81. Martensen, p. 27. Schmidt, loc. cit.
82. The passage in Martensen, p. 20.
83. Martensen, pp. 19, 29.
84. Ibid. p. 29.
85. Etlich leut wöllent got mit den ougen ansehn, als sy ein ku ansent unnd wöllent gott liebhan, als sy ein ku liebhaben (die hastu lieb umb die milch, und umb den kätz, und umb dein eigen nutz). Also thund alle die leut die got liebhand, um uszwendigen reichtum, oder umb inwendigen trost, und die hand gott nit recht lieb, sunder sy suchent sich selbs und ir eigen nutz.—Schmidt, p. 712.
86. Got ist ein luter guot an ime selben, vnt do von wil er nienen wonen denne in einer lutern sele: in die mag er sich ergiessen vnt genzeclichen in si fliessen. was ist luterkeit? das ist das sich der mensche gekeret habe von allen creaturen, vnt sin herce so gar uf gerichtet habe gen dem lutern guot, das ime kein creature trœstlichen si, vnt ir ouch nit begere denne als vil als si das luter guot, das got ist, darinne begriffen mag. vnt also wenig das liechte ouge icht in ime erliden mag, also wenig mag diu luter sele icht an ir erliden keine vermasung vnt das si vermitlen mag. ir werdent alle creaturen luter ce niessen: wanne si niusset alle creaturen in got vnt got in allen creaturen. Denne si ist also luter, das si sich selben durschowet, denne endarf si got nit verre suochen: si vindet in ir selben, wanne si in ir natiurlichen luterkeit ist geflossen in das übernatiurliche der lutern gotheit. vnt also ist si in got, vnt got in ir; vnt was si tuot, das tuot si in got, vnt tuot es got in ir.—Wackernagel, p. 891.
87. Wann sol der mensch warlich arm sein, so soll er seynes geschaffnen willes also ledig sein, als er was do er noch nit was. Und ich sag euch bey der ewigen warheit, als lang ir willen hand zu erfüllend den willen gottes, vnd icht begerung hand der ewigkeit und gottes, also lang seind ir nitt recht arm, wann das ist ein arm mensch der nicht wil, noch nicht bekennet, noch nicht begeret—Schmidt, p. 716. Here again is the most extravagant expression possible of the doctrine of sainte indifférence, in comparison with which Madame Guyon is moderation itself.
88. See Schmidt, p. 724.
89. He was charged with denying hell and purgatory, because he defined future punishment as deprivation,—‘Das Nicht in der helle brinnet.’—Schmidt, p. 722.
90. The narrative here put into the mouth of Eckart is found in an appendix to Tauler’s Medulla animæ. There is every reason to believe that it is Eckart’s. Martensen gives it, p. 107.
91. A literal translation of a curious old hymn in Wackernagel’s collection, p. 896.
92. C. Schmidt (Johannes Tauler von Strasburg, p. 42) gives examples of the extravagant display in dress common among the clergy at that time.
93. The substance of this dialogue will be found in the works of Heinrich Suso (ed. Melchior Diepenbrock, Regensburg, 1837), Book iii. chap. vii. pp. 310-14. Suso represents himself as holding such a conversation with ‘ein vernunftiges Bilde, das war subtil an seinen Worten und war aber ungeübt an seinen Werken und war ausbrüchig in florirender Reichheit,’ as he sat lost in meditation on a summer’s day. Atherton has ventured to clothe this ideal of the enthusiast of those times in more than a couple of yards of flesh and blood, and supposed Arnstein to have picked up divinity enough in his sermon-hearing to be able to reason with him just as Suso does in his book.
The wandering devotees, who at this time abounded throughout the whole region between the Netherlands and Switzerland, approximated, some of them, to Eckart’s portraiture of a religious teacher, others to Suso’s ideal of the Nameless Wild. In some cases the enthusiasm of the same man may have approached now the nobler and now the baser type.
95. Eckart does not make use of his lapse into the Essence to philosophise withal; it is simply his religious ultimatum.
96. Louis was indebted for this important victory to the skill of Schweppermann. After the battle the sole supply of the imperial table was found to consist of a basket of eggs, which the emperor distributed among his officers, saying, ‘To each of you one egg—to our gallant Schweppermann two.’—Menzel.
97. See Laguille, Histoire d’Alsace, liv. xxiii. p. 271.
98. Many passages in his Heiligenleben are altogether in the spirit of Eckart, and have their origin, beyond question, in his sayings, or in those of his disciples.—See pp. 114, 125, 150, 187 (Pfeiffer), and also the extracts in Wackernagel, Altd. Leseb. p. 853.
99. See Schmidt’s Tauler, Appendix, p. 172, &c., where such information as can be obtained concerning Henry of Nördlingen is given.
100. Compare Petrarch’s account in his letters, cited by Gieseler: ‘Mitto stupra, raptus, incestus, adulteria, qui jam pontificalis lasciviæ ludi sunt: mitto raptarum viros, ne mutire audeant, non tantum avitis laribus, sed finibus patriis exturbatos, quæque contumeliarum gravissima est, et violatas conjuges et externo semine gravidas rursus accipere, et post partum reddere ad alternam satietatem abutentium coactos.’
101. Laguille gives an account of this revolution, Hist. d’Alsace, p. 276.
102. Schmidt’s Tauler, p. 12.
103. Laguille, liv. xxiv. p. 280.
104. Schmidt, p. 22.
105. Tauler’s Sermon on the Twenty-second Sunday after Trinity contains an exhortation to Christian love, remarkable for beauty and discrimination. Tauler’s Predigten, vol ii. p. 591 (Berlin, 1841).
106. Schmidt, p. 14:—
107. Schmidt’s Tauler, Anhang über die Gottesfreunde.
108. Passages from two of these mystics, Heinrich von Löwen and Johannes von Sterngasse, are given among the Sprüche Deutscher Mystiker, in Wackernagel, p. 890.
109. See Tauler’s Predigten, vol. ii. p. 584; and also, concerning the charge of sectarianism, p. 595; and the services of the Friends of God, vol. i. pred. xxvi. p. 194; pred. xi. p. 85.
110. Ibid., vol. ii. pred. lxvi. p. 594.
111. The sermon referred to is that on the Twenty-third Sunday after Trinity, vol. ii. p. 598.
While he is careful to warn his hearers against the presumption of attempting at once to contemplate Deity apart from its manifestation in the humanity of Christ, he yet seems to admit that when the soul has been thoroughly exercised in the imitation of Christ,—has become conformed, as far as man can be, to his spirit and his sufferings, then there commences a period of repose and joy in which there is an extraordinary intuition of Deity, which approximates to that perfect vision promised hereafter, when we shall see, not ‘through a glass darkly,’ but face to face.—Vol. ii. p. 609.
112. Meiners, Hist. Vergleichung der Sitten, &c., des Mittelalters, vol. ii. p. 117.
113. To long and weave a woof of dreams is sweet unto the feeble soul, but nobler is stout-hearted striving, and makes the dream reality.
114. This sermon is given entire in the second chapter of the Lebenshistorie des ehrwürdigen Doctors Johann Tauler, prefixed to his sermons. The succeeding incidents are all related by the same authority. The cellarer only and the family affairs of Adolf, appear to be invented by Atherton.
115. Atherton defends this word by the usage of Thomas Fuller.
116. These letters are preserved in substance in Specklin’s Collectanea, and are inserted, from that source, in the introduction by Görres to Diepenbrock’s edition of Suso’s works; pp. xxxv. &c.
117. The substance of the foregoing narrative concerning Tauler and the laymen will be found in the Lebenshistorie des ehrwürdigen Doctors Joh. Tauler. See also C. Schmidt’s account of Nicholas in his monograph on Tauler (p. 28), and a characteristic letter by Nicholas concerning visions of coming judgment given in the Appendix.
120. Serm. on Eleventh Sun. after Trinity, ii. p. 436.
121. Serm. on Eleventh Sun. after Trin., ii. pp. 442, 443. Also, Predigten, vol. iii. p. 19, and Schmidt, p. 125.
122. Third Serm. on Thirteenth Sun. after Trin., ii. pp. 474-478.
123. First Serm. on Thirteenth Sun. after Trin., ii. p. 459.
125. Twenty-first Sun. after Trin., ii. p. 584.
127. Preface to Tauler’s Life and Sermons by Susanna Winkworth.
128. Nicole, in his Traité de la Prière, describes and criticises this style of devotion. It must always be borne in mind that the warnings of Tauler with regard to the image and the symbol are addressed, not to us sober Protestant folk, but especially to the devotees of the cloister. Those who have some acquaintance with the fantastic excesses he combats, will not think his language too strong.
129. See Hecker’s Black Death (trans. by Dr. Babington, 1853).—Hecker gives the documents relating to the trial of the Neustadt Jews in an appendix, from the Chronicle of Jacob of Königshoven. See also pp. 103-127.
130. These fanatics were everywhere foremost among the instigators of the cruelties perpetrated on the Jews. Women, and even children, joined their ranks in great numbers, wearing the hats with red crosses, carrying flags, and scourging themselves with the rest. The particulars given are taken from the account in Jacob von Königshoven’s Elsassische u. Strassburgische Chronik, inserted entire in Wackernagel,—(p. 931). The chronicler says:—‘Zuo Strôsburg kam mê denne tûsent manne in ire geselleschaft, und siu teiltent sich zuo Strôsburg: eine parte der geischelaere gieng das lant abe, die ander parte das lant ûf. und kam sô vil volkes in ire bruoderschaft, das es verdrôs den bôbest und den keiser und die phafheit. und der keiser verschreip dem bôbeste das er etwas hie zuo gedaechte: anders die geischeler verkêrtent alle die welt.’ The Flagellants claimed power to confess and give absolution. The thirty-four days’ scourging among them was to make a man as innocent as a babe—the virtue of the lash was above all sacraments. Thus the people took religion into their own hands, blindly and savagely,—no other way was then possible. It was a spasmodic movement of the mass of life beneath, when the social disorder that accompanied the pestilence had loosened the grasp of the power temporal and spiritual which held them down so long.
131. See Schmidt’s Tauler, p. 58.
132. Laguille’s Histoire d'Alsace, liv. xxv. p. 290.
133. Hecker, p. 81.
134. Schmidt’s Tauler, p. 59.
136. Ruysbroek sent a copy of his book, De ornatu spiritualium nuptiarum, to the Friends of God in the Oberland. He had many friends in Cologne, and it is very likely that the work may have reached Tauler there, either through them or from the author, who must have heard of him.
137. See Johannes Ruysbroek, by Engelhardt, p. 168.
138. Froissart, book ii. chap. 40.
139. Froissart, chapp. 41, 42.
140. Ibid., book i. chap. 34.
141. Optimum aliena insania frui.
142. Engelhardt, p. 326.
143. It is certain that Ruysbroek was visited during the many years of his residence in Grünthal, much after the manner described, and also that Tauler was among the visitors, though the exact time of his journey is not known.
144. See Engelhardt, pp. 189, 288.—According to Ruysbroek, the Trinitarian process lies at the basis of the kingdoms both of Nature and of Grace. There is a flowing forth and manifestation in the creative Word,—a return and union of love by the Holy Ghost. This process goes on continually in the providential government of the universe, and in the spiritual life of believers. The upholding of the world, and the maintenance of the work of grace in the heart, are both in different ways a perpetual bringing forth of the Son, by whom all things consist, and who is formed in every devout soul. Ruysbroek is careful to state (as a caveat against pantheism) that such process is no necessary development of the divine nature,—it is the good pleasure of the Supreme. (See Vier Schriften von J. Ruysbroek, in niederdeutscher Sprache, by A. v. Arnswaldt; Hanover, 1848.) ‘Wi hebben alle boven onse ghescapenheit een ewich leuen in gode als in onse leuende sake die ons ghemaect ende ghescapen heest van niete, maer wi en sijn niet god noch wi en hebben ons seluen niet ghemaeckt. Wi en sijn ooc niet wt gode ghevloten van naturen, maer want ons god ewelijc ghevoelt heest ende bekent in hem seluen, so heest hi ons ghemaeckt, niet van naturen noch van node, maer van vriheit sijns willen,’—p. 291. (Spiegel der Seligkeit, xvii.)
The bosom of the Father, he says, is our proper ground and origin (der schois des vaders is onse eygen gront ind onse oirsprunck); we have all, therefore, the capacity for receiving God, and His grace enables us to recognise and realise this latent possibility (offenbairt ind brengit vort die verboirgenheit godes in wijsen),—p. 144.
145. Engelhardt, pp. 183, 186. Ruysbroek speaks as follows of that fundamental tendency godward of which he supposes prevenient grace (vurloiffende gracie) to lay hold:—‘Ouch hait der mynsche eyn naturlich gront neygen zo gode overmitz den voncken der sielen ind die overste reden die altzijt begert dat goide ind hasset dat quaide. Mit desen punten voirt got alle mynschen na dat sijs behoeven ind ecklichen na sinre noit,’ &c.—Geistl. Hochzeit, cap. 3.
Ruysbroek lays great stress on the exercise of the will. ‘Ye are as holy as ye truly will to be holy,’ said he one day to two ecclesiastics, inquiring concerning growth in grace. It is not difficult to reconcile such active effort with the passivity of mysticism. The mystics all say, ‘We strive towards virtue by a strenuous use of the gifts which God communicates, but when God communicates Himself, then we can be only passive—we repose, we enjoy, but all operation ceases.’
146. Engelhardt, pp. 195, 199.
147. Engelhardt, pp. 201, 213. In the season of spiritual exaltation, the powers of the soul are, as it were, absorbed in absolute essential enjoyment (staen ledich in een weselic gebrucken). But they are not annihilated, for then we should lose our creatureliness.—Mer si en werden niet te niete, want soe verloeren wy onse gescapenheit. Ende alsoe lange als wy mit geneichden geeste ende mit apen ogen sonder merken ledich staen, alsoe lange moegen wy schouwen ende gebruken. Mer in den seluen ogenblijc dat wy proeven ende merken willen wat dat is dat wy geuoelen, so vallen wy in reden, ende dan vynden wy onderscheit ende anderheit tusschen ons ende gade, ende dan vynden wy gade buten ons in onbegripelicheiden.—Von dem funkelnden Steine, x.
150. Engelhardt, p. 225. Schmidt’s Tauler, p. 61.—The same doctrine which furnished a sanctuary for the devotion of purer natures supplied also an excuse for the licence of the base. Wilful perversion, or mere ignorance, or some one of the manifold combinations of these two factors, would work the mystical exhortation into some such result as that denounced by Ruysbroek. We may imagine some bewildered man as speaking thus within himself:—‘So we are to covet ignorance, to surmount distinctions, to shun what is clear or vivid as mediate and comparatively carnal, to transcend means and bid farewell to the wisdom of the schools. Wise and devout men forsake all their learning, forget their pious toil and penance, to lose themselves in that ground in which we are united to God,—to sink into vague abstract confusion. But may I not do at first what they do at last? Why take in only to take out? I am empty already. Thank heaven! I haven’t a distinct idea in my head.’
It is so that the popular mind is sure to travesty the ultra-refinements of philosophy.
151. Engelhardt, pp. 224-228.—Eckart, like Hegel, would seem to have left behind him a right-hand and a left-hand party,—admirers like Suso and Tauler, who dropped his extreme points and held by such saving clauses as they found; and headstrong spirits, ripe for anarchy, like these New-Lights or High-Fliers, the representatives of mysticism run to seed. Ruysbroek’s classification of them is somewhat artificial; fanaticism does not distribute itself theologically. In the treatise entitled Spiegel der Seligkeit, § 16, he describes them generally as follows:—‘Ander quade duulische menschen vint men, die segghen dat si selue Cristus sijn of dat si god sijn, ende dat haer hant hemel ende erde ghemaect heest, ende dat an haer hant hanghet hemel ende erde ende alle dinc, ende dat si verheuen sijn boven alle die sacramenten der heiligher kerken, ende dat si der niet en behoeuen noch si en willen der ooc niet.’ He represents their claim to identity with God as leading to a total moral indifference (§ 17):—‘Ende sulke wanen god sijn, ende si en achten gheen dinc goet noch quaet, in dien dat si hem ontbeelden connen ende in bloter ledicheit haer eighen wesen vinden ende besitten moghen.’ Their idea of the consummation of all things savours of the Parisian heresy—the offspring of John Scotus, popularised by David of Dinant and his followers. The final restitution is to consist in the resolution of all creatures into the Divine Substance:—‘So spreken si voort dat in den lesten daghe des ordels enghele ende duuele, goede ende quade, dese sullen alle werden een eenvoudighe substancie der godheit ... ende na dan, spreken si voort, en sal god bekennen noch minnen hem seluen noch ghene creature’—(§ 16).
152. Engelhardt, pp. 326-336.—Good Ruysbroek was fully entitled to the encomium placed in the mouth of Tauler. He himself, like Bernard, would frequently perform the meanest offices of the cloister. The happy spirit of brotherhood which prevailed among the canons of Grünthal made a deep impression on that laborious practical reformer, Gerard Groot, when, in 1378, he visited the aged prior. What he then saw was not without its influence in the formation of that community with which his name is associated—the Brethren of the Common Life.—See Ullmann, Reformatoren vor der Reformation, vol. ii.
153. Engelhardt, p. 330.—Ruysbroek inveighs with much detail against the vanities of female dress—as to those hair-pads, sticking up like great horns, they are just so many ‘devil’s nests.’
154. Ruysbroek expressed himself in these words to Gerard Groot (Engelhardt, p. 168). In his touching description of the ‘desolation’ endured by the soul on its way upward toward the ‘super-essential contemplation,’ he makes the sufferer say,—‘O Lord, since I am thine (want ich din eygen bin), I would as soon be in hell as in heaven, if such should be thy good pleasure; only do thy glorious will with me, O Lord!‘—Geistl. Hochzeit, § 30. Ruysbroek, like Fénelon, abandons himself thus only on the supposition that even in hell he should still retain the divine favour;—so impossible after all is the absolute disinterestedness toward which Quietism aspires. The Flemish mystic distinguishes between the servants of God, the friends, and the sons. Those worshippers who stand in the relation of friends have still something of their own (besitten oer inwendichkeit mit eygenscap) in their love to God. The sons ascend, ‘dying-wise,’ to an absolute emptiness. The friends still set value on divine bestowments and experiences; the sons are utterly dead to self, in bare modeless love (in bloeter, wiseloeser mynnen). Yet, very inconsistently, he represents the sons as more assured of eternal life than the friends. (Von dem funkelnden Steine, § 8.)
155. A veritable personage. He died in 1377, and left behind him a book recording the conflicts he underwent and the revelations vouchsafed him. (Engelhardt, p. 326.)
156. The lyrics of Muscatblut are characterised by Gervinus (ii. p. 225), and the same authority gives some account, from the Limburg Chronicle, of the famous friar, leper, and poet mentioned by Arnstein.
157. Why smite thy breast and lament? why not lift up thy soul? why meditate for ever on the sign? He thou lovest is within thee. Thou seekest Jesus—thou hast him; he is found, and thou perceivest it not. Why these groans, this weeping? The true joy is thine; hidden within thee, though thou knowest it not, lies the solace of thine anguish; thou hast within, thou seekest without, the cure for thy languishing soul.
158. I live, but with no life of mine, and long towards a life so high—I die because I do not die.
159. The Life of Suso, published in Diepenbrock’s edition of his works, was written by his spiritual daughter, Elsbet Stäglin, according to the account she received at various intervals from his own lips. He sprang from a good family,—his name, originally Heinrich vom Berg. The name of Suso he adopted from his mother, a woman remarkable for her devotion. The secret name of Amandus, concealed till after his death, was supposed to have been conferred by the Everlasting Wisdom himself on his beloved servant.
The incident of the rescue of himself and his book from the floods, by the timely intervention of a knight passing that way, is related in the twenty-ninth chapter of the Life, p. 68.
160. Heinrich Suso’s Leben und Schriften, von M. Diepenbrock (1837), pp. 15, 51, 86. Diepenbrock’s book is an edition of the biography by Stäglin, and of the Book of the Everlasting Wisdom, &c., from the oldest manuscripts and editions, and rendered into modern German.
161. Leben, cap. 48,—where it is also said that, on one occasion, as ‘the servant was preaching at Cologne, one of his auditors beheld his face luminous with a supernatural effulgence.’ It is known that Tauler possessed a copy of the Horologium Sapientiæ.
See also Schmidt’s Tauler, p. 169. Comp. Leben, cap. xxxi. p. 72, and cap. xlix.
162. Leben, cap. iv.
163. Leben, cap. xvii.-xx. Suso died in 1385 at Ulm; he was born about the commencement of the century.
164. Suso sent a Latin version of the book of the Everlasting Wisdom, under the title Horologium Sapientiæ, to Hugo von Vaucemain, Master of the Order, for his approval. The date of the work is fixed between 1333 and 1342. The prologue contains the account of the ‘inspiratio superna’ under which the work was written.—(Diepenb. Vorbericht, p. 6.) It was translated ere long into French, Dutch, and English, and appears to have been in the fourteenth century almost what the Imitatio Christi became in the fifteenth.—Ibid., p. 15.
165. Leben, cap. vi.
166. Reverences or prostrations.
167. Leben, capp. x. and xiv.
168. Leben, cap. xxii. p 5; and xxv.
169. This incident is related at length in the twenty-seventh chapter of the Life; and the adventure with the robber, which follows, in the succeeding. The account given in the text follows closely in all essential particulars the narrative in the biography.
170. Leben, cap. lvii. Suso speaks to this effect in a dialogue with his spiritual daughter. She describes in another place (p. 74) how she drew Suso on to talk on these high themes, and then wrote down what follows.
171. Ibid., cap. xxxiv. p. 80; and comp. Buch. d. E. Weisheit, cap. vii. p. 199.
172. Buchlein von d. E. Weisheit, Buch. iii. cap. ii.; and Leben, cap. lvi. p. 168, and p. 302.
173. Leben, p. 171.
174. Extravagant as are his expressions concerning the absorption in God, Suso has still numerous passages designed to preclude pantheism; declaring that the distinction between the Creator and the creature is nowise infringed by the essential union he extols. The dialogue with the ‘nameless Wild,’ already alluded to, is an example.—Comp. Leben, cap. lvi. pp. 166, 167, and Buch. d. E. W., Buch. iii. cap. vi.
175. Leben, cap. liii. p. 148. See Note, p. 357.
176. Schröckh’s Kirchengeschichte, vol. xxxiv. pp. 431-450.
177. See Die Mystik des Nikolaus Cabasilas vom Leben in Christo, von Dr. W. Gass (1849).—In this work, Dr. Gass publishes, for the first time, the Greek text of the seven books, De Vita in Christo, with an able introduction. The authority for this summary of the theological tendency of Cabasilas will be found, pp. 210-224.
178. The Masters speak of two faces the soul hath. The one face is turned towards this world. The other face is turned direct toward God. In this latter face shineth and gloweth God eternally, whether man is ware or unaware thereof.
179. Schmidt’s Tauler, pp. 205, &c.—Mosheim gives the passage in Nieder relating the apprehension and death of Nicholas:—‘Acutissimus enim erat (says this authority) et idcirco manus Inquisitorum diu evaserat.’—Mosheim de Beghardis et Beguinabus, cap. iv. § 42, p. 454.
180. See Revelationes Selectæ S. Brigittæ (Heuser, 1851).—This is a selection for the edification of good Catholics, and contains accordingly the most Mariolatrous and least important of her writings. Rudelbach gives some specimens of her spirited rebuke of papal iniquity in his Savonarola, pp. 300, &c. In her prophetic capacity she does not hesitate to call the pope a murderer of souls, and to declare him and his greedy prelates forerunners of Antichrist. She says,—‘If a man comes to them with four wounds, he goes away with five.’ Like Savonarola, she placed her sole hope of reform in a general council.
A common mode of self-mortification with her found an imitator in Madame Guyon:—the Swede dropped the wax of lighted tapers on her bare flesh, and carried gentian in her mouth—Vita, p. 6. The Frenchwoman burned herself with hot sealing-wax in the same manner, and chewed a quid of coloquintida.
The Revelationes de Vitâ et Passione Jesu Christi et gloriosæ Virginis, contain a puerile and profane account of the birth, childhood, and death of our Lord, in the style of the apocryphal Gospel of the Infancy, professedly conveyed in conversations with the authoress by the Mother and her Son. The Virgin tells her, in reference to her Son,—‘quomodo neque aliqua immunditia ascendit super eum;’ and that his hair was never in a tangle—(nec perplexitas in capillise jus apparuit).