In translating Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love in 1991 from the Syon Abbey manuscript owned by Westminster Cathedral and now on loan to Westminster Abbey, her own English words were kept, rather than translating them into our Latinate forms, her 'oneing' instead of our 'uniting', her 'noughting' instead of our 'negating', her 'endlessness' instead of our 'eternity'. Somehow the Latin hides their meaning into its foreignness. The English words' truth, though now so unusual that they seem foreign, are actually closer to what we mean. Also, Julian's theological concepts can have a very modern ring. Computers, like brains and noughts and crosses games, generally simply 'one' and 'nought' their way through problems. Julian's 'oneing' is one's shaping oneself to that of God, 'noughting' the opposite of 'oneing', as evil, which therefore does not exist. Her 'endlessness' is of God, who is all time, but smaller and smaller bits of time, like death, are of 'noughting'.
There are three versions of Julian's Showing of Love. The first, the Westminster Manuscript, of which excerpts are given here, was written perhaps in 1368 when she was twenty-five. The Long Text, given in the Paris Manuscript and in three Sloane and Stowe Manuscripts in the British Library, presents a text originally written when she was fifty, in 1393, discussing a vision of the Crucifix she had had when she lay, she thought, dying, in 1373. A final version, the Short Text, is given in the British Library Amherst Manuscript, and states it was written when she was still alive in 1413, at seventy, when the Lollards, ancestors to the Quakers, were being burned at the stake. That manuscript also contains Marguerite Porete's Mirror of Simple Souls, Henry Suso's Horologium Sapientiae and Jan van Ruusbroec's Sparkling Stone (the latter two now transcribed in booklets in the Julian Library Portfolio) amongst other contemplative texts. All of these early Julian manuscripts are connected to Brigittine Syon Abbey. This Westminster manuscript was owned by the courageous Lowe family. The last monk to be buried at Syon Abbey at the Reformation was a Lowe. The Lowes in exile continued to be associated with Syon Abbey in exile in the Low Countries and Rouen, women, as well as men, being imprisoned for their recusancy, and a Lowe priest was drawn, hung and quartered at Tyburn for converting five hundred souls to Catholicism. In the nineteenth century Rose Lowe entered Syon Abbey in Lisbon, saving it from extinction under Wellington's deprivations in Portugal and became its Prioress. Bishop James Bramston studied for ordination at the English College, Lisbon. The manuscript then passed from Lowe ownership into his hands, being rebound at this date, and finally to Westminster Cathedral.
Julian thus spent her whole life writing this book. From the age of fifty on she lived as a Solitary, an Anchoress, in an anchorhold at St Julian's Church, Norwich, probably dressed in the black of a Benedictine nun, for she may have earlier been at Carrow Priory, and she gave counsel to troubled people, like Margery Kempe from Lynn.Julian of Norwich, and Augustine before her in his Confessions, obeyed Christ’s words that they should pray to God. These texts Julian uses, the Shema (Leviticus 19.18, Mark 12.28-31), the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6.5-23, Luke 11.1-4), the Confessions of St Augustine, the Rule of St Benedict, the Dialogues of St Gregory, in her Showing of Love, become all one prayer, a plea, that we love God and our even-Christian, our neighbour, as ourselves. In all these versions, except the last, Julian gives passages from the Bible in her Middle English, from Isaiah, from Jonah, from the Epistles and much else, but she dare not do so in the 1413 version when to own or use John Wyclif's translation of the Bible into English would have caused one to have been burnt at the stake as a Lollard heretic. Strangely she uses neither Jerome's Latin Vulgate nor Wyclif's Middle English, the evidence being that she has access to the Hebrew of the Scriptures, likely gained through Cardinal Adam Easton who had taught the Hebrew Scriptures at Oxford and who had translated them into Latin, correcting Jerome's errors. But she is not an elitist scholar. Her last word in her last version is the Lollard term, one's 'even Christian', one's neighbour as one's equal in the eyes of one's Creat or
Julian begins the Westminster Manuscript by imagining the Virgin Mary worshipping her Child. The initial 'O' in the manuscript is illuminated in blue with red penwork ornamentation, the text written in brownish ink. It echoes the lovely Advent Antiphon, 'O Sapientiae', where the pregnant Virgin worships and addresses her not yet born child as Wisdom.
Later, Julian speaks of the tender hands of God as our Mother.
The manuscript has
drawings of hands in the margin pointing to important parts of
the text. The sections given here in red are so rubricated in
the Paris Manuscript, but not in the Westminster Manuscript.
In other manuscripts these phrases are in engrossed letters,
which in one instance, occurs in the Westminster Manuscript
and which may have been Julian's own practice, perhaps
borrowed from Rabbinical texts, as in the manuscript of Rabbi
David Kimhi, owned by Cardinal Adam Easton, Benedictine from
Norwich, who effected Birgitta of Sweden's canonization in
1391.
Ur gracious and good lord God showed me in part the wisdom and the truth of the soul of our blessed Lady, Saint Mary that he would be born of her that was a simple person of his making. For this was her marvelling, 'That he who was her maker would be born of her that is made.' And this wisdom and truth, knowing the greatness of her Maker and the littleness of her self who is made, caused her to say full meekly to Gabriel, 'Lo, me here, God's handmaiden'. This wisdom and truth made her see her God so great, so high, so mighty and so good that the greatness and the nobility and beholding of God fulfilled her with reverent dread. And with this she saw herself so little and so low, so simple and so poor in reward of her God, that this reverent dread fulfilled her with meekness. And thus, by this ground, she was fulfilled of grace and of all manner of virtue, and overpassed all people. In this sight, I understood truly that she is more than all that God made beneath her in worthiness and fullness. For above her there is no thing that is made: but the blessed manhood of Christ, as to my sight. And this our good Lord showed to my understanding, in teaching us.
· · ·
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Westminster Cathedral Manuscript, Julian of Norwich, Showing of Love
Italian blessed olive leaves , Australian hazel nut
Earth First Seen From Space
And in this he showed me a little thing, the
quantity of a hazel nut , lying in the palm of my hand, as
it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it
with the eye of my understanding, and thought, 'What may
this be?' And it was answered generally thus,'It is all that is made.' I marvelled how it might last, for I thought
it might suddenly have fallen to nought for littleness. And
I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and
ever shall, for God loves it.
And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.
In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that he loves it. And the third, that God keeps it. But what is this to me? Truly, the Creator, the Keeper, the Lover. For until I am substantially oned to him, I may never have full rest nor true bliss. That is to say, until I be so fastened to him that there is nothing that is made between my God and me.
This little thing that is made, I thought it might have fallen to nought for littleness. Of this we need to have knowledge that it is like to nought, all things that are made. For to love and have God that is unmade.
For this is the cause why we are not at ease in heart and soul, for we seek rest here, in this thing that is so little where there is no rest, and knowing not our God who is all mighty, all wise and all good. For he is true rest. God will be known, and he likes us to rest in him. For all that is beneath him cannot suffice us. And this is the cause why no soul is rested, until it is noughted of all that is made. And when he wills to be noughted for love, to have him who is all, then he is able to receive spiritual rest.
Also our Lord showed that it is the fullest pleasure to him, that an innocent soul come to him nakedly, plainly and humbly. For this is the natural yearning of the soul by the touching of the Holy Spirit. And by the understanding that I have in this showing,
Westminster Cathedral Manuscript, Julian of Norwich, Showing of Love
After this, I saw God in a point. That is to say in my understanding. But which sight I saw that he is all things. I beheld with advisement, seeing and knowing in that sight, that he does all that is done, be it never so little. And I saw that nothing is done by chance, nor by hazard, but all by the foreseeing of God's wisdom. And if it be chance or fortune in the sight of man, our blindness and our lack of foresight is the cause. Therefore, well I know that in sight of our lord God, there is not chance or happenstance. And therefore it needs behoove me to grant that all things that are done, are well done, because our lord God does all. For in this time the working of Creation was not showed but of our lord God, in Creation, for he is in the midpoint of all things, and he does all.
And I was sure that he does no sin. And here I saw truly that sin is no deed. Also among other showings our good Lord means thus, 'See, I am God. See, I am in all things. See, I do all things. See, I never left off the works of my hand, nor ever shall, without end. See, I lead all things to the end, to which I ordained them, from without beginning, by the same power, wisdom and love, that I made them with. How should then anything be amiss?'
I saw full surely
that he never changes his purpose in any manner of thing,
nor ever shall without end. For there was nothing unknown to
him in his rightful ordering from without beginning. And
therefore all things were set in order before anything was
made, as it should be without end.
· · ·
And
this was shown in these words,'Are
you well paid?'. By those other words that Christ said, 'If you are paid, I am paid'. As if he
had said,'It is joy and
liking enough to me, and I ask nothing else of you for my
travail, but that I might pay you' . And it is
this he brought to my mind. The property of a glad giver:
a glad giver takes but little heed of the thing that he
gives, but his desire is in all his intent, to please him
and solace him to whom he gives it. And if the receiver
takes the gift gladly and thankfully, then the courteous
giver sets at nought all his cost and all his travail for
joy and delight that he has, for he has so pleased and
solaced him whom he loves. Plenteously and fully was this
shown.
· · ·
Also our Lord showed for
prayer, in which showing I saw two conditions in our Lord's
meaning. One is right full prayer. And the other is sure
trust. But yet often our trust is not full, for we are not
sure that God hears us, we think, because of our
unworthiness, and because of that we feel nothing. For we
are as barren and as dry often after our prayer, as we were
before. And thus in our feeling, our folly is the cause of
our weakness. For thus I have felt in myself.
And all this brought our Lord suddenly to my mind and showed these words and said ,'I am ground of your seeking. First it is my will that you have it, and I make you to will it. How should it then be that you should not have your seeking of it, since I make you to seek it, and you seek it' . And thus is in the first reason of the three that follow, our lord God shows a great comfort as may be, saying in the same words in the first reason. Where he says , 'And you seek it' , there he shows full great pleasure, and endless reward that he will give us for our seeking.
And in the sixth reason there he says, 'How should then this be?'This was said for an impossibility. For it is the most impossible thing that may be that we should seek mercy and grace, and not have it. For of all things that our Lord makes us to seek, himself has ordained it to us from without beginning.
Here may we [see] then that our seeking is not cause of the goodness and grace that he does to us, but his own proper goodness, and that he shows truly in all these sweet words, where he says, 'I am ground of your prayer and of your seeking' . And our Lord wills that this be known of all his lovers on earth. And the more that we know it, the more should we seek it, if it is wisely taken. And so is our Lord's meaning.
Wise seeking is a true, gracious, lasting will of the soul, oned and fastened into the will of our lord God himself. He is the first receiver of our prayer, it seems to me, and he takes it right thankfully and highly enjoys it. He sends it up above and sets it in the treasury, where it shall never perish. It is there before God with all his holy company continually received, ever fulfulling our needs. And when we shall achieve our bliss, it shall be given to us for a degree of joy with endless worshipful thanking of him. Full glad and merry is our lord God of our prayer. He looks there after and he would have it. For with his grace it makes us like himself in condition, as we be in nature.
Also he says, 'Pray though you think it not help you' .
Also to prayer belong
thankings. Thanking is a true inward knowing with great
reverence and lovely dread, turning ourself with all our
might into the working that our lord God stirred us to,
enjoying and thanking him inwardly. And sometimes with
plenteousness, it breaks out into voice, and says, 'Good
lord, grant mercy, blessed must you be'.
· · ·
Truth
sees God, and wisdom beholds God, and of these two comes
the third, and that is a marvelous holy delight in God,
which is love. Where truth and wisdom is, truly there is
love and truly coming of them both, and all of God's
making. For God is endless sovereign truth, endless
sovereign wisdom, endless sovereign love unmade.
· · ·
And
furthermore he wills that we know that this dear worthy
soul was preciously knit to him in the making. Which knot
is so subtle and so mighty, that it is oned to God, in
which oneing it is made endlessly holy. Furthermore, he
wills that we know and understand, that all the souls that
shall be saved in heaven without end are knitted in this
kot, and oned in this oneing, and made holy in this
holiness. And for great endless love that God has to all
mankind, he makes no departing in love between the blessed
soul of Christ and the least soul that shall be saved, for
it it is very easy to live and to believe, that the
dwelling of the blessed soul of Christ is full high in the
glorious godhead. And truly as I understand in our Lord's
meaning, where the blessed soul of Christ is, there is the
substance of all the souls that shall be saved by Christ.
Highly ought we to enjoy that our God dwells in our soul, and much more highly we ought to enjoy that our soul dwells in God. And the dwelling place of our soul is in God, which is unmade. A high understanding it is inwardly to see and to know that God which is our maker, dwells in our soul. And a higher understanding it is and more inwardly to see and to know our soul that is made dwells in God in substance, of which substance by God we be that we be.
Also the almighty
truth of the Trinity is our Father. For he made us and keeps
us in him. And the deep wisdom of the Trinity is our Mother,
in whom we be all enclosed, and the high goodness of the
Trinity is our Lord, and in him we are closed, and he is in
us. All mighty, all wisdom and all goodness; one God, one
Lord and one goodness.
· · ·
God
is nearer to us than our own soul, for he is ground in
whom our soul stands, and he is the means that keeps the
substance and the sensuality together so that it shall
never depart. For our soul sits in God, in true rest, and
our soul stands in God in sure strength, and our soul is
naturally rooted in God, in endless love. And therefore if
we will have knowing of our soul, and communing and
daliance therewith, it is right to seek into our lord God
in whom it is enclosed.
· · ·
Also,
as truly as God is our Father, so as truly God is our
Mother. And that he shows in all and namely in these sweet
words, where he says, 'I it
am'. That is to say,'I it am, the might and goodness of
Fatherhead; I it am, the wisdom and the kindness of
Motherhood; I it am, the light and the grace, that is all
blessed love; I it am, the Trinity; I it am, the Unity; I
it am, the high sovereign goodness of all manner of
things; I it am, that makes you to love; I it am, that
makes you to long, the endless fullness of all true
desires'.
· · ·
I
understand three manners of beholding of Motherhead in
God. The first is ground of our natural making. The second
is taking of our nature, and there begins the Motherhead
of grace. The third is Motherhead of working and therein
is a spreading forth by the same grace of length and of
breadth, of height and of deepness without end. And all is
one love.
· · ·
The
mother's service is nearest, readiest and surest. It is
nearest, for it is natural, readiest, for it is most of
love, and surest for it is of truth. This office might nor
could anyone ever do to the full, but Christ Jesus, God
and Man alone. We know well that all our mothers bear us
with pain and for dying. But our true Mother Jesus, he
alone bears us to joy and to bliss, and endless living,
blessed must he be.
Thus he sustains us within him in love. And travailed into the full time that he would suffer the sharpest throes and the most grievous pains that ever were or ever shall be, and died at the last and when he had done and so borne us to bliss, yet might not all this be enough to his marvellous love. And that showed he in these high overpassing words of love, 'If I might suffer more I would suffer more' .
He might no more
die, but he would not cease working. Therefore then he needs
must feed us, for the dear worthy love of Motherhead has
made him debtor to us. The mother may give her child to suck
her milk, but our precious Mother Jesus, he may feed us with
himself, and does full courteously and full tenderly with
the blessed sacrament of his body and blood that is precious
food of very life. And with all the sweet sacraments he
sustains us well mercifully and graciously.
.·
· ·
The
sweet gracious hands of our Mother are ready and diligent
about us. For he in all this working uses the true office
of a kind nurse, that has nothing else to do, but to
attend about the salvation of her child. It is the office
of our lord Jesus Christ to save us. It is his worship to
do it, and it is his will, we know it. For he wills that
we love him sweetly and trust in him meekly and strongly.
And this he showed in these gracious words, I keep you
most surely'. Furthermore a natural child despairs not of
the mother's love, and naturally the child presumes not of
itself, naturally the child loves the mother, each of them
loves the other.
Also I had great desire and longing for God's gift to be delivered of this world and of this life. For often I beheld the woe that is here in this life, and the weal and the blessed being that is in heaven, and I thought sometimes, though there had been no pain in this life but the absence of our lord God, it was more than I might bear, and this made me to mourn and anxiously yearn. And also my own wretchedness, sloth and irksomeness helped thereto, so that I wanted not to live and to travail as it fell out to me to do. And to all our courteous lord God answered for comfort and patience, and said these words, 'Suddenly you shall be taken from all your pain, and from all your sickness, from all your illness and from all your woe, and you shall come up above, and you shall have me to your pay and reward, and you shall be filled with joy and with bliss, and you shall never more have any manner of pain, neither any manner of sickness, nor manner of misliking, nor no wanting of will, but be ever in joy and bliss without end. What should it then grieve you to suffer a while, since it is my will and my worship' .
It is God's will that we set the point of our thought in this blessed beholding, as often as we may, and as long.
iuliana di
Norwich inizia il manoscritto di Westminster con un'immagine
della Vergine Maria in adorazione del Figlio suo, come in
Dante, Paradiso XXX.1-6.
I concetti teologici di Giuliana appaiono molto moderni. I computer, così come il nostro cervello e i giochi affini al filetto, nella risoluzione di un problema utilizzano semplicemente un sistema di numerazione binaria di "uno" e "zero". L' 'essere uno' per Giuliana corrisponde al trasformarsi di un individuo a immagine di Dio. 'L'essere nulla', il contrario dell' 'essere uno', rappresenta il male, che, in quanto tale, non esiste. E 'l'essere infinito' è una proprietà di Dio, che esiste in eterno, laddove i sempre più piccoli frammenti di tempo, così come la morte, appartengono al nulla.
Esistono tre versioni delle Visioni di Giuliana di Norwich. La prima, il manoscritto di Westminster, di cui qui sono presentati alcuni passi, è stata redatta da Giuliana probabilmente nel 1368, a cinquant'anni d'età. Il manoscritto di Parigi e due versioni più tarde, attualmente custodite alla British Library, contengono un testo scritto da Giuliana nel cinquantesimo anno d'età, dove si parla di una visione del Crocifisso, da lei avuta nel 1373, quando, così credeva, era in punto di morte. Una ultima versione è stata composta nel 1413, a settanta anni d'età, quando i Lollardi, progenitori dei Quaccheri, venivano bruciati al rogo. Giuliana attese l'intera vita alla composizione di questo libro. Dai cinquant'anni in poi visse come anacoreta, da reclusa, in un romitaggio presso la Chiesa di san Giuliano a Norwich. Verosimilmente vestì l'abito nero delle monache Benedettine, ed era stata probabilmente nel Convento di Carrow; come Margery Kempe di Lynn consolava gli afflitti. In tutte queste versioni, eccetto l'ultima, Giuliana include passi della Bibbia in Middle English, da Isaia, da Giona, dalle Epistole e da molti altri libri. Non osa, tuttavia, farlo nella versione del 1413, al tempo in cui possedere o usare la traduzione in inglese della Bibbia di Wyclif sarebbe costato l'essere bruciato sul rogo come eretico Lollardo. Eppure l'ultima parola della sua ultima versione è il termine Lollardo 'cristiano mio pari', il mio proprio prossimo, mio simile agli occhi del Creatore.
La lettera
iniziale del manoscritto di Westminster è miniata in blu con
decorazioni in rosso eseguite a pennino. Il testo è vergato in
marrone. Manine a margine indicano le parti importanti del
testo. Le parti qui in grassetto, le parole di Cristo, nel
manoscritto di Parigi sono in rosso.
Testo
l nostro amabile e buon Signore Dio mi ha in parte
rivelato la sapienza e la verità dell'anima della nostra
Vergine benedetta, Santa Maria, così ho compreso la
riverente adorazione, con la quale Ella ha contemplato il suo Dio
che è il suo Creatore, provando stupore e gran riverenza
perchè Lui sarebbe nato da lei, creatura semplice e da Lui
stesso generata. Dunque questa era la causa del suo stupore:
'Che colui che era il suo Fattore fosse nato da lei che è la
sua creatura.' Questa saggezza e verità, di fronte alla
conoscenza della grandezza del Creatore e della propria
piccolezza, come creatura, è la ragione per la quale Maria
ha detto con assoluta umiltà all'Arcangelo Gabriele,
'Eccomi, sono l'ancella del Signore.' Questa sapienza e
verità le fece vedere il suo Dio così maestoso, così
eccelso, così possente e così buono che la grandezza e la
nobiltà e la contemplazione di Dio la riempirono di
riverente tremore. Ed allo stesso tempo si vide così piccola
e misera, così semplice e povera dinanzi al suo Dio che tale
riverente timore la ricolmò di umiltà. E dunque, per tale
verità fondamentale, fu piena di grazia e di ogni virtù
molto più di ogni altra creatura. In considerazione di
questo veramente compresi che Lei, per i suoi meriti e la sua
perfezione, è al di sopra di tutti coloro che Dio ha creato
al di sotto di lei. In quanto più in alto di lei non c'è
alcuna cosa creata, eccetto la beata umanità di Cristo, così
come a me apparve. E questo il nostro buon Dio lo ha
rivelato alla mia intelligenza, per ammaestrarci.
. . . . .
A questo punto Egli mi ha mostrato una piccola cosa,
grande quanto una nocciola, che mi pareva stare nel palmo
della mia mano. Era rotonda come ogni altra sfera. L'ho
guardata con gli occhi della mente e ho pensato, 'Che cosa mai
può essere?'
E mi fu così risposto: 'Questo è tutto ciò che è creato'. Mi chiedevo con stupore come avesse potuto
durare, poichè pensavo che avrebbe potuto improvvissamente
ridursi a nulla a causa della sua piccolezza. E la risposta
giunse alla mia mente: 'Sussiste
e sussisterà sempre perché Dio l'ama'. Così tutte le cose hanno origine dall'amore
di Dio.
Ed in questa piccola cosa ho visto tre attributi. Il primo è che Dio l'ha creata. Il secondo è che l'ama. E il terzo è che Dio la custodisce. Ma cosa simboleggia ciò per me? In verità il Creatore, il Custode, l'Amore. Poiché fino a che non mi sarò unita a Lui, mai avrò piena pace o vera beatitudine. Questo significa: fino a che non sarò in completa unione con Lui, e fino a che nulla di esistente nel creato si interponga tra me e il mio Dio.
Pensavo che questa piccola cosa che è creata avrebbe potuto ridursi a nulla per la sua piccolezza. Da ciò dobbiamo avere piena coscienza che tutte le cose che sono create sono nulla in confronto all'amare e al possedere Dio che è increato.
Questo è il motivo per cui non troviamo pace nel nostro cuore e nella nostra anima, poiché noi cerchiamo la pace in questa cosa che è così piccola, dove non c'è alcun ristoro, e non riconosciamo Dio, che è l'Onnipotente, che è Sapienza e Somma bontà. Poiché Lui è la vera pace. Così conosceremo Dio, e Egli ama che troviamo riposo in Lui. Poichè tutto quello che è al di sotto di Lui non è pienezza. E questo è il motivo per cui nessuna anima trova riposo finchè non fa vuoto di tutto ciò che è creato. Ma allorquando l'anima vuole far vuoto dentro di sè per amore, per possedere Lui che è tutto, allora può trovare la pace dello spirito.
Inoltre il Signore mi rivelò che non c'è più grande gioia per Lui che ricevere un'anima pura, nella nudità, semplice e umile. Essendo tale anelito la naturale propensione dell'anima toccata dallo Spirito Santo. E da ciò che ho inteso con l'intelligenza di questa visione: 'Dio, per la tua bontà, donami te stesso. Poiché tu mi basti e posso non chiedere altro che sia meno, così ch'io possa essere pienamente degna di Te per renderti pieno onore. E se dovessi chiedere meno, mi mancherebbe sempre qualcosa. Ma soltanto in Te non manco di nulla'. Queste parole, 'Dio di bontà', sono gioia per la nostra anima e sono vicinissime alla volontà di nostro Signore. Poiché la Sua bontà è in tutta la Sua creazione e in tutte le Sue opere benedette e tutte le trascende nei secoli dei secoli. Poiché Egli è l'infinito e ci ha creati solo per Se stesso, ci ha redenti con la Sua preziosa Passione e nel Suo amore benedetto ci custodisce, e tutto questo per la sua benevolenza. Questa visione mi è stata data, come ho inteso nello spirito, per ammaestrare le nostre anime ad aderire sapientemente alla bontà di Dio.
E' volontà di Dio che tre cose otteniamo nella nostra preghiera, come dono di Lui. La prima è che preghiamo con pieno intento e con tutta la mente, senza pigrizia e, per sua grazia, con gioia e letizia, senza sciocca pesantezza e vano dolore. La seconda è che rimaniamo saldamente in Lui, per amor suo, senza lamentarci e senza resistergli per le mire della nostra vita perché questa durerà ben poco. La terza è che confidiamo in lui con tutte le nostre forze, con salda fede, poichè è Sua volontà il farci conoscere che arriverà all'improvviso, pieno di benedizioni per tutti coloro che Lo amano, poiché il Suo operare è segreto, e allora sarà conosciuto. La sua venuta sarà improvvisa e come un lampo e si crederà in Lui poichè Sua è la potenza, ed Egli è umile e amabile. Sia benedetto.
Dopo di ciò vidi Dio in un punto. Da tale visione percepita con l'intelligenza compresi che Egli è tutte le cose. Contemplai riflettendo, percependo e comprendendo mediante quella visione, che Egli crea tutto ciò che è creato, ed ama la più piccola cosa. E vidi che nulla è fatto per caso o senza ordine, ma tutto viene fatto dalla onniveggente sapienza di Dio. E se anche vedessimo agire il caso o la fortuna nella vita dell'uomo, la nostra cecità e la nostra deficienza nel prevedere ne sarebbero la causa. Dunque so bene che per nostro Signore Dio non c'è causalità o accidente. E' necessario perciò che io riconosca che tutte le cose che sono create sono cose buone, poiché il Signore nostro Dio crea tutte le cose. In quel momento non mi fu rivelato l'operare della Creazione, ma quello del nostro Signore Dio nella creazione, poiché Egli è il centro di tutte le cose e tutto crea.
E sono certa che non fa il male. E qui ho visto con certezza che il male non è. Inoltre, in altre visioni nostro Signore Dio mi ha detto, 'Vedi, io sono Dio. Vedi, sono in tutte le cose. Vedi, io creo tutte le cose. Vedi, mai ho abbandonato le mie opere nè mai le abbandonerò per l'eternità. Vedi, conduco tutte le cose verso il fine da me prefissato per loro dall'eternità - con la stessa potenza, lo stesso amore e la stessa sapienza, con cui le ho create. Dunque come potrebbe esistere qualcosa che non sia cosa buona?'.
Vidi con assoluta certezza che Egli mai muta le Sue disposizioni nell'opera Sua e mai lo farà in eterno. Poiché non vi è nulla a Lui sconosciuto nella creazione, in tutto il suo ordine e la sua bontà, fin dall'eternità. E dunque tutte le cose furono ordinate prima che alcunché fosse creato, così come sarà per tutta l'eternità.
. . .
E ciò mi fu rivelato con queste parole: 'Hai raggiunto la pace?' E Cristo disse queste altre parole, 'Se tu hai la tua ricompensa, io ho la mia ricompensa'. Come se avesse detto: "E' mia gioia e cosa a me gradita, e non chiedo a te niente altro per il mio sacrifio se non che io possa darti il premio'. Ed è questo che egli mi ha fatto percepire con l'intelligenza: la proprietà di colui che dona con gioia. Il datore gioioso non considera ciò che dà, ma il suo desiderio è tutto proteso a compiacere e a confortare colui a cui ne fa dono. E se colui che riceve il dono lo accoglie con gioia e gratitudine, allora l'amabile datore ritiene come nulla tutto il suo sacrificio e tutta la sua passione per la gioia e il compiacimento che prova, poichè ha fatto cosa tanto gradita e ha tanto confortato colui che Egli ama. Ciò mi fu rivelato abbondantemente e in pienezza.
. . .
Inoltre nostro Signore si manifestò con una rivelazione sulla preghiera. In questa visione ho visto che due sono le condizioni secondo le intenzioni di nostro Signore. Una è che la preghiera sia retta. E l'altra è l'assoluta fiducia. Ma sovente tuttavia la nostra fiducia non è piena poichè non siamo certi che Dio ci ascolti. Pensiamo che sia a causa dell'esser noi indegni e per questa ragione ci sentiamo nulla. Poichè sovente, dopo aver pregato, ci sentiamo sterili e proviamo come prima aridità. E così percependo, la nostra stoltezza è causa della nostra debolezza. Poiché io stessa mi sono sentita così.
E nostro signore subitamente mi ispirò nella mente e mi rivelò queste parole, e disse, 'Io sono il fondamento della tua preghiera. Per prima cosa è mia volontà che tu giunga a pregare, e sono io che ti ispiro a volere ciò. E dunque, come sarebbe mai possibile che tu non fossi esaudita, dal momento che io ho fatto sì che tu pregassi, e tu preghi'. Ed ecco così è nella prima argomentazione delle tre che seguono: il nostro Signore Dio per quanto possibile consola, usando le stesse parole del primo ragionamento. Ove Egli dice, 'E tu preghi', rivela la sua somma gioia e l'infinita ricompensa che ci concederà per il nostro pregare.
E disse nella sesta argomentazione, 'Allora come sarebbe possibile?' Questo fu detto riguardo ad una cosa impossibile. Poiché è la cosa più impossibile che mai possa accadere che noi supplicassimo misericordia e grazia e non ottenessimo questo. Poiché tutte le cose che nostro Signore ci fa chiedere, è lui stesso ad averle preordinate per noi dall'eternità.
Dunque da questo possiamo comprendere che il nostro chiedere non è causa della benevolenza e della grazia che Egli concede a noi, ma emana dalla Sua propria bontà, che egli propriamente rivela in tutte queste dolci parole, dove dice 'Io sono il fondamento della vostra preghiera e del vostro chiedere'. Ed il nostro Signore vuole che tutti coloro che Lo amano sulla terra sappiano questo. E quanto più noi lo comprendiamo tanto più dovremmo tendere a questo, se sapientemente lo accogliessimo. E dunque queste sono le intenzioni di nostro Signore.
La sapiente preghiera è una sincera, perseverante volontà dell'anima, dalla grazia ispirata, tutt'una con la volontà dello stesso nostro Signore Dio. Lui è il primo a ricevere le nostre preghiere, così penso, le accoglie con piena gratitudine e con somma gioia. Le innalza al cielo e le custodisce come tesori, ove non andranno mai perdute. Là la nostra preghiera viene accolta, al cospetto di Dio e di tutta la sua Santa Corte celeste, per sempre esaudirci nelle necessità. E quando raggiungeremo la beatitudine in cielo, il gaudio sarà la ricompensa alle nostre preghiere, e adoranti renderemo grazie a Lui per l'eternità. Il Signore nostro Dio esulta di gioia ed è pieno di gaudio per la nostra preghiera, Egli la attende e la accoglie. Poiché mediante la Sua grazia l'orazione ci rende simili a Lui nella condizione così come lo siamo per natura.
Disse anche, 'Prega anche se pensi che non ti aiuti'. Anche la preghiera di ringraziamento è orazione. Il ringraziamento è un'autentica sapienza interiore congiunta a una grande riverenza, a un timore con sollecitudine, che suscita il volgerci con tutte le nostre forze verso le opere a cui Dio ci ha esortati, gioiendo e Lui ringraziando nell'intimo. E talora profusamente prorompe in esclamazioni, così esprimendosi, 'Signore Dio abbi pietà e sii Tu benedetto'.
. . .
La Verità vede Dio, e la Sapienza Lo contempla e da queste due origina il terzo, che è sublime santa dolcezza in Dio, l'Amore. Dove è verità e sapienza, in verità lì c'è amore e questo emana dalle due, così come tutto ciò che è stato creato da Dio. Poichè Dio è l'infinita sovrana verità, l'infinita sovrana sapienza, l'infinito sovrano amore che è da sempre.
. . .
Ed inoltre vuole che sappiamo che questa amata anima era preziosamente congiunta a Lui quando è stata creata. Il vincolo è così intimo e così possente, così che l'anima è una con Dio ed in questa unità è resa sommamente santa. Inoltre, Dio vuole che conosciamo e comprendiamo che tutte le anime che saranno salvate in cielo per l'eternità sono strettamente avvinte in tale vincolo, e unite in questo "esser uno" e rese sante in tale santità. Ed è per il sommo ed infinito amore che Dio ha per tutta l'umanità, che Egli non fa alcuna differenza nel suo amore tra la benedetta anima di Cristo e la più piccola anima che sarà salvata. Poiché è molto semplice vivere e credere che la dimora della benedetta anima di Cristo si eleva più alta nella gloriosa Deità. E in verità, così come comprendo il significato che il Signore intende, laddove è la benedetta anima di Cristo, là è anche la vita di tutte le anime che saranno salvate da Cristo.
Noi dobbiamo compiacerci grandemente del fatto che il nostro Dio ha posto la Sua dimora nella nostra anima, e ancora di più dobbiamo gioire che la nostra anima dimori in Dio. E la dimora della nostra anima è in Dio, che è da sempre. Sommo discernimento è comprendere e sapere che Dio, che è il nostro creatore, ha preso dimora nella nostra anima. E maggior saggezza è comprendere più profondamente, e ancora di più intuire e conoscere che la nostra anima, che è creata, nell'essenza dimora in Dio, e tale essenza, per grazia di Dio, ci rende quel che siamo.
Inoltre l'onnipotente verità della Trinità è nostro Padre. Poiché ci ha creati e ci custodisce in Lui. E la profonda sapienza della Trinità è nostra Madre, in cui noi siamo tutti racchiusi. E la somma benevolenza della Trinità è nostro Signore e viviamo in intimità con Lui e Lui è in noi. Tutto potenza, tutto sapienza e tutto bontà; un unico Dio, un unico Signore, un'unica benevolenza.
. . .
Dio è più vicino a noi della nostra stessa anima poiché Lui è il fondamento in cui la nostra anima si radica ed Egli è lo strumento che mantiene l'essenza ed il corpo materiale uniti così che essa non se ne parta mai. Poiché la nostra anima è in Dio, riposa in lui, rimane in Dio con salda forza, e per natura è radicata in Dio, nell'amore infinito. E dunque se vogliamo conoscere la nostra anima e vivere in comunione spirituale ed insieme amare, è cosa giusta cercare la nostra anima in Dio nostro Signore, che Egli racchiude in Sé.
. . .
E così come in verità Dio è nostro Padre, altrettanto vero è che Dio è nostra Madre. E Dio rivela questo in tutte le cose e più propriamente quando dice queste dolci parole: 'Io sono ciò'. Questo significa, 'Io sono la potenza e la benevolenza di Dio Padre; Io sono la sapienza e la dolcezza della Maternità; Io sono la luce e la grazia che è tutto amore benedetto; Io sono la Trinità; Io sono l'Unità; Io sono la somma sovrana bontà di tutte le cose; Io sono colui che suscita il tuo amare; Io sono colui che suscita il tuo desiderare l'infinita pienezza di ogni vero anelito'.
. . .
Sento che vi sono tre modi di contemplare la Maternità di Dio. Il primo è fondamento della nostra natura creata. Il secondo deriva dalla nostra natura, e da lì si è originata la Maternità della grazia. Il terzo è la Maternità della creazione e questo è un'effondersi della stessa grazia, un profluvio di grazia, somma e perfetta per tutti i secoli dei secoli. E tutto è un unico amore.
. . .
La protezione della madre è la più vicina, la più sollecita e la più sicura. E' la più vicina poichè è naturale, la più sollecita poichè è tutta amore, la più sicura poiché è verace. Questo ufficio nessuno sarebbe mai capace di compiere perfettamente, se non Gesù Cristo, Dio e Uomo. Sappiamo bene che ogni madre ci dà alla luce con dolore e per la morte. Ma solo la nostra vera Madre, Gesù, ci fa nascere alla gioia e alla beatitudine, e alla vita eterna. Sia benedetto.
Dunque ci sostiene, ci fa rimanere in Lui, nel suo amore. E quando è giunta l'ora patì, soffrendo le più acute pene e i più atroci dolori che mai siano stati e saranno. Morì infine e questo fu compiuto per condurci alla beatitudine. Tuttavia questo ancora non sarebbe stato abbastanza per il suo sommo amore. E mi rivelò ciò con queste somme ed eccelse parole d'amore, 'Se potessi soffrire di più, soffrirei di più'.
Gesù è morto una volta per sempre, ma non cesserà di sacrificarsi. Dunque deve nutrirci poiché il prezioso amore della Maternità Lo ha reso nostro debitore. La madre può dare a suo figlio il suo latte da succhiare, ma, la nostra preziosa Madre, Gesù può nutrirci offrendo se stesso, e opera ciò in completa umiltà e piena tenerezza mediante il santissimo sacramento del Corpo e Sangue Suo, il prezioso cibo di vita. E con tutti questi dolci sacramenti Egli, benignissimo e misericordioso, è nostro sostegno.
. . .
Siamo nelle dolci e amorevoli mani della
Madre nostra, sollecite e premurose. Poiché in tutto questo
operare Egli assume l'ufficio di una amorevole nutrice che non
ha nessun altro compito se non attendere alla salvezza del suo
bambino. La missione di nostro Signore Gesù Cristo è quella di
salvarci. Questo è compiuto per i suoi meriti, ed è conforme
alla sua volontà che si conosca. Poiché Egli vuole che lo
amiamo teneramente e confidiamo in Lui con umiltà e con tutta
le nostre forze. E questo rivelò con tali benigne parole 'Vi sostengo fortemente'. Per di più un bambino per natura confida
sempre nell'amore della madre e, naturalmente non pone la sua
fiducia in sè; ama la madre ed essi si amano reciprocamente.
Inoltre il mio anelito e la mia grande speranza era che, per dono di Dio, fossi liberata da questo mondo e da questa vita. Poiché sovente ho veduto le pene dell'esistere e il benessere e la condizione beata che è nei Cieli e talora ho pensato che malgrado non abbia avuto in questa vita altro dolore che l'assenza di nostro Signore Dio, questo era più di quanto potessi sopportare e questo mi addolorava e mi struggevo nel mio anelito. Inoltre la mia stessa miseria, pigrizia e abbattimento hanno contribuito a quella situazione, cosicché non volevo vivere e soffrire in quanto per me era insopportabile. Ed a tutto questo il nostro amabile Signore Dio rispose confortandomi e esortandomi ad essere capace di sopportare con queste parole: 'In un subito sarai liberata da tutto il tuo dolore e da tutta la tua malattia e da ogni tua pena. E verrai quassù e avrai me come tua ricompensa e premio e sarai ricolma di gioia e beatitudine. E mai più proverai alcun dolore, nè avrai alcuna malattia, nè alcun dispiacere, nè mancanza di volontà, ma sarai per sempre nella gioia e nella beatitudine per l'eternità. Perché dunque dovrebbe affliggerti il soffrire per un po', dal momento che questa è la mia volontà ed è degno del mio onore?
È volontà di Dio che fissiamo i nostri pensieri in
questa benedetta contemplazione il più spesso ed il più a
lungo possibile.
X.xxiv.46v
nd with
this our good Lord said full blissfully, 'Lo, how I love you'. As if he had
said, 'My darling, behold and see your Lord your God who
is your Maker and your endless joy. See your own brother, your
Saviour, my child, behold. See what liking and bliss I have in
your salvation. And for my love joy now with me'. And also for
more understanding this blessed word was said, 'Lo, how I love you'. As
if he had said, 'Behold and see that I loved you so much before
I died for you, that I would die for you, and now I have died
for you and suffered willfully that I may. And now is all my
bitter pain and all my hard travail turned to endless joy and
bliss to me. And to you. How should it now be, that you should
pray anything of me that delights me, but if I should full
gladly grant it to you. For my delight is your holiness and your
endless joy and bliss with me.
Il nostro buon Signore disse in piena beatitudine: 'Guarda quanto ti amo', come se avesse detto: 'Mia diletta, contempla e guarda il tuo Signore, il tuo Dio, che è il tuo creatore e la tua gioia eterna. Guarda il fratello tuo, il tuo salvatore; figlia mia, contempla e guarda quale gaudio e beatitudine provo per la tua salvezza, e rallegrati con me per il mio amore'. E perché comprendessi più profondamente, furono dette queste parole benedette: 'Guarda quanto ti amo', come se avesse detto: 'Contempla e guarda che ti ho così tanto amato, prima di morire per te, da voler morire per te. E ora sono morto per te, e ho voluto soffrire così. Ora tutta la mia amara pena e tutto il mio duro travaglio sono stati trasformati in gioia eterna e gaudio per me, per te. Come potrebbe accadere ora che tu mi chieda qualcosa che mi è gradito senza che io te lo conceda con grande gioia? Per il mio gaudio è la tua santità, la tua gioia e felicità eterna unita a me'.
XIV.liv.113-113v
And
for the great endless love that God has to all mankind, he makes
no separation in love between the blessed soul of Christ and the
least soul that shall be saved. For it is full easy to believe
and to trust, that the dwelling of the blessed soul of Christ is
full high in the glorious Godhead. And truly as I understand in
our Lord's meaning, where the blessed soul of Christ is, there
is the substance of all the souls who shall be saved by Christ.
Highly ought we to enjoy that God dwells in our soul, and much
more highly ought we enjoy that our soul dwells in God. Our soul
is made to be God's dwelling place, and the dwelling place of
our soul is God who is unmade. A high understanding it is
inwardly to see and to know that God who is our maker dwells in
our soul. And a higher understanding it is inwardly to see and
to know our soul that is made dwells in God's substance, of
which substance by God, we are who we are. And I saw no
difference between God and our substance but as it were all God.
And yet my understanding took that our substance is in God, that
is to say that God is God, and our substance is a creature in
God.
E per l'infinito grande amore che Dio ha per tutta l'umanità non fa alcuna distinzione nell'amore tra l'anima santa di Cristo e la più piccola anima che sarà salvata. E' pienamente semplice credere e confidare che la dimora dell'anima beata di Cristo è eccelsa nella gloria di Dio; ma è anche vero, come compresi da quello che nostro Signore mi rivelava, che dove dimora l'anima beata di Cristo, là c'è pure l'essenza di tutte le anime che saranno salvate da Cristo. Dovremmo grandemente gioire che Dio abita nella nostra anima; e ancor più grandemente dovremmo gioire che la nostra anima dimora in Dio. La nostra anima è stata creata per essere la dimora di Dio, e la dimora della nostra anima è Dio che è increato. Sublime conoscenza è vedere e percepire intimamente che Dio, nostro creatore, dimora nella nostra anima, e una conoscenza ancora più grande è il vedere e conoscere più intimamente che la nostra anima, che è creata, dimora nell'essenza di Dio, e per questa essenza divina noi siamo quello che siamo. E non vidi differenza alcuna tra Dio e la nostra essenza, ma era come se tutto fosse Dio.
XIV.lvi.118
And
thus I saw full securely that it is readier to us, and more easy
to come to the knowing of God, than to know our own soul.
For our soul is so deep grounded in God and so endlessly
treasured that we may not come to the knowing thereof, till we
have first knowing of God, who is the maker to whom it is oned.
But notwithstanding, I saw that we have naturally of fullness to
desire wisely, and truly to know our own soul. Whereby we are
taught to seek it where it is, and that is in God. And thus by
gracious leading of the holy Ghost, we should know them both in
one. Whether we be stirred to know God, or our soul, they are
both good and true. God is nearer to us than our own soul, for
he is ground in whom our soul stands, and he is the means who
keeps the substance and the sensuality together so that they
shall never separate. For our soul sits in God in very rest, and
our soul stands in God in true strength. And our soul is
naturally rooted in God in endless love. And therefore if we
will have knowledge of our soul and communing and dalliance
therewith, we must needs seek into our Lord God in whom it is
enclosed.
E così vidi con assoluta certezza che più prontamente e più facilmente riusciamo a conoscere Dio che non la nostra anima. La nostra anima è così profondamente radicata in Dio e così custodita per l'eternità come un tesoro che non possiamo giungere a conoscerla se prima non conosciamo Dio, il creatore al quale è unita. Ciò nonostante vidi che per la nostra natura e la nostra perfezione dobbiamo desiderare con sapienza e rettitudine di conoscere la nostra anima, imparando a cercarla dove essa è, e cioè in Dio. E così per la guida che ci viene dalla grazia del Santo Spirito noi conosceremo le due cose in una: sia che siamo spinti a conoscere Dio o la nostra anima; ambedue gli impulsi sono buoni e veri. Dio è più vicino a noi di quanto non lo sia la nostra stessa anima, poiché egli è il fondamento su cui poggia la nostra anima [Egli è il mediatore che tiene unite l'essenza e il desiderio così che non si separino mai]. Poiché la nostra anima riposa in Dio nella quiete, in Dio ha la vera forza. La nostra anima è per sua natura radicata in Dio in un amore infinito. E dunque, se vogliamo conoscere la nostra anima, conversare e entrare con essa in comunione, dobbiamo cercarla in Dio nostro Signore, in Lui essa è racchiusa.
XVI.lxviii.143v
And then our Lord opened my ghostly eye and showed me my soul in the midst of my heart. I saw the soul so large as it were an endless world and as it were a blissful kingdom. And by the condition I saw therein I understood, that it is a worshipful city.
E Dio nostro Signore aprì gli occhi del mio spirito
e mi mostrò la mia anima nell'intimo del mio cuore. Vidi che
l'anima era così grande da essere come una cittadella senza
confini e come un regno beato. Capii da quel che vidi dentro
che è una città che deve essere adorata.
Julian's
manuscripts, like those of Catherine of Siena, are copied out
again and again in the context of Syon Abbey, the Abbey
deliberately founded in England in accordance with St
Birgitta's Rule by Henry V, in response to her desire for
peace between England and the rest of the world.
Interestingly, both Julian (circa 1413) and Syon Abbey (1434)
were visited by an indefatigable woman pilgrim, mother of
fourteen, Margery Kempe.
Margery
Kempe
visited
Julian
of Norwich perhaps before 1413 and later reported their
conversations, thus providing for us not only the early
written texts we now have, the Amherst, Westminster, Paris
Texts, but also an Oral Text, spoken just prior to the time
that the 1413 exemplar to the Amherst Text was being
written. Margery's Manuscript thus allows us to go back to
fifteenth-century East Anglia with, as it were, a
tape-recorder or an IPod. For this reason we present this
essay in an oral recording on the Web which can be read
simultaneously with this text, giving the various Julian and
Margery texts, on the screen. Julian functioned in her
community much like a psychiatrist, healing souls, that
Greek word, in fact, meaning 'soul doctor'. For the Middle
Ages theology was psychiatry, making use of the Book of Job
and of Boethius' Consolation of Philosophy. Julian helps heal
Margery's soul, perhaps too by suggesting the therapy of the
Jerusalem pilgrimage and the writing of the vast book of her
travels, The Book of Margery Kempe.
Both the Amherst and the Butler-Bowden Manuscripts, of Julian's Showing and Margery's Book, are now in the British Library. This essay transcribes directly from the manuscript texts. The letter þ 'thorn' is the Middle English form for th, the letter 3, 'yoch', is g, y or gh, the median letter ∫ the scribal s. Contractions are spelled out in italics. The foliation of the manuscripts is cited, preceded by A for Amherst (the Julian Showing Manuscript in the British Library, Additional 37,790), W for Westminster (the Julian Showing Manuscript owned by Westminster Cathedral and on loan to Westminster Abbey), P for Paris (the Julian Showing Manuscript in the Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Anglais 40) which can all be retrieved from the edition by Sister Anna Maria Reynolds, C.P. and Julia Bolton Holloway, published by SISMEL, Florence, 2001), and M for The Book of Margery Kempe (the Butler-Bowden Manuscript, now British Library, Additional 61,823, discovered in 1934, and retrieved from the manuscript rather than from the edition by Sanford Brown Meech and Hope Emily Allen, Oxford: Early English Text Society, 212, 1939, 1961). Letters and words rubricated here are so in the manuscripts.
Margery has her scribes tell us (M, folio 21)
Margery and Julian's conversation continues
Julian next is reported as citing her authorities, Paul and Jerome, to Margery, who perhaps misremembers one of them:
Julian next discusses evil:
Apart from the Hilton and Julian texts in the Westminster Manuscript, making this same point are other texts associated with Julian: Norwich Castle Manuscript, fol. 78v: . . . iusti sedes est sapiencie. ffor as seith holy write the soule of the ry3tful man or womman is the see & dwelling of endeles wisdom that is goddis sone swete ihe If we been besy & doon our deuer to fulfille the wil of god & his pleasaunce thanne loue we hym wit al our my3te; and likewise John Whiterig, Contemplating the Crucifixion; from Anima iusti sedes est sapiencie: Proverbs 10.25b; cited, Gregory, Hom. XXXVIII in Evang. PL 76, 1282.
With that last comment, '& ∫o I tru∫t, ∫y∫ter, þat 3e ben', we realise that we certainly are listening to reported speech and that Dame Julian addressed Dame Margery, her 'evyn cristen', even as 'Sister'. The discussion of evil reminds one more of William Flete's Remedies Against Temptations than it does of Julian's 'sin as nought'. Interestingly, this phrasing concerning the soul as a city is closer to that of the Sixteenth Showing in the 1393/1580 Paris Manuscript, P143v-145v, and the 1413/1450s Amherst Manuscript, A112, which both give vestiges of the Lord and the Servant Parable, than it is to the earlier version, the Fourteenth Showing, present in the Westminster, W101-102v, and Paris, P116-119, Manuscripts.
liance þer with: It behouyth
to ∫eke into oure lord god
in
whom it is enclo∫yd. And an=
nentis oure ∫ub∫tance it may
ryghtfully be called our
∫oule.
and anentis our ∫en∫ualite it
may ryghtfull be called our
∫oule. and þat is by þe onyng
þat it hath in god. That wur=
∫hypfull cite þat our lord ihesu
∫yttith in. it is our
∫en∫ualite.
in whiche he is enclo∫ed.
and
our kyndely sub∫tance is
beclo=
∫yd in ihesu cri∫te. with þe ble∫∫ed
∫oule of cri∫te ∫yttyng in
re∫te
in þe godhed. And I ∫awe ful
∫urely þat it behouyth nedis
þat we ∫hall be in longynge
and in penance. into þe tyme
þat we be led ∫o depe in to god
þat we may verely &
truely
know oure owne ∫oule. And
∫othly I ∫aw þat in to thys
high depenes oure lorde hym
∫elfe ledith vs in þe ∫ame
loue
þat he made vs. and in þe same
loue þat he bought vs. bi
his
mercy & grace þrough vertue
of his blessed pa∫∫ion. And
not with∫tondyng all þis we
may neuer comme to the full
knowyng of god. tyll we
fir∫t
know clerely oure owne
∫oule.
ffor into þe tyme þat it be in the
ffull myghtis we may not be
all full holy. and þat is þat oure
∫en∫ualite. by þe vertue of
cri∫tis
pa∫∫ion be brought up into þe
∫ub∫tance with all the profitis of
oure tribulacion þat oure lorde
∫hall make vs to gete by mercy
& grace.
Of interest, too, is that the Amherst Manuscript contains not only Julian's Showing of Love but also Jan van Ruusbroec's Sparkling Stone, translated into Middle English. Both Julian's Sixteenth Showing, P146, and the Sparkling Stone make use of Revelation 2.17. The Amherst Manuscript, A118, gives the text from Ruusbroec's Sparkling Stone discussing the Apocalypse of St John as the 'Book of the Secrets of God' addressed 'To him that overcometh', in which 'the spirit says in the Apocalyps vincenti says he schalle gyffe hym a lytil white stone and in it a newe name the whiche no man knowes but he that takys it' . This is material Julian well could have shared with Margery.
Julian continues:
1st Gent. An ancient land in ancient oraclesJulian and Margery inscribe within the pages of their books their souls and their cities, black-clad Julian in her anchorhold in Norwich inscribing within that small space all the cosmos and its Creator while Margery in her white pilgrim robes trudges to Jerusalem and back.
Is called "law-thirsty:" all the struggle there
Was after order and a perfect rule.
Pray, where lie such lands now? . .
2nd Gent. Why, where they lay of old - in human souls.
A. The Brigittines
B. The Benedictines: Dames Margaret Gascoigne, Bridget More, Barbara Constable, Gertrude More, Catherine Gascoigne, Clementia Cary, Agnes More, Fathers Augustine Baker and Serenus Cressy, OSB
Dames Margaret Gascoigne (†1637) and Bridget More, OSB (†1665)
Dame Bridget More, OSB
ame Margaret Gascoigne, OSB, an exiled English Benedictine nun at Cambrai in
Flanders, died there in 1637, hers being the first grave
within the shadow of their monastic house. Before that
date she had compiled a contemplative anthology of her
devotions. In its Chapter Forty-Two, she had copied out a
fragment from a medieval Julian exemplar likely present at
Cambrai, and commented upon its text. She misreads, or
only partially reads, the text, believing that Julian
dies, rather than lives, following her death-bed vision of
1373. Nevertheless she responds appropriately to her
reading, taking Julian's experiencing of God's presence
into her own intense life of monastic prayer. In so doing
she is part of a Benedictine continuity of contemplation,
a continuity that transcends time and gender, caring only
that the soul be oned with God in eternity that equally
included women with men, to be attained in a community
where all are vowed to conversion from worldliness, to
stability and to obedience.
Dame Margaret Gascoigne's book of devotions would likely have been found in her cell at her death and was treasured by her Benedictine Sisters who particularly made copies of it when the Cambrai daughter house was founded at Paris. The copy that survives, called by Placid Spearitt, OSB, 'Gascoigne B', was most carefully made by Dame Bridget More, OSB, descendant of Thomas More, sister of the foundress of the Cambrai Our Lady of Consolation, Dame Gertrude More, OSB, and herself first Prioress of the Paris Our Lady of Good Hope. Another of their relatives was Dame Agnes More, again a descendant of Thomas More, who wrote a treatise influenced by Julian of Norwich, titled The Building of Divine Love. While Dame Clementia Cary, OSB, was the Foundress of the Paris house; being the daughter of Viscount Falkland, Viceroy in Ireland, she had contacts with Caroline royalty, especially Queen Henrietta Maria, and she brought with her into community her father's chaplain, Serenus Cressy, OSB, who would publish the first edition of Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love in 1670. Dame Margaret Gascoigne had been sister to Dame Catherine Gascoigne, OSB, who was elected first Abbess of Our Lady of Consolation in Cambrai in 1629, both coming from Yorkshire, their niece, Dame Justina Gascoigne, succeeding Dame Bridget More as Prioress at Our Lady of Good Hope in Paris in 1665.
The party of English women had settled in Cambrai in 1623, and within six months they had petitioned the President of the English Congregation to send them a monk qualified to train them in Benedictine contemplative prayer. In answer, they were joined in 1624 by Father Augustine Baker, OSB, who became their spiritual director until his stormy removal in 1633, when he returned to Douai. He went back to England in 1638, dying there in 1641.
The Paris daughter house, founded in 1651, brought forth an intense burst of copying of all devotional books in the Cambrai library prior to that removal, the greatest number being executed by Dame Barbara Constable, who had joined the Cambrai community from Yorkshire in 1645,(3) the copied books including Dame Bridget More's manuscript of Dame Margaret Gascoigne (today, St Mary's Abbey, Colwich, H18, folios 155-161), Dame Barbara Constable's fragmentary manuscript of Julian's Showing of Love (Upholland Manuscript), and Dame Clementia Cary's complete manuscript of Julian's Showing of Love (British Library, Sloane 1). Another complete manuscript is found with Sloane 1 and given the siglum S2. Both these manuscripts have careful annotations made in preparation for the 1670 first edition. Yet another manuscript is the most carefully prepared Stowe 42, turning the queries and NBs of S1 and S2 into carefully prepared but not quite finished shoulder notes from which Serenus Cressy's 1670 edition was to be typeset. All these manuscripts tend to give the words to Christ to Julian in larger script than they do the texts in which these are embedded.
How did Margaret Gascoigne and the Cambrai and Paris communities come by a medieval exemplar of Julian's Showing of Love? It is possible that they acquired the exemplar for the Paris Long Text, Bibliothèque Nationale, Anglais 40 (which in their day was shut up in the Bigot collection in Rouen), but which had been copied out by Syon Abbey in exile in Flanders. They could have obtained that exemplar from Sheen Anglorum. But the manuscripts of G, U, S1 and S2 all differ from P in that they enlarge or underline Christ's words to Julian, while P rubricates them. The other possibility is that Dame Margaret Gascoigne had treasured a Julian manuscript that had remained in her family since the days of Thomas Gascoigne, Chancellor of Oxford and patron of Syon Abbey, and which was to engender in turn G, U, S1, S2, C1 and Serenus Cressy's published edition from C1 as C2.
These texts were read and copied in the midst of a living community of prayer and contemplation, and one that continues today at Stanbrook and at Colwich. But the Sisters had to fight with every weapon of love and obedience to preserve their manuscripts, including their manuscript of Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love. In 1655, they were ordered by Dom Claude White, then President of the English Benedictine Congregation, to surrender their contemplative books which were perceived 'to containe poysonous, pernicious and diabolicall doctrine'. The Abbess and the Sisters prostrated themselves before Dom White, refusing, in charity, to surrender their books (one of them their exemplar manuscript of Julian's Showing of Love),
Text:
__________________________
_____________________________
___________________________
ought, yet I desire that
with all the might,
and powers of my soule,
and with all the
affection of my harte, I
could reioice
in thy infinite
happines; and though
my soule be neuer so
poore and in
neuer so great miseries,
yet I desire
according to such
abilitie as is in me
of thy gift, to ioy and
reioy together with
thee, for what thou art and doest
possesse in thy immense
riches,
power and glorie , and in all that
is pleasing to thee in
all things, in thy
selfe and in all thy
creatures, in the
riches of others, and my
owne pouertie
and miserie (for to
them, whom thou
art pleasing to, what
thing of thine
can be displeasing.) and
what is wan=
ting in me (through
disabilitie) to
performe in this matter,
I will re=
ioice and exullt in
hart, that in all
fullnes and perfection
it is supplied
____________________________
and aboundeth in thee
thy self, where
I hope my selfe
accordinglie in the
time which thou hast
from eternitie
foreordained for it, to
finde by ex=
perience such supplie
and amends
for all mine and other
creatures in=
sufficiencies in the
matter. I farther=
more reioice in my Saluation which
I confidentlie hope in
vertue of thy
most free and liberall
goodnes, in the
end to obtaine at the
handes of thy
mercie, and in no sorte
as if I could
expect anie such matter
as due
to me or merited by me,
nor anie
other waies to be
attained to by me,
then by thy free giuft
and meere
mercie (in vertue of the
grace and
deserts of my most deere
Lorde
and sauiour Jesu Christ thy
onlie
and most dearelie
beloued sonne)
____________________________
which mercies and
goodnesses of thine I
haue allreadie in
various maners euen
in my owne most
unworthie selfe so
greatlie and so
frequentlie experienced, that
I can not, nor maie
heerafter doubt there=
of, but euer maie, must,
and will to the
end confidentlie hope in
thesame, and
thereon onlie and wholie
relie.
Since editing the above I enquired of Dame Margaret Truran
about their manuscript of Augustine Baker on Dame Margaret
Gascoigne and she has kindly sent the following:
The passage in Fr Baker’s Life and Death of Dame Margaret Gascoigne on Julian of Norwich runs as follows (my transcript).
"She upon Sunday at night, being the Vigil of St Laurence, in bed beginning to be distressed in body, and the next morning after being present at Mass she there fainted and was carried thence into the Infirmary where remaining to her expiration or last Agony in perfect use of her senses, she for that space spent her thoughts wholly towards God, and in preparation for death, if God should please to send it, and which she esteemed (considering how she found her state of body) would be her lot by means of the Extraordinary Indisposition & sickness she was now in. Towards the said good Preparation for Death, and to hold her the more continually and efficaciously therein, she caused one that was oft conversant & familiar with her to place (written at and underneath the Crucifix, that remained there before her, and which she regarded with her eyes during her sickness and till her death) the holy words that had sometime been spoken by God to the holy Virgin Juliana the Anchoress of Norwich, as appeareth by the Old Manuscript Book of her Revelations, and with the which words our Dame had ever formerly been much delighted: ‘Intend (or attend) to me. I am enough for thee: rejoice in me thy Saviour and in thy salvation.’ Those words, I say, remained before her eyes beneath the Crucifix till her death." Stanbrook Baker MS 19 (copy of Downside Abbey Baker MS 42), pp 46-47.Gaudium Paschale!
Sr Margaret OSB
Dame Barbara Constable, OSB († )
Dame Barbara Constable, OSB
n the
seventeenth century exiled English nuns were reading,
copying out and contemplating upon fourteenth-century texts,
one of these being Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love. Dame Barbara Constable,
OSB, in particular, in her clearly legible hand, was
responsible for the copying out of innumerable Augustine
Baker manuscripts, - as they are called by English
Benedictine monks. But many of these texts are less those of
Father Augustine Baker, OSB,'s writings, than they are of
the writings of mystics which he encouraged the English
Benedictine nuns to use in their own devotional writings,
for their own libraries for contemplation. Dame Barbara
Constable in these pages is copying out St Teresa of Avila,
Henry Suso, Julian of Norwich (whom she calls 'St Iulian')
and John Tauler. She herself never left Cambrai once she
entered in 1638, yet her manuscripts made their way to Paris
and also to the men's Benedictine abbeys and to the mission
in England.
One reason for the great amount of copying done by Dame Barbara Constable and others at Cambrai was because of dissension amongst the English Benedictines, the nuns desiring to continue Father Augustine Baker's contemplative practices, for which he had obtained for them medieval manuscripts from Sir Robert Cotton during his time at Cambrai, 1624-1633, the monks wishing to suppress this activity and call in and censor these texts, first in 1633 and again in 1655. To prevent their loss the nuns, amidst great poverty, even established a daughter house in Paris, in 1651, taking to it duplicates of all their texts, hurriedly made out 1650-1651. Manuscripts of Julian's Showing of Love are mentioned twice in their catalogue, now in the Bibliothèque Mazarine, which was confiscated from the English nuns at the French Revolution. In 1655 the nuns defied the monks, going so far as to threaten to withdraw from the English Benedictine Congregation, rather than relinquish their books on spirituality, their most prized being Julian's Showing of Love. The nuns in Paris had already in their Consitution itself, written out both in English by Dame Clementia Cary, OSB, in English, and in French by Dame Bridget More, OSB, stated that the community would continue in the contemplative practices taught them by the Venerable Augustine Baker, OSB The English nuns in exile were preserving Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love three hundred years after it was written in Norwich and three hundred years before we ourselves - around the world - could hold her text in our hands.
Serenus Cressy, OSB, became the chaplain at the Paris daughter house for a brief period, having already strong associations with the Cary family. He published Augustine Baker's Sancta Sophia or Holy Wisdom , describing these devotional practices based on the Cloud Author's writings, William Flete's Remedies Against Temptations (thought to be by Richard Rolle) and Hilton's Scale of Perfection with its prayer of the pilgrim, 'I am nought, I have nought, I seek nought, but sweet Jesus in Jerusalem'. Cressy also published the writings of Dame Gertrude More, Dame Bridget More's sister, who had founded the Cambrai mother house. These two biological sisters were direct descendants of St Thomas More. Then in 1670 Cressy published the editio princeps, the first edition, of Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love. That text was carefully transcribed in preparation for this publication in England by these English nuns in exile in France, and to do so they collated all their manuscripts of Julian, one of them a now lost medieval exemplar to the two Sloane versions of the Long Text, another a Tudor exemplar like that of Paris, copied out by them into Stowe 42. Thus these nuns had in their possession no less than seven manuscripts in total or in part of Julian's Showing of Love, five of which still exist, two at Cambrai being lost at the Revolution.
Following the French Revolution these English Benedictine nuns returned to England, bringing some of their fine library of medieval contemplative texts with them, while other manuscript books of theirs remain in France. But the Cambrai collection was largely lost, those English Benedictines having been imprisoned at Compiègne with the French Carmelites, the latter of whom were then guillotined, the English nuns inheriting their clothing. Cambrai's Our Lady of Consolation is today Stanbrook Abbey in Worcester, Paris' Our Lady of Good Hope is St Mary's Abbey, Colwich, Stafford.
Of interest is that Dame Margaret Gascoigne and Dame Barbara Constable both present Christ's words to Julian in larger letters, a trait seen also in Westminster in one instance, and throughout in Sloane 3709. When Serenus Cressy took Stowe 42, which instead reduces these words both to differentiate them from the rest of the text, and to save paper, the printer elected to print them instead in italics. In the Paris Manuscript, which at this time was still in Rouen where the Brigittine nuns had left it in their flight in time of war to Lisbon, and to which the English Benedictines lacked all access, Christ's words to Julian are in red, rubricated, a practice familiar to the Brigittines who customarily wrote the Office books so for the next entrant into Syon Abbey following themselves.
Dame Barbara selected fine passages from Julian's Showing of Love, culling these from the Twelfth and Thirteenth Revelations and from Chapters 28, 30 and 32, then followed that selection with a discussion on the Way of Perfection as exemplified in the writings of the two Friends of God, Henry Suso and John Tauler, all of the fourteenth century.
When Hywel Wyn Owen examined the Upholland Manuscript he found it was bound in a piece of the same office book as another manuscript at Colwich, H18, which also contains a fragment from Julian's Showing of Love. This other manuscript is where Dame Bridget More, OSB, descendant of St Thomas More, copied out the contemplative anthology written originally by Dame Margaret Gascoigne, OSB, who had died at Cambrai in 1637.
This Upholland
Manuscript became separated from both Abbeys and, according to
the Julian scholar, Sister Benedicta Ward, S.L.G, who sought
information concerning it, is lost. But Father Eric Colledge,
O.S.A., had earlier given to Stanbrook a bound photocopy of
the entire text. Because the foliation in the manuscript is
incorrect, the verso being written not on the back of the
folio but on the subsequent page, that given in Hywel Wyn Owen
and Luke Bell's article, 'The Upholland Anthology: An
Augustine Baker Manuscript', The Downside Review
(1989), 274-292, is also incorrect, so when I requested Dame
Easnwyth Edwards, OSB, to photocopy for me the relevant Julian
pages, two are lacking. I supply them from Hywel Wyn Owen's
transcription. The remainder is taken directly from the
photocopy of the Upholland Manuscript. It also gives the two
following pages, which are not Julian's Showing of Love,
but instead a discourse upon the way of perfection, citing
Suso and Tauler.
[Folio 113]
The number of the words passeth my witts and vnderstanding, and all my mights, for they were in the highest, as to my sight;
[113v]
for therein is comprehended I am not able to tell what, so that it cannot be expressed. But the ioy that I saw in the shewing of them exceedingly surpasseth all that hart can thinke, or soule may desire. And therefore these words (the meaning of them) be not declared heere; but euery one according to the grace god hath giuen him in vnderstanding and louing, let them receaue them in our lords meaning.
[114]
thought in my mind; I should haue forsaken and not haue yealded vnto it; yet neuerthelesse it caused me to mourne and sorrow without discretion. but Jesu who in this vision enformed me of all thinges that were needfull, answered by this word and sayd: Sinne is behouefull, But all shall be well. In this naked worde. Sinne. our lord brought to my mind generally all that is not good.
[114v]
compassion; That to each person that he loueth and intendeth to bring to his bliss he layeth on him something, that is to some affliction or tribulation, that is no impediment to the soule in the sight of God, therby they be humbled and despised in this world, scorned, mocked, and contemned by others And this he doth to hinder and preuent he harme which they are apt to fall into, and would incurre by the pride the pompe and the vaine glory of this wretched life, and for to their way the more readdy, and better prepare them to come to heauen, and enioy his blisse without end euerlasting for he sayth, I shall all to breake you from your vaine affections, and your vitius pride; and after that I shall gather you and make you meeke and mild, cleane and holy by uniting you to mee. And then I saw that each kind compassion that man hath one his euen Christian with charity, it is christ in him, whose loue to man made him to esteeme little of all the paines he suffered in his passion, which loue againe was shewed here in this compassion, wherin were two thinges to be understood in our lords meaning, the on was the blisse that we be
[115]
brought vnto, wherin his will is that we reioyce the other is, for our comfort in our paine and tribulation: for he will that wee know all shall turne to his worship and to our profit by the vertue of his holy passion: and that we know that wee suffered right no thing alone, but with him, and that we see him our ground. And that we see his paines and his tribulations so farre to exceed and surpasse all that we can suffer, that it cannot be fully thought or imagined. And the well beholding and considering of this will keepe vs from ouermuch trouble and despaire in the feeling of our paines, and we see verely that our sinnes deserue it, yet his loue excuseth vs, and of his great curtesy he doth away all our blames and beholdeth vs with ruth and merveilous pitty as children Innocents and vnspotted.
[115v]
we deserue of him, and the more speedy and expedient it is to our selues. And thus we may see and enioy or reioyce in that our part is our Lord. The other part is hid and shutt up, or concealed from us. that is to say, all that is besides our salluation for that is our lords priuy counsell and it belongeth to the Royall Lordship of allmighty god to haue his priuy counsels in peace. And it belongeth to his seruants for obedience and reuerence to him, not to haue or will or desire to know his counsels, Our lord hath pitty and compassion on vs, for that some creatures do busy themselues so much therein seeking and desiring to know and vnderstand the secrets of all mighty god. And I am sure if we know how much we should please him and ease ourselues to forbear it we would do it.
The saints in heaven, thay haue a will to know nothing, but that which our Lord will shew them. And also their charity and desire is ruled according to the will of our Lord. And thus ought we to haue our will like to them; Then shall we nothing will nor desire, but the will
[116]
of our lord like as they do. for we bee all one in gods meaning. And heer I was taught that I should only enioy in our Blessed Sauiour Jesu, and trust in him for all thinges.
[116v]
impossible that euer they should come to a good end. And vpon these wee looke sorrowfull and mourne therfore, so that it cannot rest in the blessedfull holding of God as we should doe. And the cause is this, that the vse of our reason and vnderstanding is now so blind & Lowe that we cannot know nor vnderstand the high mervailous wisedome, and the goodnes of the most blessed Trinity. And thus meaneth he where he sayth Thou shalt see thy selfe that all manner of thing shall be welle, as if he had seyd take or beleeue faithfully and trust fully and hearafter thou shalt see it verely and truely in fullnes of ioy. And thus in the same fiue words before sayd: I may make all thinges well I vnderstood a mighty comfort (that wee owght to take) of all the workes of our Lord god, that are to come
[The text following that giving excerpts from Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love appears to be a contemplation by Dame Barbara Constable, OSB, or from another Benedictine, and copied out by her, concerning the way of perfection as described in the conversions of the Friends of God Henry Suso and John Tauler.]
[117]
O how exceedingly are we bound to god for discouering vnto vs this way so necessary, and whereof there is so few teachers, considering also how many soules he leaueth in want thereof, and who if they knew the way, would ioyfully prosecute it: O swee Iesus. blessed for euer be thy sweet mercyes; O how vngratefull shall wee proue if wee doe not make good vse of this great blessing of thyne and why should we doubt of thy assistance in prosecution of our way since that our good god of his loue to us and out of his desire of our saluation and perfection hath extraordinarily made knowne vnto us the way, so will he not be wanting in his grace that we may bring all to a perfect end which he intended in his discovuery vnto vs of the way we hauing the way discouered vnto us if we should neglect to tread and prosecute it with perseuerance it
[117v]
had bin far better for us that we had neuer knowne it for (sayth our sauiour) the servant that knoweth the will of his master and doth it not shall be beaten with many stripes.
To come to know the way how to serue god in the way
of perfection there is not meane but that it must come from
god, and that by one of these two meanes either immediately
from god as was the conuersion and instructions of Suso and
many others or from him by the meanes of some man as was the
conuersion of Thaulerus and the like hath bin of many other.
And here Theleurus though he had his conuersion and some
instruction at the first from the Lay man, yet afterwards in
his spirituall course he was doutles guided by the spirit of
god (the lay man not liuing with him
Dame Gertrude More, OSB (†1632)
Permission, Ampleforth Abbey Trustees
century
later than Father
Augustine Baker's
July 1624 arrival at Cambrai to give spiritual direction to
the English Benedictine nuns there, a manuscript was written
out, July 1724, in the Paris daughter house by an anonymous
English Benedictine nun, speaking of him as 'father
Anonimus'. (This was how Father Baker styled himself in his
Life of Gertrude
More.) Cambrai's
foundation of Our Lady of Comfort would become Stanbrook Abbey, Worcestershire, and Paris'
foundation of Our Lady of Good Hope, Colwich Abbey, Staffordshire, both
communities returning to England from which they had lived
for centuries in exile, following the French Revolution.
Dame Gertrude More was the most prominent of the young
English Foundresses, 1623, of Our Lady of Comfort, dying in
1633, Dame Catherine
Gascoigne was
its Abbess from 1629-1676. This manuscript's centennial
celebration of Father Augustine Baker's method of prayer,
suppressed by an atheist revolution, lost to its religious
communities, deserves today being shared and used, by
Stanbrook, by Colwich, and by ourselves, by religious and
lay, women and men.
Dame Gertrude More and Dame Catherine Gascoigne both wrote defenses of Father Augustine Baker's teaching on prayer, presenting these to the General Chapter of the English Benedictine Congregation in 1633, when all their contemplative manuscripts were called in and examined at Cambrai. During this process, Dame Gertrude was stricken with smallpox and died. So persuasive were their two texts that the English Benedictine Congregation's Chapter told the surviving Dame Catherine, 'Goe on couragiously, you have choosen the best way: we beseech Allmighty God to accomplish that union which your hart desireth'. Dame Catherine was to have to resist again, in 1655, as Dom Augustine Baker had foretold them would happen, against the calling in again of all their contemplative manuscripts. On her deathbed in 1675, Dame Catherine Gascoigne appealed to the then-President of the English Congregation, Dom Benedict Stapylton for 'a new and very ample confirmation' of these writings, 'as being the greatest treasure that belongs to this poor community'. One reason for this conflict was that Father Augustine Baker had revived the medieval form of contemplation through studying and sharing such fourteenth-century texts as Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love , Walter Hilton's Scale of Perfection, William Flete's Remedies Against Temptations, The Cloud of Unknowing, and the works of the Continental Friends of God, like John Tauler and Henry Suso. What had become fashionable instead were the Jesuit Spiritual Exercises, of imaging, though these in turn reflected far more ancient practices connected with Paula's worship in Bethlehem and Calvary, oberved by Jerome, and copied by countless pilgrims to the Holy Places. Those contemplative writings were lost at the French Revolution, apart from two small manuscripts, one of these the Cloud Author's 'Epistle of Privat Counsell', that were preserved in the nuns' pockets during their imprisonment, 1793-1795, part of that time with the French Carmelite nuns, who were to be guillotined, in the Compiègne prison. These two manuscripts are now treasured at Stanbrook Abbey, along with the clothing of the executed Carmelites.
However, the Cambrai nuns had already founded a daughter house in Paris, in 1651, and had made sure that all their precious manuscripts, among them, Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love, were duplicated, many being written out by Dame Barbara Constable, OSB, who remained at Cambrai, and that these texts were taken with the nuns going to Paris, Dame Clementia Cary, their mother foundress, Dame Bridget More, their prioress. The Paris Our Lady of Good Hope carefully stated in their Constitution, in both the French (written by Dame Bridget More) and English (written by Dame Clementia Cary) versions, their desire to continue Dom Augustine's legacy of spiritual reading and writing, so doing deepening their call to the Benedictine religious life. Dom Serenus Cressy became the chaplain of the Paris nuns and saw to it that Dame Gertrude More's writings (1657,1658), including Gertrude More's defense of Augustine Baker's teachings (made at the same time as Catherine Gascoigne's), Augustine Baker's Sancta Sophia, Holy Wisdom (1657) and Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love (1670) were all printed and published. Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love's publication was under the patronage of Abbot Placid Gascoigne of Lamspringe, Dame Catherine Gascoigne's brother and likewise a Benedictine, during her lifetime (A. Allanson, Biography of the English Benedictines, Ampleforth Abbey, 1999, on Placid or John Gascoigne, as Abbot, 1651-1681), Serenus Cressy noting in his preface, 'Whatsoever benefit thou mayst reap by this Book; thou art obliged for it to a More Venerable Abbot of our Nation, by whose order and liberality it is now published, and by Consequence sufficiently Approved', the marginal note identifying the benefactor as 'The V.R.F.Jo.Guscoyn.L.Abbot of Lamb-spring'. Indeed, it is likely that Catherine Gascoigne, or her sister Margaret, brought the Julian manuscript to Cambrai in the first place. The Gascoigne family claimed Sir Thomas Gascoigne, Chancellor of Oxford and devotee of St Birgitta's Syon Abbey, as relative. The Lowes, connected with Syon Abbey from the fifteenth through the nineteenth centuries, owned Julian's Showing. Dame Margaret Gascoigne wrote about Julian's Showing, and Dame Bridget More copied her text. The Mores and Gascoignes would logically have entered Syon Abbey, then in exile in Lisbon, but for a libel published by a pirate against Syon, causing these English families with the greatest Brigittine ties, to break them and found instead Benedictine Cambrai. Thus the precious legacy of Julian of Norwich Showing of Love manuscripts changed from Brigittine cloisters to Benedictine ones, the Westminster, Amherst and Paris texts being Brigittine, Paris representing the text prepared for Tudor/Elizabethan printing by the Brigittines, the Gascoigne, Upholland, Sloane, and Stowe being Benedictine, likewise the first successfully printed edition by Serenus Cressy.
The Paris English Benedictines, as were the Cambrai English Benedictines, were imprisoned during the French Revolution, but upon finally being freed were able to negotiate the return of most of their manuscripts and books to England, where they are now to be found at Colwich Abbey. However, this manuscript, written by one of their nuns, likely found in her cell at her death as was the custom with such contemplative collections, ended up in Paris' Bibliothèque Mazarine.
Opening of Bibliothèque Mazarine 1202
This particular manuscript, dated July 23, 1724, by its scribe, an anonymous English nun in exile, is sneered at in the Paris, Bibliothèque Mazarine, Catalogue as the production of some superstitious monk. The manuscript is indeed prefaced with an engraving of a Benedictine monk kneeling in prayer, rays of light falling upon him. The cataloguer failed to notice that the anthology of contemplative writings was written by a woman whose humility conceals from us her identity, almost even her gender. This 'Colections' includes writings from Father Augustine Baker, the Friend of God John Tauler, Blessed Angela of Foligno, the Conversio Morum, Bishop of Cambray Fénelon's Letters of Siritual Direction , Dame Gertrude More, including excerpts of her defense of Father Augustine Baker made to the General Chapter of the English Benedictine Congregation in 1633, and Dame Catherine Gascoigne, again this being her defense of Father Augustine Baker's teaching on prayer presented to Chapter in 1633, when all manuscripts were called in. In this same library is also to be found the Catalogue of all their Cambrai Augustine Baker texts, listing as well Julian of Norwich's Showing of Love as 'The Revelations of Sainte Julian', as a manuscript which they owned but which was not from Dom Augustine Baker's collecting, plus another, now lost, manuscript, 'Colections outt of Holy Mo: Juilan' [sic.]. Furthermore this particular surviving 'Colections' manuscript includes a section written by the anonymous nun herself which gives near-quotations from Julian's Showing. This evidence tells us that the Paris house a century later than the Cambrai foundation was continuing to preserve, to live and to celebrate its contemplative legacy.
It is my hope that this transcription will return this important copy of their original Mother Abbess's text to these Abbeys' cloistered nuns at Stanbrook and at Colwich. It is a portion of their treasured lost inheritance. And likewise to share it not only in the cloister, but also with the world. That had been a major purpose of their contemplative copying and writing when in exile, to exercise the 'apostolate of the scribe' as their contribution to the English Mission of the Benedictine monks to the laity of their then lost homeland.
~ Nothing has my lord god left un
-done which might win me wholy to
himself, and make me to dispise my
self, and all created things for his
love. for when I sinned, he recal'd
me and forsook me not in that my
Permission, Ampleforth Abbey Trustees
Colections D.G. 322
323 Colections D.G.
misery of offending such an infinit
goodness so shamefully, & that alsoe
after my entrance into religion,-
nay even after my proffesion in that
blessed state, the hapiness, & worth
wherof I did not yet know by which
means I grew weary of tending bear-
-ing therin his sweet yoke and
light burthen, the which is heavy
only thro our fault, & not in it self
through which default & ignorance
of mine, it became so greivous, and
intolerable to me, that I wish'd oft-
-en it might have bine shaken of from
by me pretending it was soe incom-
-patible with my good, that I could
scarcely work my salvation, in
this my state & profesion, this
my
god you are wittness of was true,
&
soe it did continue with me about
two years, after that I had in show
forsaken the world, & the world,
ind-
-eed forsaken me, but did my lord
in these biter afflictions forsake me
no, no, but he provided such a help
for me, that quickly was my sorrow
turn'd into joy, yea into such an un-
speakable joy, that it has sweetned
all the sorows which since that time
has befalen me, for as soon as my
soull
was set into a way of tending to my
god by prayer and abnegation, I found
Colections D.G. 324all my miseries presently disperse
themselves, & come to nothing; yea
even in five weeks my soull became
so enamour'd with the yoke of this -
my dear lord, þt if I must have ma
de not only four, but even four th-
ousand vows, to have become wholy
dedicated to him, I should have em-
-braced this state with more joy, and
content then ever I did find in obta-
-ining that which ever I most of all
wish'd & desir'd; yea & thou knowest
my god by my souls being put into a
course of prayer, I seem'd to have now
found a true means, wherby I might
love without end, or measure.
325
Colections D.G.
~Woe to that soull, who over-
-come by threats, or persuasions
from without or by temptations
within her, or other occasions wt
soever gives over her mental pra
yer by mean wherof only she is ca-
-pable of diserning & folowing
the
divine tract, inspiration, & will
whnce
her whole good is to proceed, &
ther
fore O you souls especialy that are
the more capable of internall pray-
er doe you accordingly prosecute it,
and be gratefull to god for the grace
of it, for it causeth the greatest
ha-
-piness that is to be goten in this
life & an answerable hapiness, in
the future.
Colections D.G. 326327 Colections D.G.by it in this life one paseth through
all things how hard & painfull soever
they be by it we come to be familiar
even with god himself, & to have our
conversation in heaven, by it all im-
pediments will be removed between
god and the soull, by it you will receive
light & grace. for all that god would -
doe by you, by it you will come to reg-
-ard god in all things, & profitably
neglect your selves. by it you shall
know how to converse one earth
without preiudice to your selves souls,
and infine by it you will praise god
& become so united unto him, that
nothing shall be able to seperate
you for time or eternity from his
sweet goodness.
Dame Catherine Gascoigne, OSB (†1676)
Dame Catherine Gascoigne, Cambrai's Abbess, in
1652
Dame Catherine Gascoigne's Defense of Father Augustine Baker's Way of Prayer
382 Coll: Lad: Cath: G. Prayer
My prayer I know not how to
express, but it seems to me to be a
longing and vehement desire of
the soull thirsting after the
presence
of God, seeking and intending only
and wholy his will and pleasure
with as much purity of intention as
my imperfection will permit. it is
only exercised in the will, some
times in one maner, & sometimes
in another; according to the pres
ent disposition of the soull. now
humbling itself a 1000 times in þe
presence of god, now praising, ble
sing and adoring him, at other times
confounded at my great ingratitude
not daring as it were to appear in
D. Cath: Gas: Prayer 383384 D. Cath: Gas: Pr:his presence, or to elevate myself
towards him by love, wm I have soe
much offended, sometimes I think it
is those we call acts or aspirations,
or rather an elevation of the will tow
ards god; proceeding from an interiour
motion, & enablement to continue þe
same, yet not always with like ferv
our, for many times I find a great &
strong desire to please, and praise god
and yet am not able in any sort to doe
it, and that is my greif. but thus I see
there is no way but patience & resig-
nation, till it pleases him w° only
can enable me, when he pleases G
to doe better, for methinks the more
I strive or force my self the further
I am from it. for everything meth
-inks even thinking of good and holy
things doe rather breed images and
cause multiplicity in the soul, and
are distractions & impediments to
me in my prayer, and tendance to
wards god, so I must keep myself
in as much quietness as may be, wth
out using violence or stress, for I
find myself most drawn to that pray
er which tends to an unity, without
adhering to any perticular creature
or image; but seeking only for that
thing wch our lord said to be necesa
ry, and wch contains all things in it
self, according to that saying, Unum
sit mihi totum,
id est Omnia in
Omnibus, hoc
unum quaero, hoc
D. Cath: G: Pr: 385386 D. Cath: Gas: Pr:unum desidero, propter unum
omnia, hoc si habuero contentus
ero, et nisi potitus fuero. semper
fluctus, quia multa me implere
non posunt, Quid hoc unum nescio
dicere, desiderare. me sentio, quo
nihill melius, nec majus est, sed nec
cogitare, potest, non enim hoc un
um inter omnia, sed unum super
omnia est. Deus meus est, cui ad-
haerere, et inhaerere bonum mihi
est. This way of tending and aspiring
towards god, by love and affection doth
in no sort, hinder a soull, from
the due performance of her other
duties and Obligations, and externall
Obediences, much less dos it cause
her to neglect, misprise, or
disesteem
of her superiours, their ordinations
and exactions, (as has bine feared)
for it doth cause her to observe and
perform them with more purity of
intention and more readily and more
chearfully, regarding God in the
doing
of them, rather then the works that
she doth. and a soull that is caryed
in this affectuous inclination
towards
god carefully observing the divine
call and motions, and abstracting
herself from impertinencies and all
things wch doe not belong to her to
doe or undergoo. she will be able to
make use of all things, in there
times
[Stanbrook: their due time]
D. Cath: Gas: pray: 387388 D. Cath: Gas: pr:times, to her advancement in spir
it. for nothing is required of us in
our state of life, but if we know how
to make right use of it, it will further
us in our way, and especially the divine
office, and service of the Quire, as be-
ing an exercise more imediatly belon
ging to the praise and worship of god.
so doe I most comonly find it a great
help and incitement therto, except
when the body is too much wearied or
otherwise indisposed and þs exercise
of love seems to be the best means to
purchase all vertues; for the soull þt
doth faithfully persue it with perse
verance, and faithfully coresponds
in the divine Grace, dos in some sort
(according to her progress in this di
vine love) exercise all vertues in
these times, for it is the way of
Hum-
ility, of abnegation, of sincere
obedi
-ence, of perfect submision, &
subjec
-tion to god, and to every creature
for his love, and according to his
good will and pleasure, it causeth
and encreaseth in the soull, a holly
and humble confidence in god, which
does enoble her to pass thro all
occuring
difficulties wth chearfulness and ala
crity, not that she shall not meett
wth
difficulties (for the way of love is
the way of the cross and full of
bitter
mortifications) but because she de
sires so much to please her beloved
that all things wtsoever tho never
D. Cath: Gas: Pr: 389390 D. Cath: Gas: Pr:so greivous to nature, become easy
and tolerable to her, wch may draw
more near unto him, and wtsoever
she finds to be a lett or hinderance
in her way of tendance towards him,
as fears, scruples, etc: she doth
pass them over and transcend them by
love, seeking and endeavouring always
to unite herself to god, according to
her maner, and to adher perseverantly
unto him, and although it may per
haps be esteemed a great presumption
for a soull þt has made but litle prog
ress in a spirituall course, & is full
of deffects, and imperfections, to pret
end so high an exercise, as is that of
love and aspiring towards god; yet
to me it seems to be the best way
to get true humility, nay I canot see
how tis posible for a soull by anny
other means to avoid that most detes
table sin of pride, wch so secretly -
creeps in, & intrudes itself into
all
our best actions, & Holiest
exercises.
but only by adhesion to god, which
excludes all pride, and all maner of
temptaion of what kind soever,
for the soull þt seeks and pretends
nothing but god, and tends towards
him in the best maner she can by sim
plicity, adhering to noe Image or
created thing, but only to god him
self there is no place for pride,
&
therfore noe exercise or maner of
D: Cath Gas: Pr: 391392 D. Cath: Gas: Pr:prayer so secure for the soull, and þe
less subject to the Ilusions & deceits of
the †Divell, then this exercise of the will
which is both plain & easie for those soulls
that have an aptness and call unto it, is
faithfully prosecuting, wth the grace of
god concuring, it leads the soull through
all things wtsoever, it is the way of humi
lity, and confidence. for the soull having
continuall recourse to god by prayer is
therby enlightned to see her own nothing
and poverty, and how that she is not able
to effect any thing that is good, without
the divine assistance, butt that she must
wholly, & totally depend of God, and this
dependance, wch the soull sees herself con-
tinually to have of god; methinks it is
able to humble her even to dust, besides
the sins and imperfections to which
she is subject and often falls into.
and
indeed god has many secret ways to
humble a soull, and out of his care
doth
soe provide that matter of
humiliation
shall never be wanting to her, if she
will
but accordingly endeavour to make use
therof. and the wonderfull vouchsafe
ment of God All: to is such
to a soull þt
seeks and aymes at nothing else but
to
be faithfull to him, þt it causes
& increa
-ses a great confidence in his
goodness, and
his continuall care and providence to
wards her; so that for her part she
seems to have nothing else in the
world
to doe, but only to endeavour to
comply
with his will, and pleasure. tending
and aspiring towards him by prayer
D. Cath: Gasc: Pr: 393394 D. Cath: Gas: Pr:as he shall enable her for it by his grace,
without taking care or solicitude for
any thing that may concern her keep lea
ving herself and all things wholly to his
sweet disposition, so that her only care
is to please him, and he will sufficiently
provide for her, and for all things that may
concern her good, to wm she hath totally
left herself and all other things, after this
maner to the Divine providence; she
doth not neglect that to wch she is obli-
-ged according to her dutty and charge
for god himself takes care of all, & guides
all, and nothing is lost, but much beter
performed by leaving all to him, as thau
lerus saith In deo nihill negligetur.
and the soull proceeding in this maner
with as much simplicity as she can, seeking
after nothing but God, her confidence
dailly increases as holly scripture
says,
Qui ambulat
simpliciter, ambulat
confidenter.
and she walks one secure
-ly & quietly under the divine
protection,
all things cooperating to her good,
for
wtsoever doth hapen to her by gods
per
-mision; dos serve to breed†still in
her
true and perfect resignation &
conf
ormity to the Divine will, wherby she
comes to have & enjoy betwixt God
and
her soull, true internall, and solid
peace,
even amidst all crosses and
opositions, &
variations, that we are subject unto,
in
this changeable and miserable life of
ours,
which peace, & security noe
creature
can give unto a soull but only god
himself
and therefore happy are those soulls
þt
† & Cause vertically in margin; Stanbrook: more
& more]
D. Cath: Gas: Pr: 395396 D. Cath: Gas: Prayerthat faithfully & perseverently adher
to him, with an internall regard of his
will in all things, and this plain & simple
exercise of the will, taught us by father
Anonimus tends to noe other thing, (soe, far
|as I understand it) þn þs to bring the soull
to a total subjection to god, and to others
for god.
Indeed I am not able to express wt I doe
in part conceive of the excelency & worth-
iness, of this most happy exercise, of tend-
ing aspiring towards god by love, how
be it. I have here endeavoured as well
as I could briefly and sincerely to let
my superiours know by this, how I und-
erstand and desire to practis the same.
humbly submiting myself, & all my ways
and practises, in this or wt else soever to
be corected by them, purposing & promi
-sing by Gods Grace always to stand
to
their judgment and determination, in
all things. and if your Paternities
do think it good & please to
aprove it,
I do then most humbly beseech your
leave
and blesing, with the assistance of
yr
holly prayers, that I may prosecute
it
with new fervour & diligence, for
noth-
-ing does so much trouble me as my
slack
-ness & negligence in it
hitherto.
~ ~ ~
Invidia omnis
spiritualis
et carnalis
Deo Odibilis
et Anima pestis
satis subtilis
cur non recedis
Colections 397
A meo Corde
te detestante
et reluctante
contra motus tuos
valde pestiferos
et desiderante
in vera charitate
omnes Diligere. ~
to St Arsenius my Dear PatronColections labour to make all Cogitations cease.God, sent his Angell down, to let þee know
his blesed will wch so by thee, was sought
praying to him to teach þee how to goe,
that way by wch to him thou mightst be brought.
The Angell bid thee fly & silent be,
and suffer nothing to disquiet thee.
Pray that I may fly to God, & hold my peace
and being from all noyse & tumults free
Dom Augustine Baker (†1638), Dom Serenus Cressy, OSB (†1674)
'The
Parable
of the Pilgrim' in Holy Wisdom, Chapter
6, edited by Dom Serenus Cressy from Don Augustine
Baker's writings, acknowledges its souce in Walter
Hilton, Scala
Perfectionis.
Dom Augustine Baker (†1638),
Dom Serenus Cressy, OSB
(†1674)
'The
Parable
of the Pilgrim' in Holy Wisdom, Chapter
6, edited by Dom Serenus Cressy from Don Augustine
Baker's writings, acknowledges its souce in Walter
Hilton's Scala
Perfectionis.
Now
for a further confirmation and more
effectual recommendation of what hath
hitherto been delivered touching the
nature of a contemplative life in
general, the superminent nobleness of
its end, the great difficulties to be
expected in it, and the absolute
necessity of a firm courage to
persevere and continually to make
progress in it, whatsoever it costs us
(without which resolution it is in
vain to set one step forward in these
ways), I will here annex a passage
extracted out of that excellent
treatise called Scala
Perfectionis, written by that
eminent contemplative, Dr Walter
Hilton, a Carthusian Monk, in which,
under the parable of a devout pilgrim
desirous to travel to Jerusalem (which
he interprets as the vision of peace
or contemplation), he delivers
instructions very proper and
efficacious touching the behaviour
requisite in a devout soul for such a
journey; the true sense of which
advice I will take liberty so to
deliver briefly as, notwithstanding,
not to omit any important matter there
more largely, and according to the old
fashion, expressed.
The
pilgrim,
overjoyed with that news, answered:
'So I may have my life safe, at last
come to the place that I above
all only
desire , I care not what miseries I
suffer in the way'.
Now this same humility is to be exercised, not so much in considering thine own self, thy sinfulness and misery (though to do thus at the first be very good and profitable), but rather in a quiet loving sight of the infinite endless being and goodness of Jesus; the which behldinging of Jesus must be either through grace in a savourous felling knowledge of hi, or at least in a full and firm faith in Him. And such a beholding, when thou shalt attain to it, will work in thy mind a far more pure, spiritual, solid and perfect humility, than the former way of behlding thyself, the which produces a humility more gross, boisterous and unquiet. By that thou wilt see and feel thyself, not only to be the most wretched filthy creature in the world, but also in the very substance of thy soul (setting aside the foulness of sin) to be a mere nothing, for truly, in and of thyself and in regard to Jesus (who really and in truth is all), thou art a mere nothing; and till thou hast the love of Jesus, yea, and feelest that thou hast His love, although thou hast done to thy seeming never so many good deeds both outward and inward, yet in truth thou hast nothing at all, for nothing will abide in thy soul and fill it but the love of Jesus. Therefore, cast all other things behind thee, and forget them, that thou mayest have that which is best of all; and thus doing, thou wilt beome a true pilgrim that leaves behind him houses, and wife, and children, and friends, and goods, and makes himself poor and bare of all things, that he may go on his journey lightly and merrily without hindrance.
'Well,
now
thou
art
in
thy
way travelling towards Jerusalem; the which
travelling consists in working inwardly, and
(when need is) outwardly too, such works as
are suitable to thy condition and state, and
such as will help and increase in thee this
gracious desire that thou hast to love Jesus
only. Let thy works be what they will,
thinking, or reading, or preaching or
labouring, etc.; if thou findest that they
draw thy mind from worldly vanity, and confirm
thy heart and will more to the love of Jesus,
it is good and profitable for thee to use
them. And if thou findest that through custom
such works do in time lose their savour and
virtue to increase this love, and it seems to
thee that thou feelest more grace and
spiritual profit in some other, take these
other and leave those, for though the
inclination and desire of thy heart to Jesus
must ever be unchangeable, nevertheless
thy spiritual works thouu shalt use in thy
manner of praying, reading, etc., to the end
to feed and strengthen this desire, may well
be changed, according as thou feelest thyself
by grace disposed in the applying of thy
heart. Bind not thyself, therefore,
unchangeably to voluntary customs, for that
will hinder the freedom of thy heart to love
Jesus, if grace would visit thee specially.
'Before
thou
has
made
many
steps in the way, thou must expect a world of
enemies of several kinds, that will beset thee
roun about, and all of them will endeavour
busily to hinder thee from going forward; yea,
and if they can by any means, they will,
either by persuasions, flatteries, or
violence, force thee to return home again to
those vanities that thou hast forsaken. For
there is nothing grieves them so much as to
see a resolute desire in thy heart to love
Jesus, and to travail to find Him. Therefore
they will all conspire to put out of thy heart
that good desire and love in which all virtues
are comprised.
'Thy
first
enemies
that
will
assult thee will be fleshly desires and vain
fears of thy corrupt heart; and with these
there will join unclean spirits, that with
sights and temptations will seek to allure thy
heart to them, and to withdraw it from Jesus.
But whatsoever they say, believe them not; but
betake thyself to thy old only secure remedy,
answering ever thus, I am nought, I have nought, and I
desire nought, but only the love of Jesus,
and so hold forth on thy way desiring Jesus
only.
'If
they
endeavour
to
put
dreads and scruples into thy mind, and would
make thee belief that thou hast not done
penance enough, as thou oughtest for thy sins,
but that some old sins remain in thy heart not
yet confessed, or not sufficiently confessed
and absolved, and that therefore thou must
needs return home and do penance better before
thou have the boldness to go to Jesus, do not
beleive a word of all that they say, for thou
art sufficiently acquitted of thy sins, and
there is no need at all that thou shouldst
stay to ransack thy conscience, for this will
now but do thee harm, and either put thee
quite out of thy way or at least unprofitably
delay thy travailing in it.
'If
they
shall
tell
thee
that thou art not worthy to have the love of
Jesus, or to see Jesus, and therefore that
thou oughtest not to be so presumptious to
desire and seek after it, believe them not,
but go on and say: It is not because I am
worthy, but because I am unworthy, that I
therefore desire to have the love of Jesus,
for if once I had it, it would make me worthy.
I will therefore never cease desiring it till
I have obtained it. For, for it only was I
created, therefore, say and do what you will,
I will desire it continually, I will never
cease to pray for it, and so doing I hope to
obtain it.
'If
thou
meetest
with
any
that seem friends unto thee, and that in
kindness would stop thy progress by
entertaining thee, and seeking to draw thee to
sensual mirth by vain discourses and carnal
solaces, whereby thou wilt be in danger to
forget thy pilgrimage, give a deaf ear to
them, answer them not; think only on this, That thou
wouldest fain be at Jerusalem. And if
they proffer thee gifts and preferments, heed
them not, but think ever on Jerusalem.
'And
if
men
despise
thee,
or lay any false calumnies to thy charge,
giving thee ill names; if they go about to
defraud thee or rob thee; yea, if they beat
thee and use thee despitefully and cruelly,
for thy life content not with them, strive not
against them, nor be angry with them, but
content thyself with the harm received, and go
on quietly as if nought were done, that thou
take no further harm; think only on this, that
to be at Jerusalem deserves to be purchased
with all this ill-usage or more, and that
there thou shalt be sufficiently repaired for
all thy losses, and recompensed for all hard
usages by the way.
'If
thine
enemies
see
that
thou growest courageous and bold, and that
thou will neither be seduced by flatteries nor
disheartened with the pains and troubles of
thy journey, but rather well cotnented with
them, then they will begin to be afraid of
thee; yet for all that, they will never cease
pursuing thee - they will follow thee all
along the way, watching all advantages against
thee, and ever and anon they will set upon
thee, seeking either with flatteries or
frights to stop thee, and drive thee back if
they can. But fear them not; hold on thy way,
and have nothing in thy mind but Jerusalem and
Jesus, whom thou wilt find there.
'If
thy
desire
of
Jesus
still continues and grows more strong, so that
it makes thee to go on thy ways courageously,
they will then tell thee that it may very well
happen that thou wilt fall into coprporal
sickness, and perhaps such a sickness as will
bring strange fancies into thy mind, and
melancholic apprehensions; or perhaps thou
wilt fall into great want, and no man will
offer to help thee, by occasion of which
misfortunes thou wilt be grievously tempted by
thy ghostly enemies, the which will then
insult over thee, and tell thee that thy folly
and proud presumption have brought thee to
this miserable pass, that thou canst neither
help thyself, nor will any man help thee, but
rather hinder those that would. And all this
they will do to the end to increase thy
melancholic and unquiet apprehensions, or to
provoke thee to anger or malice against thy
Christian brethren, or to murmur against
Jesus, who, perhaps for thy trial, seems to
hide His face from thee. But still neglect all
these suggestions as though thou heardest them
not. Be angry with nobody but thyself. And as
for all thy diseases, poverty, and whatsoever
other sufferings (for who can reckon all that
may befall thee?), take Jesus in thy mind,
think on this lesson that thou art taught, and
say, I am
nought, I have nought, I care for nought in
this world, and I desire nought but the love
of Jesus, that I may see him in peace in
Jerusalem.
'But
if
it
shall
happen
sometimes, as likely it will, that through
some of these temptations and thy own frailty,
thou stumble and perhaps fall down, and get
some harm thereby, or that thou for some time
be turned a little out of the right way, as
soon as possibly may be come again to thyself,
get up again and return into the right way,
using such remedies for thy hurt as as the
Church ordains; and do not trouble thyself
over much or over long with thinking unquietly
on thy past misfortune and pain - abide not in
such thoughts, for that will do thee more
harm, and give advantage to thine enemies.
Therefore, make haste to go on in thy travail
and working again, as if nothing had happened.
Keep but Jesus
in thy mind, and a desire to gain his love,
and nothing shall be able to hurt thee.
'At
last,
when
thine
enemies
perceive that thy will to Jesus is so strong
that thou wilt not spare neither for poverty
nor mischief, for sickness nor fancies, or
doubts nor fears, or life nor death, no, nor
for sins neither, but ever forth thou wilt go
on with that one thing of seeking the love of
Jesus, and with nothing else; and that thou
despisest and scarce markest anything that
they say to the contrary, but holdest on in
thy praying and other spiritual works (yet
always with discretion and submission), then
they grow even enraged, and will spare no
manner of most cruel usage. They will come
closer to thee than ever before, and betake
themselves to their last and most dangerous
assult, and that is, to bring into the sight
of thy mind all thy good deeds and virtues,
showing thee that all men praise thee, and
love thee, and bear thee great veneration for
thy sanctity, etc. And all this they do to the
end to raise vain joy and pride in thy heart.
But if thou tenderest thy life, thou wilt hold
all this flattery and falsehood to be a deadly
poison to thy soul, mingled with honey;
therefore, away with it; caste it from thee,
saying, thou wilt have none of it, but thou
wouldest be at Jerusalem,
'And
to
the
end,
to
put thyself out of the danger and reach of all
such temptations, suffer not thy thoughts
willingly to run about the world, but draw
them all inwards, fixing them upon one only
thing, which is Jesus; set thyself to think
only on Him, to know Him, to love Him; and
after thou hast for a good time brought
thyself to do thus, then whatsoever thou seest
or feelest inwardly that is not He, will be
unwelcome and painful to thee, because it will
stand in thy way to the seeing and seeking of
Him whom thou only desirest.
'But
yet,
if
there
be
any work or outward business which thou art
obliged to do, or that charity or present
necessity requires of thee, either concerning
thyself or thy Christian brother, fail not to
do it: despatch it as well and as soon as well
thou canst, and let it not tarry long in thy
thoughts, for it will but hinder thee in thy
principal business. But if it be any other
matter of no necessity, or that concerns thee
not in particular, trouble not thyself nor
distract thy thoughts about it, but rid it
quickly out of thy heart, saying still thus, I am nought, I
can do nought, I have nought, and nought do
I desire to have, but only Jesus and his
love.
'Thou
wilt
be
forced,
as
all other pilgrims are, to take ofttimes, by
the way, refreshments, meats and drink and
sleep, yea, and sometimes innocent
recreations; in all which things use
discretion, and take heed of a foolish
scrupulosity about them. Fear not that they
will be much a hindrance to thee, for though
they seem to stay thee for a while, they will
further thee and give thee strength to walk on
more courageously for a good long time after.
'To
conclude,
remember
that
thy
principal aims, and indeed only business, is
to knit thy thoughts to the desire of Jesus -
to strengthen this desire daily by prayer and
other spiritual workings, to the end it may
never go out of thy heart. And whatsoever thou
findest proper to increase that desire, be it
praying or reading, speaking or being silent,
travailing or reposing, make use of it for the
time, as long as thy soul finds savour in it,
and as long as it increases this desire of
having or enjoying nothing but the love of Jesus,
and the blessed sight of Jesus in
true peace in Jerusale; and be assured that
this good desire thus cherished and
continually increased will bring thee safe
unto the end of thy pilgrimage'.
This is the substance of the parable of the Spiritual Pilgrim travailing in the ways of contemplation; the which I have more largely set down because, but the contexture of it, not only we see confirmed what is already written before, but also we have a draught and scheme represented, according to which all the following instructions will be conformably answerable.
A
Benedictine Nun in Exile
A
hundred years later than Dom Augustine Baker's
spiritual directorship of the Cambrai nuns a
nun in their Paris daughter house wrote the
following into her eighteenth-century
manuscript book, now in the Bibliothèque
Mazarine, where its cataloguer sneers at it
for being 'monkish superstion':
{ My God,
above all blesings
grant
me a true peace in you
and
above all curses remove
far
from me a false peace in
creatures.
Title page
{ It is internity or recolectednes.
P. 14
{ On a
certain time while I pray'd in my
Cell, these words were sayd
unto
me interiorly by God.
Pp. 21-22
{ Reflect that you carry the gift of God in an earthern vessel.
P.23
{ O my
beginning, when shall I return to thee
and putting off whatsoever
I
have been formerly, be transformed
into thee.
P. 296
{ Take my self and all and give me that one in which is all things.
P. 296
{ O let my
Creator come into his tabernacle and
temple, where he may
remain
Lord and king.
P. 296
{ My God I
consecrate myself to you alone, for
the whole remnant of my life,
to
persue the exercises of an internal
life: leaving the fruit and success of
my
endeavours to your holy will.
P. 303
{ She speaks of 'desolations, obscurity of mind, & deadness of affections'.
P. 304
{ I doe renounce solicitude to please others; or to gain the affections of any to myself.
P. 304
{ Oh that I
had kept inviolately the faith I
promised you on my profession day when
in
the presence of angells and men, of
the whole triumphant or militant
church,
in
the sight of celestial, or terestials
I was solemnly espoused to you my God.
P. 333
{ O
eternall God, who hast loved me from
all eternity, I am resolved to love
you
the
short time which remains of my life,
to the end I may love you for all
eternity.
P. 363
{ Jesus, my
God, when shall I become a holocaust
of love to you, who made your
soul
an offering for sin, for my salvation.
P. 366
{ Foolish
is that Religious who having broken
the chains of gold and silver
which
make so many captives in the world,
lets herself be bound in Religion
with
threads of flax, I mean with toys, or
things of nothing.
P. 371
'Coll: Lady Cath[erine] G[ascoigne's] Prayer:
{ To St Arsenius , my dear Patron:
{ The Angel
bid the flye, silent be
and
suffer nothing to disquiet thee.
Often
hath I repented to have spoken,
never
to have been silent, said
St
Arsenius
Epilogue
utta l'immensità
l'unità che
tutto trascende
lo spirito
santo è:
il dono che
dall'abisso s'effonde
e penetra
tutto
e di sè
indivisibile e uno
tutte le
cose riempie
e tutte in
una luce trasforma.
essun uomo, nessuna creatura,
nulla nel
cielo e sopra la terra
ti adora
più:
nessuno ti
conosca o ti ammiri,
nessuno ti
serva, ti ami,
illuminato
dallo spirito,
battezzato
nel fuoco,
chiunque tu
sia:
laico,
vergine, sacerdote,
tu sei
trono di Dio,
sei la
dimora, sei lo strumento,
sei la luce della divinita' . . . .
+++ Dal Cantico di San Sergio di Radonez, Patrono della Russia, 1314-1392.
Просвещенный Духом,
огнем крещенный,
- девственник, священник, монах -
престол ты Божий:
Fathers Robert Llewellyn
and John Clark, both Anglican priests,
have understood and valued the
concepts of Mary's Dowry and the
English Mission, Father Robert having
been Guardian of the Julian Shrine in
Norwich and writing such contemplative
theology as With Pity,
Not with Blame, explaining for modern readers both
Julian and the Cloud
Author, while Rev Dr John Clark, who
lives in the Dream of the
Rood's country, has edited
Walter Hilton and Father Augustine
Baker. I have been privileged with the
friendship of both of them,
particularly, in the latter case,
through the kindness of Dr James Hogg,
former Carthusian, and Editor of the
Analecta Carthusiana which he
publishes in Salzburg. Meanwhile, I
have shared my researches with Syon
Abbey, with St Mary's Abbey, Colwich,
and with Stanbrook Abbey, these Abbeys
that returned to England from their
long exile, bringing with them, too,
the manuscripts they were able to save
from the French Revolution and
Napoleon's depradations. Hermits must
be self-supporting. I now, like
Julian, and like the Desert Fathers
and Mothers before her, live in a
graveyard, in Florence's Swiss-owned
so-called 'English' Cemetery, caring
for it in exchange for having space
for an ecumenical library
concentrating on the contemplatives
down the ages, Augustinians,
Benedictines, Brigittines, Carmelites,
Carthusians, Cistercians, Franciscans
and Clarissans, Hermits, Anchoresses,
Beguines, and Anglicans and Quakers
and others as well, their treble and
bass voices enshrined in print and now
published as well electronically on
the World Wide Web, giving Christ's
'Good News'.
_________ and
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Betty Radice. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974.
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_________. Alphabet and Order.
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_________. St Benedict's Rule.
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_________. Collections I-III
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_________. Conversio
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_________. Directions for
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Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universität Salzburg, 1999.
_________. Directions for
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_________. Directions for
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_________. Doubts and Calls.
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Salzburg: Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universität
Salzburg, 1998.
_________. A Secure Stay in
all Temptations. Ed. John Clark. Analecta Cartusiana
119.8, ed. James Hogg. Salzburg: Institut für Anglistik und
Amerikanistik Universität Salzburg, 1999.
_________. Secretum. Introduction and Notes, John Clark. Analecta Cartusiana 119.20, ed. James Hogg. Salzburg: Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universität Salzburg, 2003.
_________. Secretum. Ed. John Clark. Analecta Cartusiana 119.7, ed. James Hogg. Salzburg: Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universität Salzburg, 1997.
_________. A Spiritual Treatise . . . Called A.B.C. Ed. John Clark. Analecta Cartusiana 119.17, ed. James Hogg. Salzburg: Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik Universität Salzburg, 2001. James Hogg, Salzburg, 2006.
_________. Vox Clamantis in
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