Chapter 4
THE FIRST SHOWING
convince me that I should live, nor, indeed, was it a complete comfort to me. For I would have preferred to be freed from this world, and had had my heart set on it.
Then it came suddenly into my mind that I should desire the second wound [natural compassion] as a gracious gift of our Lord, so that my body might be filled completely with understanding and experience of His blessed passion, as I had previously prayed. I desired with compassion that His pain should be my pain, and afterward, that I should be completely filled with longing for Him.
It seemed to me that with His grace I might have the wounds I had previously desired. But in this prayer I never desired any vision, or any kind of showing from God — only compassion, as, it seemed to me, a soul following its natural bent might have for our Lord Jesus, Who for love chose to become a mortal man. And, therefore, I desired to suffer with Him, living in my mortal body, as God would give me grace.
Chapter 4 Here begins THE FIRST SHOWING, of the precious crowning of Christ, as described in the first chapter, of how God fully fills the heart with greatest joy, of His great meekness, of how the light of the passion of Christ is sufficient strength against all temptations of the fiends, and of the great excellence and meekness of the Blessed
Virgin Mary.
At this moment suddenly I saw the red blood running down from under the garland; it was hot and fresh, and just as plenteous and lifelike as it was at the time the garland of thorns was pressed on His blessed head, when He, Who was both God and man, suffered for me. I conceived truly and strongly that it was He Himself who showed it to me, without any intermediary.
And in the same showing, suddenly the Trinity completely filled my heart with the greatest joy. And so, I understood, it will be in heaven, without an end, for those who come there. For the Trinity is God; God is the Trinity. The Trin-
THE REVELATION OF DIVINE LOVE
ity is our Maker. 'The Trinity is our Keeper. The Trinity is our everlasting Lover. The Trinity is our endless joy and our bliss, through our Lord Jesus Christ and in our Lord Jesus
Christ. This truth was shown in the first showing and in all the showings, for where Jesus appears, the blessed Trinity is understood, as I see it.
I said, "Bless the Lord!" in a loud voice, but intending reverence. I was completely astonished, wondering and marveling, that He, Who is so worthy of reverence and dread, should be so familiar and homely with a sinful creature living in this wretched flesh.
This showing I took as a strengthening comfort for the time of my temptation, for I supposed that, by the permission of God and with His protection, I would be tempted by devils before I died.
With this vision of His blessed passion, and with the understanding of the godhead I had just been given, I knew well that I, and indeed all creatures living, had been given enough strength to overcome all the devils of hell and all spiritual temptations.
In this showing, He brought our blessed Lady Mary to my understanding. I saw her spiritually, in bodily likeness, a simple, meek maiden, young in age, little grown beyond childhood in stature, as she was when she conceived her child.
Also, God showed me in part the wisdom and the integrity of her soul, and I understood in this the reverence with which she beheld her God, Who is her Maker. She marveled with great reverence that He had chosen to be born of her, a simple creature of His making. Her wisdom and truth recognized the greatness of her Maker and the littleness of herself who was made; they caused her to say most humbly to Gabriel, "Behold me here, God's handmaiden." In this sight I understood truly that she is greater than all that God has made. All creation is beneath her in worthiness and in fulness of grace, for above her is nothing that is made except the blessed manhood of Christ, as I see it.
THE FIRST SHOWING
Chapter 5 How God is everything that is good, tenderly wrapping us; how everything that is made is nothing, compared to mighty God; and how man has no rest until He sees himself and all things as nothing, for the love of God.
At the same time that I saw the vision of His bleeding head, our Lord gave me spiritual insight into the unpretentious homely manner of His loving. I saw that for us He is everything that is good, comforting and helpful; He is our clothing, who, for love, wraps us up, holds us close; He entirely encloses us for tender love, so that He may never leave us, since
He is the source of all good things for us, as I understood it.
And with this insight He also showed me a little thing, the size of a hazelnut, lying in the palm of my hand. It was as round as a ball, as it seemed to me. I looked at it with the eyes of my understanding and thought, "What can this be?"
My question was answered in general terms in this fashion: "It is everything that is made." I marveled how this could be, for it seemed to me that it might suddenly fall into nothingness, it was so small. An answer for this was given to my understanding: "It lasts, and ever shall last, because God loves it. And in this fashion all things have their being by the grace of God."
In this little thing, I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second is that God loves it. The third is that God keeps it. But I cannot tell the reality of Him who is my Maker, Lover and Keeper, for until I am united to Him in substance, I may never have complete rest or real bliss, that is, until I am so fastened to Him that there is absolutely no created thing between my God and me.
It is necessary for us to know the littleness of creatures in order to reduce them to nothingness in our judgment, so that we may love and have the uncreated God. The reason we are not fully at ease in heart and soul is because we seek rest in these things that are so little and have no rest within them, and pay no attention to our God, who is Almighty, All-wise,
All-good and the only real rest.