Chapter LXXI
"Three manners of looking seen in our Lord's Face"
GLAD and joyous and sweet is the Blissful lovely Cheer of our Lord to our souls. For He beholds us ever, living in love-longing: and He wills that our soul be in glad cheer to Him, to give Him His due. And thus, I hope, with His grace He has drawn, and more shall draw, the Outer Cheer to the Inner Cheer, and make us all one with Him, and each of us with other, in true lasting joy that is Jesus.
I have signifying of Three manners of Cheer of our Lord. The first is Cheer of Passion, as He shewed while He was here in this life, dying. Though this manner of seeing be mournful and troubled, yet it is glad and joyous: for He is God. The second manner of Cheer is of Care and Compassion: and this shews He, with sureness of Keeping, to all His lovers that betake them to His mercy. The third is the Blissful Cheer, as it shall be without end: and this was shewed oftenest and longestcontinued.
And thus in the time of our pain and our woe He shews us Cheer of His Passion and His Cross, helping us to bear it by His own blessed virtue. And in the time of our sinning He shews to us Cheer of Care and Pity, mightily keeping us and defending us against all our enemies. And these be the common Cheer which He shews to us in this life; with it mingling the third: and that is His Blissful Cheer, like, in part, as it shall be in Heaven. And that shewing is by gracious touching and sweet lighting of the spiritual life, whereby that we are kept in sure faith, hope, and charity, with contrition and devotion, and also with contemplation and all manner of true solace and sweet comforts.
CHAPTER LXXII
"As long as we be meddling with any part of sin we shall never see clearly the Blissful Face of our Lord"
BUT now I need to tell in what manner I saw sin deadly in the creatures which shall not die for sin, but live in the joy of God without end.
I saw that two contrary things should never be together in one place. The most contrary that are, is the highest bliss and the deepest pain. The highest bliss that is, is to have Him in clarity of endless life, Him truly seeing, Him sweetly feeling, all-perfectly having in fulness of joy. And thus was the Blissful Cheer of our Lord shewed in Pity: in which Shewing I saw that sin is most contrary, so far forth that as long as we be meddling with any part of sin, we shall never see clearly the Blissful Cheer of our Lord. And the more horrible and grievous that
our sins be, the deeper are we for that time from this blissful sight. And for that it seems to us often as we were in peril of death, in a part of hell, for the sorrow and pain that the sin is to us. And thus we are dead for the time from the very sight of our blissful life. But in all this I saw truly that we be not dead in the sight of God, nor He passes never from us. But He shall never have His bliss in us till we have our bliss in Him, truly seeing His fair Blissful Cheer. For we are ordained thereto in nature, and get thereto by grace. Thus I saw how sin is deadly for a short time in the blessed creatures of endless life. And ever the more clearly that the soul sees this Blissful Cheer by grace of loving, the more it longs to see it in fulness. For although our Lord God dwells in us and is here with us, and albeit He clasps us and encloses us for tender love that He may never leave us, and is more near to us than tongue can tell or heart can think, yet may we never stint of moaning nor of weeping nor of longing till when we see Him clearly in His Blissful Face. For in that precious blissful sight there may no woe abide, nor any blessing fail.
And in this I saw the substance of mirth and the substance of moaning: the substance of mirth: for our Lord, our Maker, is so near to us, and in us, and we in Him, by sureness of keeping through His great goodness; the substance of moaning: for our spiritual eye is so blind and we be so borne down by weight of our mortal flesh and darkness of sin, that we may not see our Lord God clearly in His fair Blissful Cheer. No; and because of this dimness scarcely we can believe and trust His great love and our sureness of keeping. And for that it is that I say we may never stint of moaning nor of weeping. This "weeping" means not all in pouring out of tears by our bodily eye, but also has more spiritual understanding. For the kindly desire of our soul is so great and so unmeasurable, that if there were given us for our solace and for our comfort all the noble things that ever God made in heaven and in earth, and we saw not the fair Blissful Cheer of Himself, yet we should not stint of moaning nor spiritual weeping, that is to say, of painful longing, till when we should see truly the fair Blissful Cheer of our Maker. And if we were in all the pain that heart can think and tongue may tell, if we might in that time see His fair Blissful Cheer, all this pain should not grieve us.
Thus is that Blissful Sight the end of all manner of pain to the loving soul, and the fulfilling of all manner of joy and bliss. And that shewed He in the high, marvellous words where He said: I it am that is highest; I it am that is lowest; I it am that is all . It belongs to us to have three manner of knowings: the first is that we know our Lord God; the second is that we know our self: what we are by Him, in Nature and Grace; the third is that we know meekly what our self is a result of our sin and feebleness. And for these three was all the Shewing made, as to my understanding.