JESU CHRIST, OR TAKEN OUT OF THE BOOK OF MARGERY KEMPE, ANCRESS OF
LYNN
SHE desired many times that her head might be smitten off with an
axe upon a block for the love of our Lord Jesu. Then said our Lord
Jesu in her mind: "I thank thee, daughter, that thou wouldest die
for My love; for as often as thou thinkest so, thou shalt have the
same meed in heaven, as if thou suffredest the same death, and yet
there shall no man slay thee.
"I assure thee in thy mind, if it were possible for Me to suffer
pain again, as I have done before, Me were lever to suffer as much
pain as ever I did for thy soul alone, rather than thou shouldest
depart from Me everlastingly.
"Daughter, thou mayst no better please God, than to think
continually in His love."
Then she asked our Lord Jesu Christ, how she should best love Him.
And our Lord said: "Have mind of thy wickedness, and think on My
goodness.
"Daughter, if thou wear the habergeon or the hair,[140] fasting
bread and water, and if thou saidest every day a thousand Pater
Nosters, thou shalt[141] not please Me so well as thou dost when
thou art in silence, and suffrest Me to speak in thy soul.
"Daughter, for to bid many beads, it is good to them that can not
better do, and yet it is not perfect.[142] But it is a good way
toward perfection. For I tell thee, daughter, they that be great
fasters, and great doers of penance, they would that it should be
holden the best life.[143] And they that give them unto many
devotions, they would have that the best life. And those that give
much almesse, they would that it were holden the best life. And I
have often told thee, daughter, that thinking, weeping, and high
contemplation is the best life in earth, and thou shalt have more
merit in heaven for one year thinking in thy mind than for an
hundred year of praying with thy mouth; and yet thou wilt not
believe Me, for thou wilt bid many beads.[144]
"Daughter, if thou knew how sweet thy love is to Me, thou wouldest
never do other thing but love Me with all thine heart.
"Daughter, if thou wilt be high with Me in heaven, keep Me alway in
thy mind as much as thou mayst, and forget not Me at thy meat; but
think alway that I sit in thine heart and know every thought that is
therein, both good and bad.
"Daughter, I have suffered many pains for thy love; therefore thou
hast great cause to love Me right well, for I have bought thy love
full dear."
"Dear Lord," she said, "I pray Thee, let me never have other joy in
earth, but mourning and weeping for Thy love; for me thinketh, Lord,
though I were in hell, if I might weep there and mourn for Thy love
as I do here, hell should not noye[145] me, but it should be a
manner of heaven. For Thy love putteth away all manner of dread of
our ghostly enemy; for I had lever be there, as long as Thou
wouldest, and please Thee, than to be in this world and displease
Thee; therefore, good Lord, as Thou wilt, so may[146] it be."
She had great wonder that our Lord would become man, and suffer so
grievous pains, for her that was so unkind a creature to Him. And
then, with great weeping, she asked our Lord Jesu how she might best
please Him; and He answered to her soul, saying: "Daughter, have
mind of thy wickedness, and think on My goodness." Then she prayed
many times and often these words: "Lord, for Thy great goodness,
have mercy on my great wickedness, as certainly as I was never so
wicked as Thou art good, nor never may be though I would; for Thou
art so good, that Thou mayst no better be; and, therefore, it is
great wonder that ever any man should be departed from Thee without
end."
When she saw the Crucifix, or if she saw a man had a wound, or a
beast, or if a man beat a child before her, or smote a horse or
another beast with a whip, if she might see it or hear it, she
thought she saw our Lord beaten or wounded, like as she saw in the
man or in the beast.
The more she increased in love and in devotion, the more she
increased in sorrow and contrition, in lowliness[147] and meekness,
and in holy dread of our Lord Jesu, and in knowledge of her own
frailty. So that if she saw any creature be punished or sharply
chastised, she would think that she had been more worthy to be
chastised than that creature was, for her unkindness against God.
Then would she weep for her own sin, and for compassion of that
creature.
Our Lord said to her: "In nothing that thou dost or sayest,
daughter, thou mayst no better please God than believe that He
loveth thee. For, if it were possible that I might weep with thee, I
would weep with thee for the compassion that I have of thee."
Our merciful Lord Jesu Christ drew this creature unto His love, and
to the mind of His passion, that she might not endure to behold a
leper, or another sick man, specially if he had any wounds appearing
on him. So she wept as if she had seen our Lord Jesu with His wounds
bleeding; and so she did, in the sight of the soul; for, through the
beholding of the sick man, her mind was all ravished in to our Lord
Jesu, that she had great mourning and sorrowing that she might not
kiss the leper when she met them in the way, for the love of our
Lord: which was all contrary to her disposition in the years of her
youth and prosperity, for then she abhorred them most.
Our Lord said: "Daughter, thou hast desired in thy mind to have many
priests in the town of Lynn, that might sing and read night and day
for to serve Me, worship Me, and praise Me, and thank Me for the
goodness that I have done to thee in earth; and therefore, daughter,
I promise thee that thou shalt have meed and reward in heaven for
the good wills and good desires, as if thou haddest done them in
deed.
"Daughter, thou shalt have as great meed and as great reward with Me
in heaven, for thy good service and thy good deeds that thou hast
done in thy mind, as if thou haddest done the same with thy bodily
wits withoutforth.[148]
"And, daughter, I thank thee for the charity that thou hast to all
lecherous men and women; for thou prayest for them and weepest for
them many a tear, desiring that I should deliver them out of sin,
and be as gracious to them as I was to Mary Magdalene, that they
might have as much grace to love Me as Mary Magdalene had; and with
this condition thou wouldest that everich[149] of them should have
twenty pounds a year to love and praise Me; and, daughter, this
great charity which thou hast to them in thy prayer pleaseth Me
right well. And, daughter, also I thank thee for the charity which
thou hast in thy prayer, when thou prayest for all Jews and
Saracens, and all heathen people that they should come to Christian
faith, that My name might be magnified in them. Furthermore,
daughter, I thank thee for the general charity that thou hast to all
people that be now in this world, and to all those that are to come
unto the world's end; that thou wouldest be hacked as small as flesh
to the pot for their love, so that I would by thy death save them
all from damnation, if it pleased Me. And, therefore, daughter, for
all these good wills and desires, thou shalt have full meed and
reward in heaven, believe it right well and doubt never a deal."
She said: "Good Lord, I would be laid naked upon an hurdle for Thy
love, all men to wonder on me and to cast filth and dirt on me, and
be drawen from town to town every day my life time, if Thou were
pleased thereby, and no man's soul hindered. Thy will be fulfilled
and not mine."
"Daughter," He said, "as oftentimes as thou sayest or thinkest:
Worshipped be all the holy places in Jerusalem, where Christ
suffered bitter pain and passion in: thou shalt have the same pardon
as if thou were there with thy bodily presence, both to thyself and
to all those that thou wilt give to.[150]
"The same pardon that was granted thee aforetime, it was confirmed
on Saint Nicholas day, that is to say, playne[151] remission; and it
is not only granted to thee, but also to all those that believe, and
to all those that shall believe unto the world's end, that God
loveth thee, and shall thank God for thee. If they will forsake
their sin, and be in full will no more to turn again thereto, but be
sorry and heavy for that they have done, and will do due penance
therefore, they shall have the same pardon that is granted to
thyself; and that is all the pardon that is in Jerusalem,[152] as
was granted thee when thou were at Rafnys."[153]
That day that she suffered no tribulation for our Lord's sake, she
was not merry nor glad, as that day when she suffered tribulation.
Our Lord Jesus said unto her: "Patience is more worth than miracles
doing. Daughter, it is more pleasure to Me that thou suffer
despites, scorns, shames, reproofs, wrongs, and diseases, than if
thine head were stricken off three times a day every day in seven
year."
"Lord," she said, "for Thy great pain have mercy on my little pain."
When she was in great trouble, our Lord said: "Daughter, I must
needs comfort thee, for now thou hast the right way to heaven. By
this way came I and all My disciples; for now thou shalt know the
better what sorrow and shame I suffered for thy love, and thou shalt
have the more compassion when thou thinkest on My passion."
"O my dear worthy Lord," said she, "these graces Thou shouldest shew
to religious men and to priests."
Our Lord said to her again: "Nay, nay, daughter, for that I love
best that they love not, and that is shames, reproofs, scorns, and
despites of the people; and therefore they shall not have this
grace; for, daughter, he that dreadeth the shames of this world may
not perfectly love God."
Here endeth a short treatise of a devout ancress called Margery
Kempe of Lynn
IV.
HERE FOLLOWETH A DEVOUT TREATISE COMPILED BY MASTER WALTER HYLTON OF
THE SONG OF ANGELS
DEAR brother in Christ, I have understanding by thine own speech,
and also by telling of another man, that thou yearnest and desirest
greatly for to have more knowledge and understanding than thou hast
of angel's song and heavenly sound; what it is, and on what wise it
is perceived and felt in a man's soul, and how a man may be siker
that it is true and not feigned; and how it is made by the presence
of the good angel, and not by the inputting of the evil angel. These
things thou wouldest wete of me; but, soothly, I cannot tell thee
for a surety the soothfastness of this matter; nevertheless
somewhat, as me thinketh, I shall shew thee in a short word.
Wete thou well that the end and the sovereignty of perfection
standeth in very onehead[154] of God and of a man's soul by perfect
charity. This onehead, then, is verily made when the mights of the
soul are reformed by grace to the dignity and the state of the first
condition; that is, when the mind is stabled sadly,[155] without
changing and vagation,[156] in God and ghostly things, and when the
reason is cleared from all worldly and fleshly beholdings, and from
all bodily imaginations, figures, and fantasies of creatures, and is
illumined by grace to behold God and ghostly things, and when the
will and the affection is purified and cleansed from all fleshly,
kindly, and worldly love, and is inflamed with brenning love of the
Holy Ghost. This wonderful onehead may not be fulfilled[157]
perfectly, continually, and wholly in this life, for the corruption
of the flesh, but only in the bliss of heaven. Nevertheless, the
nearer that a soul in this present life may come to this onehead,
the more perfect it is. For the more that it is reformed by grace to
the image and the likeness of its Creator here on this wise; the
more joy and bliss shall it have in heaven. Our Lord God is an
endless being without changing, almighty without failing, sovereign
wisdom, light, soothness without error or darkness; sovereign
goodness, love, peace, and sweetness. Then the more that a soul is
united, fastened, conformed, and joined to our Lord, the more stable
and mighty it is, the more wise and clear, good and peaceable,
loving and more virtuous it is, and so it is more perfect. For a
soul that hath by the grace of Jesu, and long travail of bodily and
ghostly exercise, overcome and destroyed concupiscences, and
passions, and unskilful stirrings[158] within itself, and without in
the sensuality, and is clothed all in virtues, as in meekness and
mildness, in patience and softness, in ghostly strength and
righteousness, in continence, in wisdom, in truth, hope and charity;
then it is made perfect, as it may be in this life. Much comfort it
receiveth of our Lord, not only inwardly in its own privy
substance,[159] by virtue of the onehead to our Lord that lieth in
knowing and loving of God, in light and ghostly brenning of Him, in
transforming of the soul in to the Godhead; but also many other
comforts, savours, sweetnesses, and wonderful feelings on sere[160]
or sundry manners, after that our Lord vouchethsafe to visit His
creatures here in earth, and after that the soul profiteth and
waxeth in charity. Some soul, by virtue of charity that God giveth
it, is so cleansed, that all creatures, and all that he heareth, or
seeth, or feeleth by any of his wits, turneth him to comfort and
gladness; and the sensuality receiveth new savour and sweetness in
all creatures.[161] And right as beforetime the likings in the
sensuality were fleshly, vain, and vicious, for the pain of the
original sin; right so now they are made ghostly and clean, without
bitterness and biting of conscience. And this is the goodness of our
Lord, that sith the soul is punished in the sensuality, and the
flesh is partner of the pain, that afterward the soul be comforted
in the sensuality, and the flesh be fellow of joy and comfort with
the soul, not fleshly, but ghostly, as he was fellow in tribulation
and pain. This is the freedom and the lordship, the dignity, and the
worship that a man[162] hath over all creatures, the which dignity
he may so recover by grace here, that every creature savour to him
as it is. And that is, when by grace he seeth, he heareth, he
feeleth only God in all creatures. On this manner of wise a soul is
made ghostly in the sensuality by abundance of charity, that is, in
the substance of the soul. Also, our Lord comforteth a soul by
angel's song. What that song is, it may not be described by no
bodily likeness, for it is ghostly, and above all manner of
imagination and reason. It may be felt and perceived in a soul, but
it may not be shewed. Nevertheless, I shall speak thereof to thee as
me thinketh. When a soul is purified by the love of God, illumined
by wisdom, stabled by the might of God, then is the eye of the soul
opened to behold ghostly things, as virtues and angels and holy
souls, and heavenly things.[163] Then is the soul able because of
cleanness to feel the touching, the speaking of good angels. This
touching and speaking, it is ghostly and not bodily.[164] For when
the soul is lifted and ravished out of the sensuality, and out of
mind of any earthly things, then in great fervour of love and light
(if our Lord vouchsafe) the soul may hear and feel heavenly sound,
made by the presence of angels in loving of God. Not that this song
of angels is the sovereign joy of the soul; but for the difference
that is between a man's soul in flesh and an angel, because of
uncleanness, a soul may not hear it, but by ravishing in love, and
needeth for to be purified well clean, and fulfilled of much
charity, or[165] it were able for to hear heavenly sound. For the
sovereign and the essential joy is in the love of God by Himself and
for Himself, and the secondary is in communing and beholding of
angels and ghostly creatures. For right as a soul, in understanding
of ghostly things, is often times touched and moved through bodily
imagination by working of angels; as Ezekiel the prophet did see in
bodily imagination the soothfastness of God's privities;[166] right
so, in the love of God, a soul by the presence of angels is ravished
out of mind of all earthly and fleshly things in to an heavenly joy,
to hear angel's song and heavenly sound, after that the charity is
more or less.[167] Now, then, me thinketh that there may no soul
feel verily angel's song nor heavenly sound, but he be in perfect
charity; though all that are in perfect charity have not felt it,
but only that soul that is so purified in the fire of love that all
earthly savour is brent out of it, and all mean letting[168] between
the soul and the cleanness of angels is broken and put away from it.
Then soothly may he sing a new song, and soothly he may hear a
blessed heavenly sound, and angel's song without deceit or feigning.
Our Lord woteth there that soul is that, for abundance of brenning
love, is worthy to hear angel's song. Who so then will hear angel's
song, and not be deceived by feigning of himself, nor by
imagination, nor by the illusion of the enemy, him behoveth for to
have perfect charity; and that is when all vain love and dread, vain
joy and sorrow, is cast out of the heart, so that it love nothing
but God, nor dread nothing but God, nor joyeth, nor sorroweth
nothing but in God, or for God. Who so might by the grace of God go
this way, he should not err. Nevertheless, some men are deceived by
their own imagination, or by the illusion of the enemy in this
manner.[169] Some man, when he hath long travailed bodily and
ghostily in destroying of sins and getting of virtues, and
peradventure hath gotten by grace a somedeal[170] rest, and a
clarity in conscience, anon he leaveth prayers, readings of holy
scriptures, and meditations of the passion of Christ, and the mind
of his wretchedness; and, or[171] he be called of God, he gathereth
his own visits by violence to seek and to behold heavenly things, or
his eye be made ghostly by grace, and overtravaileth by imaginations
his wits, and by indiscreet travailing turneth the brains in his
head, and forbreaketh[172] the mights and the wits of the soul and
of the body. And then, for feebleness of the brain, him thinketh
that he heareth wonderful sounds and songs; and that is nothing else
but a fantasy, caused of troubling of the brain; as a man that is in
a frenzy him thinketh that he heareth and seeth that none other man
doth; and all is but vanity and fantasies of the head, or else it is
by working of the wicked enemy that feigneth such sounds in his
hearing.
For if a man have any presumption in his fantasies and in his
workings, and thereby falleth in to indiscreet imagination, as it
were in a frenzy, and is not ordered nor ruled of grace, nor
comforted by ghostly strength, the devil entereth in, and by his
false illuminations, and by his false sounds, and by his false
sweetnesses, he deceiveth a man's soul.
And of this false ground springeth errors, and heresies, false
prophecies, presumptions, and false reasonings, blasphemings, and
slanderings, and many other mischiefs. And, therefore, if thou see
any man ghostly occupied fall in any of these sins and these
deceits, or in frenzies, wete thou well that he never heard nor felt
angel's song nor heavenly sound. For, soothly, he that heareth
verily angel's song, he is made so wise that he shall never err by
fantasy, nor by indiscretion, nor by no slight[173] of working of
the devil.
Also, some men feel in their hearts as it were a ghostly sound, and
sweet songs in divers manners; and this is commonly good, and
sometime it may turn to deceit. This sound is felt on this wise.
Some man setteth the thought of his heart only in the name of Jesu,
and steadfastly holdeth it thereto, and in short time him thinketh
that that name turneth him to great comfort and sweetness, and him
thinketh that the name soundeth in his heart delectably, as it were
a song; and the virtue of this liking is so mighty, that it draweth
in all the wits of the soul thereto. Who so may feel this sound and
this sweetness verily in his heart, wete thou well that it is of
God,[174] and, as long as he is meek, he shall not be deceived. But
this is not angel's song; but it is a song of the soul by virtue of
the name and by touching of the good angel.[175] For when a soul
offereth him to Jesu truly and meekly, putting all his trust and his
desire in Him, and busily keepeth Him in his mind, our Lord Jesu,
when He will, pureth[176] the affection of the soul, and filleth it,
and feedeth it with sweetness of Himself, and maketh His name in the
feeling of the soul[177] as honey, and as song, and as any thing
that is delectable; so that it liketh the soul evermore for to cry
Jesu, Jesu. And not only he hath comfort in this, but also in psalms
and hymns, and anthems of holy Church, that the heart singeth them
sweetly, devoutly, and freely, without any travail of the soul, or
bitterness in the same time,[178] and notes that holy Church useth.
This is good, and of the gift of God, for the substance of this
feeling lies in the love of Jesu, which is fed and lightened[179] by
such manner of songs. Nevertheless, in this manner of feeling, a
soul may be deceived by vain glory; not in that time that the
affection singeth to Jesu, and loveth Jesu in sweetness of Him, but
afterward, when it ceaseth and the heart keeleth[180] of the love of
Jesu, then entereth in vain glory. Also some man is deceived on this
wise: he heareth well say that it is good to have Jesu in his mind,
or any other good word of God; then he straineth his heart mightily
to that name, and by a custom he hath it nearhand alway in his mind;
and, nevertheless, he feeleth not thereby in his affection
sweetness, nor light of knowing in his reason, but only a naked mind
of God,[181] or of Jesu, or of Mary, or of any other good word. Here
may be deceit, not for it is evil for to have Jesu in mind on this
wish but if he this feeling and this mind, that is only his own
working by custom, hold it a special visitation of our Lord,[182]
and think it more than it is. For wete thou well that a naked mind
or a naked imagination of Jesu, or of any ghostly thing, without
sweetness of love in the affection, or without light of knowing in
reason, it is but a blindness, and a way to deceit, if a man hold it
in his own sight more than it is. Therefore I hold it siker[183]
that he be meek in his own feeling, and hold this mind in regard
nought, till he may, by custom and using of this mind, feel the fire
of love in his affection, and the light of knowing in his reason.
Lo, I have told thee in this matter a little, as me thinketh; not
affirming that this sufficeth, nor that this is the soothfastness in
this matter. But if thou think it otherwise, or else any other man
savour by grace the contrary hereto, I leave this saying, and give
stead to him; it sufficeth to me for to live in truth[184]
principally, and not in feeling.
EXPLICIT
V.
HERE AFTER FOLLOWETH A DEVOUT TREATISE CALLED THE EPISTLE OF PRAYER
GHOSTLY friend in God, as touching thine asking of me, how thou
shalt rule thine heart in the time of thy prayer, I answer unto thee
thus feebly as I can. And I say that me thinketh that it should be
full speedful unto thee at the first beginning of thy prayer, what
prayer so ever it be, long or short, for to make it full known unto
thine heart, without any feigning, that thou shalt die at the end of
thy prayer.[185] And wete thou well that this is no feigned thought
that I tell thee, and see why; for truly there is no man living in
this life that dare take upon him to say the contrary: that is to
say, that thou shalt live longer than thy prayer is in doing. And,
therefore, thou mayst think it safely, and I counsel thee to do it.
For, if thou do it, thou shalt see that, what for the general sight
that thou hast of thy wretchedness, and this special sight of the
shortness of time of amendment, it shall bring in to thine heart a
very working of dread.