The Forty Questions of the Soul

17. Moreover, the outward spirit could not have life without this fire, seeing it hath fire in all creatures; but this fire is only the wrath of the inward fire.

18. The inward fire consumeth earth and stones, also the body and blood, yea, even the noble image, if it be 1 inflamed in the will: But there the water is a medicine for it, which allayeth its aspiring force, whereby it laboureth to get above the meekness of God, as Lucifer did.

1 Or kindled.

* "wound," or "entwined."

THE SEVENTEENTH QUESTION Whence, and wherefore is the Contrariety between the Spirit and the Flesh?

1. MY beloved Friend, you know well, that fire and water are contrary; for the fire is life, and the water is its death; and you see plainly, that when water is poured upon the fire, the source of the fire goeth out, and so the fire is dead.

2. And although in man [the fire] is not wholly dead, because of the light, which continually causeth fire, yet there is an enmity; as there is an enmity between God and hell; and yet hell, or the fire of wrath, is God's.

3. And God's Majesty would not be manifested, if his anger were not, which sharp eneth the divine obscure hiddenness of the eternity, by the wrath of nature, so that it is changed into fire, whence the high light in the free eternity is brought forth, which maketh a Majesty in the meek source.

4. And yet the fire is the only cause, that there is a * source in the light, in the meekness; for the light proceedeth from the glance of the fire, and hath in it the source of the fire.

1 Or life, or working.

5. But the will (as is mentioned before) sinketh down in the anguish, even into death, and springeth forth again into the liberty; and this is the hght which hath the l source of the fire; but yet it hath another Principle in it, for the anguish is become love.

6. After this manner also it is in the body, where the flesh striveth against the spirit: the life of the outward flesh is a glass of the most inward fire-life, viz. of the life of the soul; and the life of the spirit of the soul, with the light of the tincture, is the middlemost life, and yet it is born out of the soul.

7. But understand our depth aright: the spirit of the soul, wherein the divine image standeth, ariseth in the fire, and is first of all the will to the fire; but when the 2 wrath in the fire is sharpened and inflamed, then the will cometh into a great anguish, like a dying, and sinketh down in itself, out of the wrath into the eternal liberty; and yet there is no dying, but 3 another world thus cometh out of the first.

8. For then the will springeth up in the other world, as a sharpness out of the fire; yet it is without any such 4 anguish source in the eternal liberty: and it is a moving, a driving and an 5 acknowledging of the anguishing nature; it hath all the 6 essences, which in the first sharp fire-world are brought forth in the anguish; but they are like one that goeth out of fire into water, and so the anguish of the fire is left in the water.

1 Or property.

2 Or wrathful desire, and indignation of the fire.

3 Or second.

4 Or aching property.

5 Or feeling.

6 Or springing virtues.

9. You must understand, that this hfe is the life of the spirit of the soul: the soul is the centre of nature, and the spirit is the precious and noble image, which God created for his image; herein standeth the high, x royal, and precious image of God; for God is thus, he is comprehended in the same source of life.

10. The spirit is not parted from the soul; no: as you see fire and light are not parted, and yet are not one, they have a twofold 2 source: the fire is wrathful, the light is meek and lovely: in the light is the life, and in the fire the cause of the life.