[And all men who are exalted above their creatureliness into a contemplative life are _one with this divine glory,—yea, are that glory_. And they see, and feel, and find in themselves, by means of this divine light, that they are the same simple Ground as to their uncreated nature (_i.e._, in respect of their ideal pre-existence in the Son), since the glory shineth forth without measure, after the divine manner, and abideth within them simply and without mode (particular manifestation or medium), according to the simplicity of the essence. Wherefore interior contemplative men should go forth in the way of contemplation above reason and distinction, beyond their created substance, and gaze perpetually by the aid of their inborn light, and so they become transformed, and _one with the same light, by means of which they see, and which they see_. Thus do contemplative men arrive at that eternal image after which they were created, and contemplate God and all things without distinction in a simple beholding, in divine glory. And this is the loftiest and most profitable contemplation whereto men may attain in this life.] This passage, and others like it, gave rise to the charge of pantheism brought by Gerson against Ruysbroek in the following century. The prior of Grünthal found a defender in Schönhoven, who pointed with justice to numerous expressions in the writings of the accused, altogether incompatible with the heresy alleged. Quite inconsistent with any confusion of the divine and human is Ruysbroek’s fine description of the insatiable hunger of the soul—growing by that it feeds on,—the consciousness that all possessed is but a drop to the illimitable undeemed Perfection yet beyond. (‘Wi leren in waerheit sijns aenschijns dat al dat wi gesmaken tegen dat ons ontblijft dat en is niet een draep tegen al die zee, dit verstormt onsen geest in hetten ende in ongeduer van mynnen.’—_Von dem funkelnden Steine_, x. p. 194.) So again he says, ‘Want wy enmogen te mael niet got werden ende onse gescapenheit verliesen, dat is onmoegelic’—p. 190; and similarly that we become one with God in love, not in nature, (‘ouerformet ende een mit hem in sijnre minnen, niet in sijnre naturen.’)—_Spiegel der Seligkeit_, xxiv. Note to page 329. Ruysbroek expressed to Gerard Groot, in these very words, his belief in the special guidance of the Holy Spirit vouchsafed for the composition of his books on these ‘deep things’ of the kingdom. (Engelhardt, p. 168.)