Haply thou wilt say, ‘Good Brother, if the life is become the light of men enabling them to know themselves as they are known, is it then possible for me to know myself the very Son of God ?’ I answer and say, that the Son of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, is so attached to the Father’s nature that never for an instant does he quit the paternal mode of deity. He wrought his whole work in that nature and into that nature which gives being to all things and he did so freely, in absolute idleness, for no reason at all. Here, bound to human nature, I have to work above nature freely, in absolute idleness or motionless quiet, so as not to be hindered by myself and by my personal nature and by things which are conditioned by time and temporalities; for to know all things in the cause of their existence I must soar beyond all lights, temporal and eternal, and plunge into the causeless essence which gives mind and being to my soul. Drowned in this being, aware of self and things merely as being, my soul has lost her name and there remains no nature but that which, in the Father, is eternally in travail with the Son and as such I am a new man born in his nature and doing all I do supernaturally in the divine nature. As our Lord said, ‘ When I am lifted up I will draw all things after me.’ So I being lifted up with all my powers into the. uncreated good do be with Christ one body and with God one
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spirit and do draw all things to me in one pure, perfect nature. As the gospel says, ‘ This is my beloved Son in whom I am well _ pleased.’ Knowing myself none other than the Son of God, in
that same sonship I am cast into my middle power and that in the perennial now, thus the eternal Word is born in me unceasingly, as our Lord says, ‘ Father, glorify thy Son.’ In this interpretation lies the explanation of the words, ‘ How hardly does the rich man enter the kingdom of heaven.’ Christ says in effect that the life is none other than the naked spark alight within the soul, which in the groundless Godhead knows itself none but God; to wit, the light which in rational creatures is splendid with the truth. I might give another meaning but I fear ye could not follow it.
To continue: ‘ The light shineth in the darkness and the dark- ness comprehendeth it not.’ I make no comment here save to lament to the eternal truth what numbers fail to realize the high perfection, the deep happiness, glowing unseen within the soul. Christ says, ‘ Blessed be the eyes which see the things ye see.’ He did not mean our bodily eyes, he meant those eyes, twin powers of the soul, set in her mind. As the gospel says, ‘ There was a man sent from God whose name was John.’ Verily, be they male or female, these souls are John, for John denotes the grace of God. What is grace ? There is a power in the soul which is idle and does no work ; this is none other than the image of God, not that grace is itself this image, it is its form which reforms and transfigures the soul; and in this re-formation wherein she has no form, in this transformation in which she has all forms, the omniform form, there is this quiet the soul has, she being self-contained because the truth is in her: not as hers nor as a quality. As Christ said, ‘ He that enjoyeth me liveth eterfially.’ Such an one is sent from God but is not God-forsaken. Christ says, ‘He that sent me -sendeth me not alone, he sendeth also every one that doeth the will of my Father.’
_ There are four signs to tell a man that he is sent from God. First, that in time he is superior to time and temporalities. Secondly, being therein he is detached from creatures. The third is, that he is idle or quiet-minded. The fourth is, that he is not changeable by nature. Christ said, ‘I am that I am.’ Possessing these a man may take it that he is sent from God and his name is John for he is the grace of God itself. Hence Paul’s words, ‘ God is my soul’s new form wherein she is formless.’
Pass on to the next. ‘ He came to bear witness to the light that “all might believe in him.’ Examine this carefully. The words are open to a purely figurative interpretation. Just as he (John) bore witness to the light of the divine unity concealed * Christ
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in order that all might believe in him, so forerunning intuition tells the soul of insight into the innermost recesses of the mind where shines the spark which knows itself none other than the uncreated good of the ineffable Deity. Then the soul with all her powers acknowledges and affirms the Son eternally in the Father and eternally born of the Father who is without beginning. As Christ said, ‘ Whoso heareth my Word and keepeth it liveth forever.’
Now take this in another sense. I will put a question and answer it myself: What reference has this to the true light ? Look you. There is a power in the soul called mind, God sent it with the soul, it is her storehouse of incorporeal forms and intel- lectual notions. This soul-capacity the Father fashions in his outflowing divinity whereby all the words of his divine essence flow into the word in our mind in distinction of Person just as memory pours out treasure of images into the powers of the soul. When the soul sees in this power the form of a rational creature, an angel’s or her own form, the idea of the Father is clearly impressed in the soul angelically. But on penetrating deeper, into the very centre of the soul, intellect finds God there in this power face to face, and in this capacity, if she recollect herself to con- template the vision of God in her, there wakes another power of the soul called understanding and the eternal Word is born, conceived by the soul while subsisting eternal in the Father, these two powers forming one amicable disposition which gives direction to the intellect and is its will towards its source. When the spirit is flowing from the Father and the Son into this power and into all the powers she has, the soul, oriented to God, grows cognisant of his image as her eternal prototype in God and she perceives too how the holy Trinity is sealed in her. Thus the energies of the soul all bear witness to the light of the blessed Trinity that gives light to all mankind and they acknowledge and affirm and believe in the Son born in this man without ceasing. As the gospel says, ‘ He was not the light but bare witness to the light.’
Mark what follows. ‘That was the true light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.’ Throw wide now the ears of understanding to catch the arcane meaning of the boundary between created and uncreated light which is plainly indicated in St John’s words, ‘ That was the true light.’ Taking the name John to mean the light of grace, as said above, then I propose to show what may be rightly termed ‘ the true light that lighteth every man,’ which we receive direct.
I distinguish five lights. The first is devilish light, the second natural light, the third is angelic light, the fourth is spiritual
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ee the fifth is divine light. Mark carefully how these five lights iffer.
The first or devilish light leads all astray from the truth. This can be seen in cases where the outward man is not entirely in sympathy with the inward man. Supposing then that the in- ward man is sunk into his inner mind, where the eternal Word is born in the perennial now, the sudden shock of seeing the out- ward man pictured in the uncertain, fluctuating light of time, will distort the light of his understanding and stop the eternal birth from taking place. This shows it to be devilish light and it behoves you therefore to turn away from it to the peace and quiet of your higher mind. By this means Mary in her virginity, being enlightened by the Holy Ghost, contrived to shun ideas ofıtemporal things and thus, transcending time, to harmonise her inner and her outer man into one settled calm, quite free from images, and this shows you the difference between this devilish light and the divine light.
_ The second light is natural light. The line of demarcation between natural light and the divine light comes where soul sees spirit direct in very truth. Thinking in natural light, in random images, human nature is changing, waxing and waning, sensible of weal and woe, as Christ shows by his death and passion. But when human nature is face to face with her proper self she is reflected into the divine nature. I ask then, does the soul in this natural light remain changeless in time? I say, no. That is a supertemporal state of union with the divine light and by the grace of God. Being drawn or caught up into the suavity of the indwelling spirit of God, the soul loves universal human nature as her own nature, as God has been loving it eternally, where this nature is set over time in the light of glory. Apart from this light, this man has the natural light of indwelling grace and at the point where he expresses the idea everything in this light of nature must needs fade away out of time, as I have said. Even so Mary was changeless by nature inasmueh as she was free from sinful accidents in the idea of her created nature wherein she knew and loved all mankind. Here ye have the difference between the light of nature in time and light of that nature beyond time in eternal glory. To me it proves that all creatures are one man, loving God by nature.
The third light is angelic light. Now you must know that every individual angel is always open to any ideas that he may choose, one more than another according to the idiosyncrasy of his angelic nature. Their stability is not impaired thereby provided they know and will and love in idleness. This uncreated understanding Lucifer had, and if Lucifer in his creaturehood had seen into the
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light of nature, if his creature nature had veered round in his angelic nature to his formless divine nature, he would never have fallen from the truth. As Isaiah observes, ‘ The angelic light in man is the means.’ In the divine light the soul is not subject to ideas nor can any shape appear to her now that she knows, with knowledge that transcends the soul’s, of the incarnation of the Word. Even so Mary, aloof in absolute purity of mind and body, knew creatures as a whole in super-angelic light and her mind conceiving no form save the unformed form of God, she knew herself to be the ornament of God not fashioned in the form of any creature. Wherefore she cried, ‘ My spirit hath rejoiced in God my saviour.’
The fourth light is spiritual light, which is moreover the medium of the light of grace in the mind. In this light of the spirit ye know how to order things in your mind with a view to the con- templation and enjoyment of the groundless essence in your soul. Absorbed therein ye are aware that the divine deep transcends the highest height of creatures. Why, I ask, was Peter oblivious of himself upon the mountain when Christ was transfigured before his three disciples ? I answer, that the spiritual light of his mind was eclipsed by interior vision of the divine light : he forgot his own form on perceiving himself in this glory as the reflection ever streaming back to its paternal source. By formlessly appre- hending in itself the bound Word whereto Christ knew himself united, he was taking the Christ-image for his own image. How- beit he was not ravished into the divine light of the perfect intellect but he was caught up into the spiritual light of its reflection shining back into its actual self. Beyond this spiritual light Mary was ravished when at the annunciation she conceived the Word in the word begotten according to the love of men.