It is here that heavy crosses are borne, and all the heavier that they are believed to be merited. The soul begins to have a horror of itself. God casts it so far off, that He seems determined to abandon it for ever. Poor soul! thou must be patient, and remain in thy sepulchre. It is content to remain there, though in terrible suffering, because it sees no way of escape from it; and it sees, too, that it is its only fit place, all others being even sadder to it. It flees from men, knowing that they regard it with aversion. They look upon this forlorn Bride as an outcast, who has lost the grace of God, and who is only fit to be buried in the earth.
The heart endures its bitterness; but, alas! how sweet this state is even now, and how easy it would be to remain in the sepulchre, if it were not necessary [p 189] to decay! The old man becomes gradually corrupted; formerly there were weaknesses and failings, now the soul sees a depth of corruption of which it had hitherto been ignorant, for it could not imagine what were its self-esteem and selfishness. O God! what horror this soul suffers in seeing itself thus decaying! All troubles, the contempt and aversion of man, affect it no longer. It is even insensible to the deprivation of the Sun of Righteousness; it knows that His light does not penetrate the tomb. But to feel its own corruption, that it cannot endure. What would it not rather suffer? But it must experience, to the very depths of its being, what it is.
And yet, if I could decay without being seen by God, I should be content: what troubles me is the horror which I must cause Him by the sight of my corruption. But, poor desolate one! what canst thou do? It should suffice thee, one would think, to bear this corruption, without loving it: but now thou art not even sure that thou dost not desire it! The soul is in darkness, without being able to judge whether its terrible thoughts proceed from itself or from the evil one.
[p 190]
It is no longer troubled at being cast off by God; it is so conscious of its demerit, that it consents to the deprivation of the sensible presence of God. But it cannot endure the thought that the taint of its corruption reaches even to God. It does not wish to sin. Let me decay, is its cry, and find my home in the depths of hell, if only I may be kept free from sin. It no longer thinks of love, for it believes itself to be incapable of affection. It is, in its own opinion, worse than when it was in a state of nature, since it is in the state of corruption usual to the body deprived of life.
At length by degrees the soul becomes accustomed to its corruption: it feels it less, and finds it natural, except at certain times, when it is tried by various temptations, whose terrible impressions cause it much anguish. Ah, poor torrent! wast thou not better off on the mountain-top than here? Thou hadst then some slight corruption, it is true; but now, though thou flowest rapidly, and nothing can stop thee, thou passest through such filthy places, so tainted with sulphur and saltpetre, that thou bearest away their odours with thee.
[p 191]
At last the soul is reduced to a state of nothingness, and has become like a person who does not exist, and never will exist; it does nothing, either good or ill. Formerly it thought of itself now it thinks no longer. All that is of grace is done as if it were of nature, and there is no longer either pain or pleasure. All that there is, is that its ashes remain as ashes, without the hope of ever being anything but ashes: it is utterly dead, and nothing affects it either from without or within—that is, it is no longer troubled by any sensible impressions. At last, reduced to nonentity, there is found in the ashes a germ of immortality, which lives beneath these ashes, and in due time will manifest its life. But the soul is in ignorance of it, and never expects to be revived or raised from the dead.
The faithfulness of the soul in this condition consists in letting itself be buried, crushed, trampled on, without making any more movement than a corpse, without seeking in any way to prevent its putrefaction. There are those who wish to apply balm to themselves. No, no; leave yourselves as you are. You must know your corruption, and see [p 192] the infinite depth of depravity that is in you. To apply balm is but to endeavour by good works to hide your corruption. Oh, do it not! You will wrong yourselves. God can suffer you; why cannot you suffer yourselves? The soul, reduced to nothingness, must remain in it, without wishing to change its state; and it is then that the torrent loses itself in the sea, never to find itself in itself again, but to become one with the sea. It is then that this corpse feels without feeling, that it is gradually reanimated, and assumes a new life; but this is done so gradually that it seems like a dream. And this brings us to the last degree, which is the commencement of the divine and truly inner life, including numberless smaller degrees, and in which the advancement is infinite: just as this torrent can perpetually advance in the sea, and imbibe more of its nature, the longer it remains in it.
[p 193]
CHAPTER IX.
FOURTH DEGREE OF THE PASSIVE WAY OF FAITH, WHICH IS THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE DIVINE LIFE—TRANSITION FROM THE HUMAN STATE TO THE DIVINE, AND TO THE RESURRECTION OF THE SOUL IN GOD—DESCRIPTION OF THIS LIFE AND OF ITS PROPERTIES, GRADATIONS, IDENTITY, INDIFFERENCE—SENTIMENTS OF THE SOUL—ITS EXISTENCE IN GOD—ITS PEACE, ETC.—POWER AND VIEWS WITH REGARD TO OTHERS, TO ITSELF, TO ITS CONDITION, TO ITS ACTIONS, TO ITS WORDS, TO ITS FAULTS—MIND OF CHRIST—VARIOUS OBSERVATIONS.
When the torrent begins to lose itself in the sea, it can easily be distinguished. Its movement is perceptible, until at length it gradually loses all form of its own, to take that of the sea. So the soul, leaving this degree, and beginning to lose itself, yet retains something of its own; but in a short time it loses all that it had peculiar to itself. The corpse which has been reduced to ashes is still dust and ashes; but if another person were to swallow those ashes, they would no [p 194] longer have an identity, but would form part of the person who had taken them. The soul hitherto, though dead and buried, has retained its own being; it is only in this degree that it is really taken out of itself.