reason, and in the inmost depths of intelligence, is always open,
and beholds and contemplates with naked vision that light by that light
itself. There we have eye to eye, glass to glass, image to image.
By these three things we are like unto God, and are united to Him.
For this vision which strikes upon our naked eye is a living mirror
which God has made in His image. His image is His divine brightness,
and with it He has filled to overflowing the mirror of our soul, so
that no other brightness and no other image can enter there. But this
brightness is not an intermediary between God and us; for it is the
thing which we see, and also the light by which we see, but not our eye
which sees. For although the image of God is without intermediary in
the mirror of our soul, and is united to Him, still the image is not
the mirror, for God does not become the creature. But the union of the
image with the mirror is so great and so noble that the soul is called
the mirror of God.
“Further, that very image of God which we have received and which we
carry in our souls is the Son of God, the eternal mirror of divine
wisdom, in which we all dwell, and are continually reflected. Yet we
are not the wisdom of God, otherwise we should have created ourselves,
which is impossible and a suggestion savouring of heresy. For whatever
we are and whatever we have, we have received all from God and not
from ourselves. And although this sublimity is so great a thought for
our soul, yet is it hidden from the sinner and from many righteous
persons. And all that we can know by the light of nature is incomplete
and savourless and without emotion, for we cannot contemplate God or
find Him reigning in our souls without His aid and grace, and without
diligently exercising ourselves in His love.”
_The Book of the Spiritual Tabernacle_ (_Dat boec van den Gheesteleken
Tabernacule_). _In Tabernaculum Mosis et ad id pertinentia commentaria,
ubi multa etiam Exodi, Levitici, Numerorum mysteria, divino spiritu
explicantur_, as Surius describes it, is the longest work of the
hermit, and contains a strange, naïve, and arbitrary interpretation of
the symbols of the ark of the covenant, and of the sacrifices of the
ancient law. I shall give somewhat copious extracts from this work, for
it shows an interesting and brotherly aspect of his Flemish soul; and
the artistic subtlety with which he labours to elucidate his emblems,
as well as his amusing and childlike delight in certain effects of
colour and of figures, reminds us now and then of his marvellous
contemporaries of the Cologne school, the old dreamy painters, Meister
Wilhelm and Lochner, and of the splendid succession of nameless
dreamers, who, in lands far off from his, gave a fixed form to the
almost supernatural reflections of the spiritual joys of that and the
following century, which passed away so near to God and so far from
earth.
Here is what he says with regard to the offering of the poor as
commanded in the Jewish law:--
“And they (the doves) shall keep near streams and beside clear waters,
so that if any bird flies downwards to seize them or to do them any
injury, they may recognise him by his reflection in the water and
beware of him. The clear water is Holy Scripture, the lives of saints,
and the mercy of God. We shall reflect ourselves therein when we are
tempted, and so none shall be able to hurt us. These doves have a
loving nature, and young doves are often born of them, for whenever, to
the glory of God and for our own felicity, we think of sin with scorn
and hatred, and of virtue with love, we give birth to young doves--that
is to say, to new virtues.”
In the following passages he pictures, with the help of these same
doves, the offering of Saint Paul:--
“And our Lord replied that His grace should be sufficient for him, for
virtue is perfected in the weakness of temptations. When he understood
this he offered these two doves into the hands of our Lord. For he
renounced self, and willingly became poor, and bent the necks of his
doves (that is, his desires) under the hands of our Lord Jesus Christ
and of the Holy Church. And Christ broke the necks and the wings of the
doves, and then he became incapable of desiring or of flying towards
any desire except that which was God’s will. And then Christ placed the
head (that is to say, the will, which was dead and powerless) under the
broken wings, and then the doves were ready to be consumed; and so the
holy apostle says: ‘Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my
weakness, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.’”
Let us consider further the extraordinary interpretation of the
spiritual flowers embroidered on the hangings of the tabernacle:--
“On these four curtains of divers colours the Lord ordered Bezaleel
and Aholiab to weave and to embroider with the needle many ornaments.
So likewise our obedient will and our intelligence will place upon
these four colours divers ornaments of virtues. On the white colour of
innocence we shall place red roses, by evermore resisting all that is
evil. Thus we maintain purity and crucify our own nature, and these red
roses with their sweet perfume are very lovely on the white colour.
Again, upon innocence we shall embroider sunflowers, by which we mean
obedience; for when the sun rises in the east, the sunflower opens
towards its rays, and turns ever eagerly towards the sun, even until
its setting in the west; and at night it closes and hides its colours
and awaits the return of the sun. Even so will we open our hearts by
obedience towards the illumination of the grace of God, and humbly
and eagerly will we follow that grace so long as we feel the warmth
of love. And when the light of grace ceases to awaken fresh emotions,
and we feel the warmth of love but little, or feel it not at all, then
it is night, when we shall close our heart to all that may tempt it;
and so shall we shut up within ourselves the golden colour of love,
awaiting a new dawn, with its new brightness and its fresh emotions;
and thus shall we preserve innocence always in its pristine splendour.
On the blue colour, which is like the firmament, we shall embroider
birds with varied plumage; in other words, we shall keep before our
minds, with clear observation, the lives and the works of the saints,
which are manifold. These works are their varied plumage, so gracious
and so beautiful, and with this they adorned themselves and soared to
heaven. They are birds which we must observe with attention; if we are
like them in their plumage, we shall follow them to their eternal
rest. On the purple colour (that is, violet or blood-red, meaning
generosity) we shall place water-lilies, and these symbolise the free
possession of all the treasures of God. For we notice four things in
the water-lily. It keeps itself always above the water, and has four
green leaves between the air and the water; and it is rooted in the
earth, and above it is opened out to the sun; and it is a remedy for
those who are fevered. So also may we, by generosity and freedom of
spirit, possess the waves of all the riches of God. And between this
free possession by our spirit and the waves of the lavish gifts of God,
we shall have green leaves--that is to say, an earnest consideration
of the way in which the eternal liberality of God flows forth, with
ever new gifts to men, and we shall consider also how the gifts are
bestowed with discrimination, according to the nature of the beloved
ones who receive them, and how the final cause of all the gifts is
the generous outflow of divine love; and the more immediate cause the
wisdom and generosity in human creatures, which makes them resemble
God. For none can know the wealth of the gifts of God except the wise
and generous man, who, out of the treasures of God, can give wisely and
generously to all creatures. So shall we adorn generosity, and then we
shall be rooted in the soil of all the gifts--that is to say, in the
Holy Spirit, as the water-lily is rooted deep down under the water. And
we shall open our hearts in the air above, towards truth and towards
the sun of righteousness. And thus we are a remedy for all the world;
for the generous heart which possesses the treasures of God, ought to
fill, console, refresh, and cool all those who are afflicted. And it
is thus that the purple colour is adorned with the red colour--that
is to say, with burning love. On it we shall place bright stars, by
which I mean pious and devout prayer for the good of our neighbour, and
reverent and secret communion between God and ourselves. These are the
stars which illuminate with their brightness the kingdoms of heaven and
of earth, and they make us inwardly light-giving and fruit-bearing, and
fix us in the firmament of eternal life.”
I shall next translate the whole of the “chapter on fishes,” with its
amazing analogies:--
“This is why the symbolic law ordered the Jews to eat clean fish, which
had scales and fins; and all other fish were unclean and were forbidden
by the law. By this we understand that our inner life ought to have a
clothing of virtues, and our inward devotions ought to be covered with
the application of our reason, just as the fish is clothed and adorned
with its scales. And our loving power should move in four different
ways:--in triumphing over our own will, in loving God, in desiring to
resist our own nature, and in seeking to acquire virtues. These are
four fins between which our inward life should swim, as fish do, in
the water of divine grace. The fish has besides, in the middle of its
body, a straight fin, which remains motionless in all its movements.
So our inward feelings, firmly centred, should be empty of everything
and without personal preference; in other words, we should allow God
to act in us and in all things, both in heaven and earth. The fourth
scale balances us in the mercy of God and in true divine peace. And so
our devotion has fins and scales and becomes for us a pure nourishment
which pleases God. But the scales which clothe and adorn our inward
exercises should be of four colours, for some fish have gray scales,
others red scales, others green scales, and others again white scales.
The gray scales teach us that the images with which we clothe our
devotions must be humble; in other words, we must think of our sins,
of our want of virtue, of the humility of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
of His mother, and of all things which may abase and humble us, and
we shall love poverty and contempt and to be unknown and despised by
everybody. This is the gray colour, which is very beautiful in the eyes
of God.
“Further, we shall clothe our devotions with red scales--that is to
say, we shall remember that the Son of God laid down His life for love
of us, and we shall keep His passion in our memory, like a glorious
mirror before our inward eyes, so that we may remember His love and
console ourselves in all our sorrows. And we shall also think of the
many torments of the martyrs, who by their sufferings followed our Lord
into eternal life. These are red scales, set well in order, and they
are a delightful clothing for our inward emotions.
“Then, again, we shall adorn our secret thoughts with green scales.
I mean that we shall earnestly meditate upon the noble lives of
confessors and saints, remembering how they despised the world, and by
what wonderful work and in what divers ways they honoured and served
God. Green is the colour which attracts and rejoices loving hearts and
willing eyes. Let us stir our fins, then, and follow the saints by
imitating their good works to the utmost of our power.
“Again, we shall clothe our inward exercise with white scales; in
other words, we shall glass ourselves in the purity of virgins, and
shall observe how they fought and how they conquered flesh and blood,
by which is meant the inclination of nature. This is why they wear
the crown of gold and follow the Lamb, who is Christ, with new songs,
which none shall sing save those who have preserved chastity in soul
and body. But if we have lost purity, we may still acquire innocence
and clothe ourselves with other virtues, and so we may reach the day
of judgment shining brighter than the sun, and possess the glory of
God through an unending eternity. In this way, then, we shall cover
our inward devotion with four kinds of scales, and each kind shall
have the active fins of good-will; that is, we must desire to carry out
in good works that which we understand by our intelligence. So shall
our spiritual nourishment be clean; for knowledge and wisdom without
a virtuous life are like scales without fins; and practical virtues
without reflection are fins without scales; and so we must know, love,
and practise virtues, in order that our life may be pure; and then we
shall be nourished with clean fish which have scales and fins.”