Ch. III. Sec. i. "And though we should prove not to be able to recover
it fully here in this life, yet should we desire and endeavour to
recover the image and likeness of the dignity we had, so that our soul
might be reformed as it were in a shadow by grace to the image of the
Trinity which we had by nature, and hereafter shall have fully in
bliss...." Sec. ii. "Seeke then that which thou hast lost, that thou
mayest finde it; for well I wote, whosoever once hath an inward sight,
but a little of that dignity and that spirituall fairness which a soule
hath by creation, and shall have again by grace, he will loath in his
heart all the blisse, the liking, and the fairnesse of this world....
Nevertheless as thou hast not as yet seen what it is fully, for thy
spiritual eye is not yet opened, I shall tell thee one word for all, in
the which thou shalt seeke, desire, and finde it; for in that one word
is all that thou hast lost. This word is Jesus.... If thou feelest in
thy heart a great desire to Jesus ... then seekest thou well thy Lord
Jesus. And when thou feelest this desire to God, or to Jesus (for it
is all one) holpen and comforted by a ghostly might, insomuch that it
is turned into love, affection, and spiritual fervour and sweetnesse,
into light and knowing of truth, so that for the time the point of thy
thought is set upon no other created thing, nor feeleth any stirring
of vain-glory, nor of selfe-love, nor any other evill affection (for
they cannot appear at that time) but this thy desire is onely enclosed,
rested, softened, suppled, and annoynted in Jesus, then hast thou found
somewhat of Jesus; I mean not him as he is, but a shadow of him; for
the better that thou findest him, the more shalt thou desire him. Then
observe by what manner of Prayer or Meditation or exercise of Devotion
thou findest greatest and purest desire stirred up in thee to him, and
most feeling of him, by that kind of prayer, exercise, or worke seekest
thou him best, and shalt best finde him....
"See then the mercy and courtesie of Jesus. Thou hast lost him, but
where? soothly in thy house, that is to say, in thy soul, that if
thou hadst lost all thy reason of thy soule, by its first sinne, thou
shouldst never have found him again; but he left thee thy reason, and
so he is still in thy soule, and never is quite lost out of it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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