(d) Or, the matter being in no way from preternatural sources, the strong and perhaps irresistible impulse to record and publish it, might be preternatural.
(e) Or (in addition to or apart from such an impulse), it might be a record of certain truths already contained implicitly in the writer's mind, but brought to remembrance or into clear recognition, not by the ordinary free activity of reason, but, as it were, by an alien will controlling the mind.
(f) Or, if really new truths or facts are communicated to the mind from without, this may be effected in various ways: (i) By the way of verbal "inspiration," as when the very words are received apparently through the outer senses; or else put together in the imagination. (ii) Or, the matter is presented pictorially (be it fact or symbol) to the outer senses or to the imagination; and then described or "word-painted" according to the writer's own ability. (iii) Or, the truth is brought home directly to the intelligence; and gets all its imaginative and verbal clothing from the recipient.
Many other hypotheses are conceivable, but most will be reducible to one or other of these. We may perhaps add that, when the revelation is given for the sake of others, this purpose might be frustrated, were not a substantial fidelity of expression and utterance also secured. This would involve, at least, that negative kind of guidance of the tongue or pen, known technically as "assistance."
Mother Juliana gives us some clue in regard to her own revelations where she says: [8] "All this blessed showing of our Lord God was showed in three parts; that is to say, by bodily sight; and by words formed in my understanding; and by ghostly sight. For the bodily sight, I have said as I saw, as truly as I can" (that is, the appearances were, she believed, from God, but the description of them was her own). "And for the words I have said them right as our Lord showed them to me" (for here nothing was her own, but bare fidelity of utterance). "And for the ghostly sight I have said some deal, but I may never full tell it" (that is to say, no language or imagery of her own can ever adequately express the spiritual truths revealed to her higher reason). As a rule she makes it quite clear throughout, which of these three kinds of showing is being described. We have an example of bodily vision when she saw "the red blood trickling down from under the garland," and in all else that seemed to happen to the crucifix on which her open eyes were set. And of all this she says: "I conceived truly and mightily that it was Himself that showed it me, without any mean between us;" that is, she took it as a sort of pictorial language uttered directly by Christ, even as if He had addressed her in speech; she took it not merely as having a meaning, but as designed and uttered to convey a meaning—for to speak is more than to let one's mind appear. Or again, it is by bodily vision she sees a little hasel-nut in her hand, symbolic of the "naughting of all that is made." Of words formed in her imagination she tells us, for example, "Then He (i.e., Christ as seen on the crucifix) without voice and opening of lips formed in my soul these words: Herewith is the fiend overcome." Of "ghostly sight," or spiritual intuition, we have an instance when she says: "In the same time that I saw (i.e., visually) this sight of the Head bleeding, our good Lord showed a ghostly sight of His homely loving. I saw that He is to us everything that is comfortable to our help; He is our clothing, that for love wrappeth us," &c.—where, in her own words and imagery, she is describing a divine-given insight into the relation of God and the soul. Or again, when she is shown our Blessed Lady, it is no pictorial or bodily presentment, "but the virtues of her blissful soul, her truth, her wisdom, her charity." "And Jesus … showed me a ghostly sight of her, right as I had seen her before, little and simple and pleasing to Him above all creatures."
Just as in the setting forth of these spiritual apprehensions, the words and imagery are usually her own, so in the description of bodily vision she uses her own language and comparisons. For example, the following realism: "The great drops of blood fell down from under the garland like pellets, seeming as it had come out of the veins; and in coming out they were brown red, for the Blood was full thick, and in spreading abroad they were bright red…. The plenteousness is like to drops of water that fall off the eavings after a great shower of rain…. And for roundness they were like to the scales of herrings in the spreading of the forehead," &c. These similes, she tells us, "came to my mind in the time." In other instances, the comparisons and illustrations of what she saw with her eyes or with her understanding, were suggested to her; so that she received the expression, as well as the matter expressed, from without.
But besides the records of the sights, words, and ideas revealed to her, we have many things already known to her and understood, yet "brought to her mind," as it were, preternaturally. Also, various paraphrases and elaborate exegeses of the words spoken to her; a great abundance of added commentary upon what she saw inwardly or outwardly. Now and then it is a little difficult to decide whether she is speaking for herself, or as the exponent of what she has received; but, on the whole, she gives us abundant indications. Perhaps the following passage will illustrate fairly the diverse elements of which the record is woven:
With good cheer our Lord looked into His side and beheld with joy [bodily vision]: and with His sweet looking He led forth the understanding of His creature, by the same wound, into His side within [her imagination is led by gesture from one thought to another]. [9] And then He showed a fair and delectable place, and large enough for all mankind that should be saved, and rest in peace and love [a conception of the understanding conveyed through the symbol of the open wound in the Heart]. And therewith He brought to my mind His dear worthy Blood and the precious water which He let pour out for love [a thought already contained in the mind, but brought to remembrance by Christ]. And with His sweet rejoicing Pie showed His blessed Heart cloven in two [bodily or imaginative vision], and with His rejoicing He showed to my understanding, in part, the Blissful Godhead as far forth as He would at that time strengthen the poor soul for to understand [an enlightening of the reason to the partial apprehension of a spiritual mystery]. And with this our Good Lord said full blissfully: "Lo! how I love thee!" [words formed in the imagination or for the outer hearing], as if He had said: "My darling, behold, and see thy Lord," &c. [her own paraphrase and interpretation of the said words].
Rarely, however, are the different modes so entangled as here, and for the most part we have little difficulty in discerning the precise origin to which she wishes her utterances to be attributed—a fact that makes her book an unusually interesting study in the theory of inspiration.
Thus, in provisionally answering the problem proposed at the beginning of this article, as to how far Mother Juliana supplied from her own mind the canvas and the colours for this portrayal of Divine love, and as to how far therefore it may be regarded as a product of and a key to her inner self, we are inclined to say that, a comparison of her own style of thought and sentiment and expression as exhibited in her paraphrases and expositions of the things revealed to her, with the substance and setting of the said revelations, points to the conclusion that God spoke to her soul in its own language and habitual forms of thought; and that if the "content" of the revelation was partly new, yet it was harmonious with the previous "content" of her mind, being, as it were, a congruous development of the same—not violently thrust into the soul, but set down softly in the appointed place already hollowed for it and, so to say, clamouring for it as for its natural fulfilment. This, of course, is not a point for detailed and rigorous proof, but represents an impression that gathers strength the oftener we read and re-read Mother Juliana's "showings."