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diff --git a/16306.txt b/16306.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3963124 --- /dev/null +++ b/16306.txt @@ -0,0 +1,1401 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Jacob Behmen, by Alexander Whyte + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Jacob Behmen + an appreciation + + +Author: Alexander Whyte + + + +Release Date: July 16, 2005 [eBook #16306] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JACOB BEHMEN*** + + + + + +Transcribed from the 1895 Oliphant Anderson & Ferrier edition by David +Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + + +Jacob Behmen +an Appreciation +by Alexander Whyte + + +author of 'Characters and Characteristics of William Law' etc. + +Oliphant Anderson & Ferrier +30 St. Mary Street, Edinburgh, and +24 Old Bailey, London +1895 + +This lecture was delivered at the opening of my Classes for the study of +the pre-Reformation, Reformation, and post-Reformation Mystics during +Session 1894-5. A Lecture on WILLIAM LAW was delivered at the opening of +a former Session as an Introduction to the whole subject of Mysticism. + +A. W. + +ST. GEORGE'S FREE CHURCH, +5_th November_ 1894. + + + + +Jacob Behmen + + +Jacob Behmen, the greatest of the mystics, and the father of German +philosophy, was all his life nothing better than a working shoemaker. He +was born at Old Seidenberg, a village near Goerlitz in Silesia, in the +year 1575, and he died at Goerlitz in the year 1624. Jacob Behmen has no +biography. Jacob Behmen's books are his best biography. While working +with his hands, Jacob Behmen's whole life was spent in the deepest and +the most original thought; in piercing visions of GOD and of nature; in +prayer, in praise, and in love to GOD and man. Of Jacob Behmen it may be +said with the utmost truth and soberness that he lived and moved and had +his being in GOD. Jacob Behmen has no biography because his whole life +was hid with CHRIST in GOD. + +* * * * * + +While we have nothing that can properly be called a biography of Jacob +Behmen, we have ample amends made to us in those priceless morsels of +autobiography that lie scattered so plentifully up and down all his +books. And nothing could be more charming than just those incidental and +unstudied utterances of Behmen about himself. Into the very depths of a +passage of the profoundest speculation Behmen will all of a sudden throw +a few verses of the most childlike and heart-winning confidences about +his own mental history and his own spiritual experience. And thus it is +that, without at all intending it, Behmen has left behind him a complete +history of his great mind and his holy heart in those outbursts of +diffidence, deprecation, explanation, and self-defence, of which his +philosophical and theological, as well as his apologetic and +experimental, books are all so full. It were an immense service done to +our best literature if some of Behmen's students would go through all +Behmen's books, so as to make a complete collection and composition of +the best of those autobiographic passages. Such a book, if it were well +done, would at once take rank with _The Confessions_ of ST. AUGUSTINE, +_The Divine Comedy_ of DANTE, and the _Grace Abounding_ of JOHN BUNYAN. +It would then be seen by all, what few, till then, will believe, that +Jacob Behmen's mind and heart and spiritual experience all combine to +give him a foremost place among the most classical masters in that great +field. + +In the nineteenth chapter of the _Aurora_ there occurs a very important +passage of this autobiographic nature. In that famous passage Behmen +tells his readers that when his eyes first began to be opened, the sight +of this world completely overwhelmed him. ASAPH'S experiences, so +powerfully set before us in the seventy-third Psalm, will best convey, to +those who do not know Behmen, what Behmen also passed through before he +drew near to GOD. Like that so thoughtful Psalmist, Behmen's steps had +well-nigh slipped when he saw the prosperity of the wicked, and when he +saw how waters of a full cup were so often wrung out to the people of +GOD. The mystery of life, the sin and misery of life, cast Behmen into a +deep and inconsolable melancholy. No Scripture could comfort him. His +thoughts of GOD were such that he will not allow himself, even after they +are long past, to put them down on paper. In this terrible trouble he +lifted up his heart to GOD, little knowing, as yet, what GOD was, or what +his own heart was. Only, he wrapped up his whole heart, and mind, and +will, and desire in the love and the mercy of GOD: determined not to give +over till GOD had heard him and had helped him. 'And then, when I had +wholly hazarded my life upon what I was doing, my whole spirit seemed to +me suddenly to break through the gates of hell, and to be taken up into +the arms and the heart of GOD. I can compare it to nothing else but the +resurrection at the last day. For then, with all reverence I say it, +with the eyes of my spirit I saw GOD. I saw both what GOD is, and I saw +how GOD is what He is. And with that there came a mighty and an +incontrollable impulse to set it down, so as to preserve what I had seen. +Some men will mock me, and will tell me to stick to my proper trade, and +not trouble my mind with philosophy and theology. Let these high matters +alone. Leave them to those who have both the time and the talent for +them, they will say. So I have often said to myself, but the truth of +GOD did burn in my bones till I took pen and ink and began to set down +what I had seen. All this time do not mistake me for a saint or an +angel. My heart also is full of all evil. In malice, and in hatred, and +in lack of brotherly love, after all I have seen and experienced, I am +like all other men. I am surely the fullest of all men of all manner of +infirmity and malignity.' Behmen protests in every book of his that what +he has written he has received immediately from GOD. 'Let it never be +imagined that I am any greater or any better than other men. When the +Spirit of GOD is taken away from me I cannot even read so as to +understand what I have myself written. I have every day to wrestle with +the devil and with my own heart, no man in all the world more. Oh no! +thou must not for one moment think of me as if I had by my own power or +holiness climbed up into heaven or descended into the abyss. Oh no! hear +me. I am as thou art. I have no more light than thou hast. Let no man +think of me what I am not. But what I am all men may be who will truly +believe, and will truly wrestle for truth and goodness under JESUS +CHRIST. I marvel every day that GOD should reveal both the Divine Nature +and Temporal and Eternal Nature for the first time to such a simple and +unlearned man as I am. But what am I to resist what GOD will do? What +am I to say but, Behold the son of thine handmaiden! I have often +besought Him to take these too high and too deep matters away from off +me, and to commit them to men of more learning and of a better style of +speech. But He always put my prayer away from Him and continued to +kindle His fire in my bones. And with all my striving to quench GOD'S +spirit of revelation, I found that I had only by that gathered the more +stones for the house that He had ordained me to build for Him and for His +children in this world.' + +Jacob Behmen's first book, his _Aurora_, was not a book at all, but a +bundle of loose leaves. Nothing was further from Behmen's mind, when he +took up his pen of an evening, than to make a book. He took up his pen +after his day's work was over in order to preserve for his own memory and +use in after days the revelations that had been made to him, and the +experiences and exercises through which GOD had passed him. And, +besides, Jacob Behmen could not have written a book even if he had tried +it. He was a total stranger to the world of books; and then, over and +above that, he had been taken up into a world of things into which no +book ever written as yet had dared to enter. Again, and again, and +again, till it came to fill his whole life, Behmen would be sitting over +his work, or walking abroad under the stars, or worshipping in his pew in +the parish church, when, like the captive prophet by the river of Chebar, +he would be caught up by the hair of the head and carried away into the +visions of GOD to behold the glory of GOD. And then, when he came to +himself, there would arise within him a 'fiery instigation' to set down +for a 'memorial' what he had again seen and heard. 'The gate of the +Divine Mystery was sometimes so opened to me that in one quarter of an +hour I saw and knew more than if I had been many years together at a +university. At which I did exceedingly admire, and, though it passed my +understanding how it happened, I thereupon turned my heart to GOD to +praise Him for it. For I saw and knew the Being of all Beings; the Byss +and the Abyss; as, also, the Generation of the Son and the Procession of +the Spirit. I saw the descent and original of this world also, and of +all its creatures. I saw in their order and outcome the Divine world, +the angelical world, paradise, and then this fallen and dark world of our +own. I saw the beginning of the good and the evil, and the true origin +and existence of each of them. All of which did not only cause me great +wonder but also a great joy and a great fear. And then it came with +commanding power into my mind that I must set down the same in pen and +ink for a memorial to myself; albeit, I could hardly contain or express +what I had seen. For twelve years this went on in me. Sometimes the +truth would hit me like a sudden smiting storm of rain; and then there +would be the clear sunshine after the rain. All which was to teach me +that GOD will manifest Himself in the soul of man after what manner and +what measure it pleases Him and as it seems good in His sight.' + +No human being knew all this time what Jacob Behmen was passing through, +and he never intended that any human being should know. But, with all +his humility, and all his love of obscurity, he could not remain hidden. +Just how it came about we are not fully told; but, long before his book +was finished, a nobleman in the neighbourhood, who was deeply interested +in the philosophy and the theology of that day, somehow got hold of +Behmen's papers and had them copied out and spread abroad, to Behmen's +great surprise and great distress. Copy after copy was stealthily made +of Behmen's manuscript, till, most unfortunately for both of them, a copy +came into the hands of Behmen's parish minister. But for that accident, +so to call it, we would never have heard the name of GREGORY RICHTER, +First Minister of Goerlitz, nor could we have believed that any minister +of JESUS CHRIST could have gone so absolutely mad with ignorance and envy +and anger and ill-will. The libel is still preserved that Behmen's +minister drew out against the author of _Aurora_, and the only thing it +proves to us is this, that its author must have been a dull-headed, +coarse-hearted, foul-mouthed man. Richter's persecution of poor Behmen +caused Behmen lifelong trouble; but, at the same time, it served to +advertise his genius to his generation, and to manifest to all men the +meekness, the humility, the docility, and the love of peace of the +persecuted man. 'Pastor-Primarius Richter,' says a bishop of his own +communion, 'was a man full of hierarchical arrogance and pride. He had +only the most outward apprehension of the dogmatics of his day, and he +was totally incapable of understanding Jacob Behmen.' But it is not for +the limitations of his understanding that Pastor Richter stands before us +so laden with blame. The school is a small one still that, after two +centuries of study and prayer and a holy life, can pretend to understand +the whole of the _Aurora_. WILLIAM LAW, a man of the best understanding, +and of the humblest heart, tells us that his first reading of Behmen put +him into a 'perfect sweat' of astonishment and awe. No wonder, then, +that a man of Gregory Richter's narrow mind and hard heart was thrown +into such a sweat of prejudice and anger and ill-will. + +I do not propose to take you down into the deep places where Jacob Behmen +dwells and works. And that for a very good reason. For I have found no +firm footing in those deep places for my own feet. I wade in and in to +the utmost of my ability, and still there rise up above me, and stretch +out around me, and sink down beneath me, vast reaches of revelation and +speculation, attainment and experience, before which I can only wonder +and worship. See Jacob Behmen working with his hands in his solitary +stall, when he is suddenly caught up into heaven till he beholds in +enraptured vision The Most High Himself. And then, after that, see him +swept down to hell, down to sin, and down into the bottomless pit of the +human heart. Jacob Behmen, almost more than any other man whatsoever, is +carried up till he moves like a holy angel or a glorified saint among +things unseen and eternal. Jacob Behmen is of the race of the seers, and +he stands out a very prince among them. He is full of eyes, and all his +eyes are full of light. It does not stagger me to hear his disciples +calling him, as HEGEL does, 'a man of a mighty mind,' or, as LAW does, +'the illuminated Behmen,' and 'the blessed Behmen.' 'In speculative +power,' says dry DR. KURTZ, 'and in poetic wealth, exhibited with epic +and dramatic effect, Behmen's system surpasses everything of the kind +ever written.' Some of his disciples have the hardihood to affirm indeed +that even ISAAC NEWTON ploughed with Behmen's heifer, but had not the +boldness to acknowledge the debt. I entirely accept it when his +disciples assert it of their master that he had a privilege and a +passport permitted him such as no mortal man has had the like since +JOHN'S eyes closed upon his completed Apocalypse. After repeated and +prolonged reading of Behmen's amazing books, nothing that has been said +by his most ecstatic disciples about their adored master either +astonishes or offends me. Dante himself does not beat such a soaring +wing as Behmen's; and all the trumpets that sound in _Paradise Lost_ do +not swell my heart and chase its blood like Jacob Behmen's broken +syllables about the Fall. I would not wonder to have it pointed out to +me in the world to come that all that Gichtel, and St. Martin, and Hegel, +and Law, and Walton, and Martensen, and Hartmann have said about Jacob +Behmen and his visions of GOD and Nature and Man were all but literally +true. No doubt,--nay, the thing is certain,--that if you open Jacob +Behmen anywhere as Gregory Richter opened the _Aurora_; if a new idea is +a pain and a provocation to you; if you have any prejudice in your heart +for any reason against Behmen; if you dislike the sound of his name +because some one you dislike has discovered him and praised him, or +because you do not yourself already know him and love him, then, no +doubt, you will find plenty in Behmen at which to stumble, and which will +amply justify you in anything you wish to say against him. But if you +are a true student and a good man; if you are an open-minded and a humble- +minded man; if you are prepared to sit at any man's feet who will engage +to lead you a single step out of your ignorance and your evil; if you +open Behmen with a predisposition to believe in him, and with the +expectation and the determination to get good out of him,--then, in the +measure of all that; in the measure of your capacity of mind and your +hospitality of heart; in the measure of your humility, seriousness, +patience, teachableness, hunger for truth, hunger for righteousness,--in +that measure you will find Jacob Behmen to be what MAURICE tells us he +found him to be, 'a generative thinker.' Out of much you cannot +understand,--wherever the blame for that may lie,--out of much slag and +much dross, I am mistaken if you will not lay up some of your finest +gold; and out of much straw and chaff some of the finest of the wheat. +The Divine Nature, human nature, time, space, matter, life, love, sin, +death, holiness, heaven, hell,--Behmen's reader must have lived and moved +all his days among such things as these: he must be at home, as far as +the mind of man can be at home, among such things as these, and then he +will begin to understand Behmen, and will still strive better and better +to understand him; and, where he does not as yet understand him, he will +set that down to his own inattention, incapacity, want of due +preparation, and want of the proper ripeness for such a study. + +At the same time let all intending students of Jacob Behmen take warning +that they will have to learn an absolutely new and an unheard-of language +if they would speak with Behmen and have Behmen speak with them. For +Behmen's books are written neither in German nor in English of any age or +idiom, but in the most original and uncouth Behmenese. Like John Bunyan, +but never with John Bunyan's literary grace, Behmen will borrow, now a +Latin word or phrase from his reading of learned authors, or, more often, +from the conversations of his learned friends; and then he will take some +astrological or alchemical expression of AGRIPPA, or PARACELSUS, or some +such outlaw, and will, as with his awl and rosin-end, sew together a +sentence, and hammer together a page of the most incongruous and unheard- +of phraseology, till, as we read Behmen's earlier work especially, we +continually exclaim, O for a chapter of John Bunyan's clear, and sweet, +and classical English! The _Aurora_ was written in a language, if +writing and a language it can be called, that had never been seen written +or heard spoken before, or has since, on the face of the earth. And as +our students learn Greek in order to read Homer and Plato and Paul and +John, and Latin in order to read Virgil and Tacitus, and Italian to read +Dante, and German to read Goethe, so William Law tells us that he learned +Behmen's Behmenite High Dutch, and that too after he was an old man, in +order that he might completely master the _Aurora_ and its kindred books. +And as our schoolboys laugh and jeer at the outlandish sounds of Greek +and Latin and German, till they have learned to read and love the great +authors who have written in those languages, so WESLEY, and SOUTHEY, and +even HALLAM himself, jest and flout and call names at Jacob Behmen, +because they have not taken the trouble to learn his language, to master +his mind, and to drink in his spirit. At the same time, and after all +that has been said about Behmen's barbarous style, Bishop Martensen tells +us how the readers of SCHELLING were surprised and enraptured by a wealth +of new expressions and new turns of speech in their mother tongue. But +all these belonged to Behmen, or were fashioned on the model of his +symbolical language. As it is, with all his astrology, and all his +alchemy, and all his barbarities of form and expression, I for one will +always take sides with the author of _The Serious Call_, and _The Spirit +of Prayer_, and _The Spirit of Love_, and _The Way to Divine Knowledge_, +in the disputed matter of Jacob Behmen's sanity and sanctity; and I will +continue to believe that if I had only had the scholarship, and the +intellect, and the patience, and the enterprise, to have mastered, +through all their intricacies, the Behmenite grammar and the Behmenite +vocabulary, I also would have found in Behmen all that Freher and Pordage +and Law and Walton found. Even in the short way into this great man that +I have gone, I have come upon such rare and rich mines of divine and +eternal truth that I can easily believe that they who have dug deeper +have come upon uncounted riches. 'Next to the Scriptures,' writes +William Law, 'my only book is the illuminated Behmen. For the whole +kingdom of grace and nature was opened in him. In reading Behmen I am +always at home, and kept close to the kingdom of GOD that is within me.' +'I am not young,' said CLAUDE DE ST. MARTIN, 'being now near my fiftieth +year, nevertheless I have begun to learn German, in order that I may read +this incomparable author in his own tongue. I have written some not +unacceptable books myself, but I am not worthy to unloose the shoestrings +of this wonderful man. I advise you to throw yourself into the depths of +Jacob Behmen. There is such a profundity and exaltation of truth in +them, and such a simple and delicious nutriment.' + +The Town Council of Goerlitz, hounded on by their Minister, sentenced +Behmen to be banished, and interdicted him from ever writing any more. +But in sheer shame at what they had done they immediately recalled Behmen +from banishment; only, they insisted that he should confine himself to +his shop, and leave all writing of books alone. Behmen had no ambition +to write any more, and, as a matter of fact, he kept silence even to +himself for seven whole years. But as those years went on it came to be +with him, to use his own words, as with so much grain that has been +buried in the earth, and which, in spite of storms and tempests, will, +out of its own life, spring up, and that even when reason says it is now +winter, and that all hope and all power is gone. And thus it was that, +under the same instigation which had produced the _Aurora_, Behmen at a +rush wrote his very fine if very difficult book, _The Three Principles of +the Divine Essence_. He calls _The Three Principles_ his A B C, and the +easiest of all his books. And William Law recommends all beginners in +Behmen to read alone for some sufficient time the tenth and twelfth +chapters of _The Three Principles_. I shall let Behmen describe the +contents of his easiest book in his own words. 'In this second book,' he +says, 'there is declared what GOD is, what Nature is, what the creatures +are, what the love and meekness of GOD are, what GOD'S will is, what the +wrath of GOD is, and what joy and sorrow are. As also, how all things +took their beginning: with the true difference between eternal and +transitory creatures. Specially of man and his soul, what the soul is, +and how it is an eternal creature. Also what heaven is, wherein GOD and +the holy angels and holy men dwell, and hell wherein the devils dwell: +and how all things were originally created and had their being. In sum, +what the Essence of all Essences is. And thus I commit my reader to the +sweet love of GOD.' _The Three Principles_, according to CHRISTOPHER +WALTON, was the first book of Behmen's that William Law ever held in his +hand. That, then, was the title-page, and those were the contents, that +threw that princely and saintly mind into such a sweat. It was a great +day for William Law, and through him it was, and will yet be acknowledged +to have been, a great day for English theology when he chanced, at an old +bookstall, upon _The Three Principles_, Englished by a Barrister of the +Inner Temple. The picture of that bookstall that day is engraven in +lines of light and love on the heart of every grateful reader of Jacob +Behmen and of William Law's later and richer and riper writings. + +In three months after he had finished _The Three Principles_, Behmen had +composed a companion treatise, entitled _The Threefold Life of Man_. +Modest about himself as Behmen always was, he could not be wholly blind +about his own incomparable books. And he but spoke the simple truth +about his third book when he said of it--as, indeed, he was constantly +saying about all his books--that it will serve every reader just +according to his constellation, his inclination, his disposition, his +complexion, his profession, and his whole condition. 'You will be soon +weary of all contentious books,' he wrote to CASPER LINDERN, 'if you +entertain and get _The Threefold Life of Man_ into your mind and heart.' +'The subject of regeneration,' says Christopher Walton, 'is the pith and +drift of all Behmen's writings, and the student may here be directed to +begin his course of study by mastering the first eight chapters of _The +Threefold Life_, which appear to have been in great favour with Mr. Law.' + +Behmen's next book was a very extraordinary piece of work, and it had a +very extraordinary origin. A certain BALTHAZAR WALTER, who seems to have +been a second Paracelsus in his love of knowledge and in his lifelong +pursuit of knowledge, had, like Paracelsus, travelled east, and west, and +north, and south in search of that ancient and occult wisdom of which so +many men in that day dreamed. But Walter, like his predecessor +Paracelsus, had come home from his travels a humbler man, a wiser man, +and a man more ready to learn and lay to heart the truth that some of his +own countrymen could all the time have taught him. On his return from +the east, Walter found the name of Jacob Behmen in everybody's mouth; +and, on introducing himself to that little shop in Goerlitz out of which +the _Aurora_ and _The Threefold Life_ had come, Walter was wise enough to +see and bold enough to confess that he had found a teacher and a friend +there such as neither Egypt nor India had provided him with. After many +immensely interested visits to Jacob Behmen's workshop, Walter was more +than satisfied that Behmen was all, and more than all, that his most +devoted admirers had said he was. And, accordingly, Walter laid a plan +so as to draw upon Behmen's profound and original mind for a solution of +some of the philosophical and theological problems that were agitating +and dividing the learned men of that day. With that view Walter made a +round of the leading universities of Germany, conversed with the +professors and students, collected a long list of the questions that were +being debated in that day in those seats of learning, and sent the list +to Behmen, asking him to give his mind to them and try to answer them. +'Beloved sir,' wrote Behmen, after three months' meditation and prayer, +'and my good friend: it is impossible for the mind and reason of man to +answer all the questions you have put to me. All those things are known +to GOD alone. But, that no man may boast, He sometimes makes use of very +mean men to make known His truth, that it may be seen and acknowledged to +come from His own hand alone.' It is told that when Charles the First +read the English translation of Behmen's answers to the _Forty +Questions_, he wrote to the publisher that if Jacob Behmen was no +scholar, then the Holy Ghost was still with men; and, if he was a learned +man, then his book was one of the best inventions that had ever been +written. The _Forty Questions_ ran through many editions both on the +Continent and in England, and it was this book that gained for Jacob +Behmen the denomination of the Teutonic Philosopher, a name by which he +is distinguished among authors to this day. The following are some of +the university questions that Balthazar Walter took down and sent to +Jacob Behmen for his answer: 'What is the soul of man in its innermost +essence, and how is it created, soul by soul, in the image of GOD? Is +the soul propagated from father to son like the body? or is it every time +new created and breathed in from GOD? How comes original sin into each +several soul? How does the soul of the saint feed and grow upon the word +of GOD? Whence comes the deadly contrariety between the flesh and the +spirit? Whither goes the soul when it at death departs from the body? In +what does its rest, its awakening, and its glorification consist? What +kind of body shall the glorified body be? The soul and spirit of CHRIST, +what are they? and are they the same as ours? What and where is +Paradise?' Through a hundred and fourteen large quarto pages Behmen's +astonishing answers to the forty questions run; after which he adds this: +'Thus, my beloved friend, we have set down, according to our gifts, a +round answer to your questions, and we exhort you as a brother not to +despise us. For we are not born of art, but of simplicity. We +acknowledge all who love such knowledge as our brethren in CHRIST, with +whom we hope to rejoice eternally in the heavenly school. For our best +knowledge here is but in part, but when we shall attain to perfection, +then we shall see what GOD is, and what He can do. Amen.' + +_A Treatise of the Incarnation of the Son of God_ comes next, and then we +have three smaller works written to clear up and to establish several +difficult and disputed matters in it and in some of his former works. To +write on the Incarnation of the Son of GOD would need, says Behmen, an +angel's pen; but his defence is that his is better than any angel's pen, +because it is the pen of a sinner's love. The year 1621 saw one of +Behmen's most original and most powerful books finished,--the _Signatura +Rerum_. In this remarkable book Behmen teaches us that all things have +two worlds in which they live,--an inward world and an outward. All +created things have an inner and an invisible essence, and an outer and a +visible form. And the outward form is always more or less the key to the +inward character. This whole world that we see around us, and of which +we ourselves are the soul,--it is all a symbol, a 'signature,' of an +invisible world. This deep principle runs through the whole of +creation. The Creator went upon this principle in all His work; and the +thoughtful mind can see that principle coming out in all His work,--in +plants, and trees, and beasts. + + As German Boehme never cared for plants + Until it happed, a-walking in the fields, + He noticed all at once that plants could speak, + Nay, turned with loosened tongue to talk with him. + That day the daisy had an eye indeed-- + Colloquized with the cowslips on such themes! + We find them extant yet in Jacob's prose. + +But, best of all, this principle comes out clearest in the speech, +behaviour, features, and face of a man. Every day men are signing +themselves from within. Every act they perform, every word they speak, +every wish they entertain,--it all comes out and is fixed for ever in +their character, and even in their appearance. 'Therefore,' says Behmen +in the beginning of his book, 'the greatest understanding lies in the +signature. For by the external form of all creatures; by their voice and +action, as well as by their instigation, inclination, and desire, their +hidden spirit is made known. For Nature has given to everything its own +language according to its innermost essence. And this is the language of +Nature, in which everything continually speaks, manifests, and declares +itself for what it is,--so much so, that all that is spoken or written +even about GOD, however true, if the writer or speaker has not the Divine +Nature within himself, then all he says is dumb to me; he has not got the +hammer in his hand that can strike my bell.' + +_The Way to Christ_ was Behmen's next book, and in the four precious +treatises that compose that book our author takes an altogether new +departure. In his _Aurora_, in _The Three Principles_, in the _Forty +Questions_, and in the _Signatura Rerum_, Jacob Behmen has been writing +for philosophers and theologians. Or, if in all these works he has been +writing for a memorial to himself in the first place,--even then, it has +been for himself on the philosophical and theological side of his own +mind. But in _The Way to Christ_ he writes for himself under that +character which, once taken up by Jacob Behmen, is never for one day laid +down. Behmen's favourite Scripture, after our Lord's promise of the Holy +Spirit to them that ask for Him, was the parable of the Prodigal Son. In +all his books Behmen is that son, covered with wounds and bruises and +putrefying sores, but at last beginning to come to himself and to return +to his Father. _The Way to Christ_ is a production of the very greatest +depth and strength, but it is the depth and the strength of the heart and +the conscience rather than the depth and the strength of the +understanding and the imagination. This nobly evangelical book is made +up of four tracts, entitled respectively, _Of True Repentance_, _Of True +Resignation_, _Of Regeneration_, and _Of the Supersensual Life_. And a +deep vein of autobiographic life and interest runs through the four +tracts and binds them into a quick unity. 'A soldier,' says Behmen, 'who +has been in the wars can best tell another soldier how to fight.' And +neither Augustine nor Luther nor Bunyan carries deeper wounds, or broader +scars, nor tells a nobler story in any of their autobiographic and +soldierly books than Behmen does in his _Way to Christ_. At the +commencement of _The True Repentance_ he promises us that he will write +of a process or way on which he himself has gone. 'The author herewith +giveth thee the best jewel that he hath.' And a true jewel it is, as the +present speaker will testify. If _The True Repentance_ has a fault at +all it is the fault of Rutherford's _Letters_. For the taste of some of +his readers Behmen, like Rutherford, draws rather too much on the +language and the figures of the married life in setting forth the love of +CHRIST to the espoused soul, and the love of the espoused soul to CHRIST. +But with that, and all its other drawbacks, _The True Repentance_ is such +a treatise that, once discovered by the proper reader, it will be the +happy discoverer's constant companion all his earthly and penitential +days. As the English reader is carried on through the fourth tract, _The +Supersensual Life_, he experiences a new and an increasing sense of ease +and pleasure, combined with a mystic height and depth and inwardness all +but new to him even in Behmen's books. The new height and depth and +inwardness are all Jacob Behmen's own; but the freedom and the ease and +the movement and the melody are all William Law's. In his preparations +for a new edition of Behmen in English, William Law had re-translated and +paraphrased _The Supersensual Life_, and the editor of the 1781 edition +of Behmen's works has incorporated Law's beautiful rendering of that +tract in room of JOHN SPARROW'S excellent but rather too antique +rendering. We are in John Sparrow's everlasting debt for the immense +labour he laid out on Behmen, as well as for his own deep piety and +personal worth. But it was service enough and honour enough for Sparrow +to have Englished Jacob Behmen at all for his fellow-countrymen, even if +he was not able to English him as William Law would have done. But take +Behmen and Law together, as they meet together in _The Supersensual +Life_, and not A Kempis himself comes near them even in his own proper +field, or in his immense service in that field. There is all the +reality, inwardness, and spirituality of _The Imitation_ in _The +Supersensual Life_, together with a sweep of imagination, and a grasp of +understanding, as well as with both a sweetness and a bitterness of heart +that even A Kempis never comes near. _The Supersensual Life_ of Jacob +Behmen, in the English of William Law, is a superb piece of spiritual +work, and a treasure-house of masculine English. (If Christopher Walton +is right, we must read 'Lee' for 'Law' in this passage. If Walton is +right, then there was a master of English in those days we had not before +been told of.) + +_A Treatise of the Four Complexions_, or _A Consolatory Instruction for a +Sad and Assaulted Heart_, was Behmen's next book. The four complexions +are the four temperaments--the choleric, the sanguine, the phlegmatic, +and the melancholy. Behmen's treatise has been well described by Walton +as containing the philosophy of temptation; and by Martensen as +displaying a most profound knowledge of the human heart. Behmen sets +about his task as a _ductor dubitantium_ in a masterly manner. He takes +in hand the comfort and direction of sin-distressed souls in a +characteristically deep, inward, and thorough-going way. The book is +full of Behmen's observation of men. It is the outcome of a close and +long-continued study of character and conduct. Every page of _The Four +Complexions_ gleams with a keen but tender and wistful insight into our +poor human nature. As his customers came and gave their orders in his +shop; as his neighbours collected, and gossiped, and debated, and +quarrelled around his shop window; as his minister fumed and raged +against him in the pulpit; as the Council of Goerlitz sat and swayed, +passed sentence upon him, retracted their sentence, and again gave way +under the pressure of their minister, and pronounced another +sentence,--all this time Behmen was having poor human nature, to all its +joints and marrow, and to all the thoughts and instincts of its heart, +laid naked and open before him, both in other men and in himself. And +then, as always with Behmen, all this observation of men, all this +discovery and self-discovery, ran up into philosophy, into theology, into +personal and evangelical religion. In all that Behmen better and better +saw the original plan, constitution, and operation of human nature; its +aboriginal catastrophe; its weakness and openness to all evil; and its +need of constant care, protection, instruction, watchfulness, and Divine +help. Behmen writes on all the four temperaments with the profoundest +insight, and with the fullest sympathy; but over the last of the four he +exclaims: 'O hear me! for I know well myself what melancholy is! I also +have lodged all my days in the melancholy inn!' As I read that light and +elastic book published the other day, _The Life and Letters of Erasmus_, +I came on this sentence, 'Erasmus, like all men of real genius, had a +light and elastic nature.' When I read that, I could not believe my +eyes. I had been used to think of light and elastic natures as being the +antipodes of natures of real genius. And as I stopped my reading for a +little, a procession of men of real and indisputable genius passed before +me, who had all lodged with Behmen in the melancholy inn. Till I +remembered that far deeper and far truer saying, that 'simply to say man +at all is to say melancholy.' No: with all respect, the real fact is +surely as near as possible the exact opposite. A light, elastic, Erasmus- +like nature, is the exception among men of real genius. At any rate, +Jacob Behmen was the exact opposite of Erasmus, and of all such light and +elastic men. Melancholy was Jacob Behmen's special temperament and +peculiar complexion. He had long studied, and watched, and wrestled +with, and prayed over that complexion at home. And thus it is, no doubt, +that he is so full, and so clear, and so sure-footed, and so impressive, +and so full of fellow-feeling in his treatment of this special +complexion. Behmen's greatest disciple has assimilated his master's +teaching in this matter of complexion also, and has given it out again in +his own clear, plain, powerful, classical manner, especially in his +treatise on _Christian Regeneration_. Let all preachers and pastors who +would master the _rationale_ of temptation, and who would ground their +directions and their comforts to their people in the nature of things, as +well as in the word of GOD, make Jacob Behmen and William Law and +Prebendary Clark their constant study. 'I write for no other purpose,' +says Behmen, 'than that men may learn how to know themselves. Seek the +noble knowledge of thyself. Seek it and you will find a heavenly +treasure which will not be eaten by moths, and which no thief shall ever +take away.' + +I shall not attempt to enter on the thorny thicket of Jacob Behmen's +polemical and apologetical works. I shall not even load your mind with +their unhappy titles. His five apologies occupy in bulk somewhere about +a tenth part of his five quarto volumes. And full as his apologies and +defences are of autobiographic material, as well as of valuable +expansions and explanations of his other books, yet at their best they +are all controversial and combative in their cast and complexion; and, +nobly as Behmen has written on the subject of controversy, it was not +given even to him, amid all the misunderstandings, misrepresentations, +injuries, and insults he suffered from, always to write what we are glad +and proud and the better to read. + +About his next book Behmen thus writes: 'Upon the desire of some high +persons with whom I did converse in the Christmas holidays, I have +written a pretty large treatise upon Election, in which I have done my +best to determine that subject upon the deepest grounds. And I hope that +the same may put an end to many contentions and controversies, especially +of some points betwixt the Lutherans and Calvinists, for I have taken the +texts of Holy Scripture which speak of GOD'S will to harden sinners, and +then, again, of His unwillingness to harden, and have so tuned and +harmonised them that the right understanding and meaning of the same may +be seen.' 'This author,' says John Sparrow, 'disputes not at all. He +desires only to confer and offer his understanding of the Scriptures on +both sides, answering reason's objections, and manifesting the truth for +the conjoining, uniting, and reconciling of all parties in love.' And +that he has not been wholly unsuccessful we may believe when we hear one +of Behmen's ablest commentators writing of his _Election_ as 'a +superlatively helpful book,' and again, as a 'profoundly instructive +treatise.' The workman-like way in which Behmen sets about his treatment +of the _Election of Grace, commonly called Predestination_, will be seen +from the titles of some of his chapters. Chap. i. What the One Only GOD +is. Chap. ii. Concerning GOD'S Eternal Speaking Word. Chap. v. Of the +Origin of Man; Chap. vi. Of the Fall of Man. Chap. viii. Of the +sayings of Scripture, and how they oppose one another. Chap. ix. +Clearing the Right Understanding of such Scriptures. Chap. xiii. A +Conclusion upon all those Questions. And then, true to his constant +manner, as if wholly dissatisfied with the result of all his labour in +things and in places too deep both for writer and reader, he gave all the +next day after he had finished his _Election_ to an _Appendix on +Repentance_, in order to making his own and his reader's calling and +election sure. And it may safely be said that, than that day's work, +than those four quarto pages, not Augustine, not Luther, not Bunyan, not +Baxter, not Shepard has ever written anything of more evangelical depth, +and strength, and passion, and pathos. It is truly a splendid day's +work! But it might not have been possible even for Behmen to perform +that day's work had he not for months beforehand been dealing day and +night with the deepest and the most heart-searching things both of GOD +and man. What a man was Jacob Behmen, and chosen to what a service! At +work all that day in his solitary stall, and then all the night after +over his rush-light writing for a memorial to himself and to us his +incomparable _Compendium of Repentance_. + +In a letter addressed to one of the nobility in Silesia, and dated +February 19, 1623, Behmen says: 'When you have leisure to study I shall +send you something still more deep, for I have written this whole autumn +and winter without ceasing.' And if he had written nothing else but his +great book entitled _Mysterium Magnum_ that autumn and winter, he must +have written night and day and done nothing else. Even in size the +_Mysterium_ is an immense piece of work. In the English edition it +occupies the whole of the third quarto volume of 507 pages; and then for +its matter it is a still more amazing production. To say that the +_Mysterium Magnum_ is a mystical and allegorical commentary upon the Book +of Genesis is to say nothing. Philo himself is a tyro and a timid +interpreter beside Jacob Behmen. 'Which things are an allegory,' says +the Apostle, after a passing reference to Sarah and Hagar and Isaac and +Ishmael; but if you would see actually every syllable of Genesis +allegorised, spiritualised, interpreted of CHRIST, and of the New +Testament, from the first verse of its first chapter to the last verse of +its last chapter, like the nobleman of Silesia, when you have leisure, +read Behmen's deep _Mysterium Magnum_. I would recommend the +enterprising and unconquerable student to make leisure so as to master +Behmen's Preface to the _Mysterium Magnum_ at the very least. And if he +does that, and is not drawn on from that to be a student of Behmen for +the rest of his days, then, whatever else his proper field in life may +be, it is not mystical or philosophical theology. It is a long step both +in time and in thought from Behmen to SCHOPENHAUER; but, speaking of one +of Schelling's books, Schopenhauer says that it is all taken from Jacob +Behmen's _Mysterium Magnum_; every thought and almost every word of +Schelling's work leads Schopenhauer to think of Behmen. 'When I read +Behmen's book,' says Schopenhauer, 'I cannot withhold either admiration +or emotion.' At his far too early death Behmen left four treatises +behind him in an unfinished condition. The _Theoscopia_, or _Divine +Vision_, is but a fragment; but, even so, the study of that fragment +leads us to believe that, had Behmen lived to the ordinary limit of human +life, and had his mind continued to grow as it was now fast growing in +clearness, in concentration, and in simplicity, Behmen would have left to +us not a few books as classical in their form as all his books are +classical in their substance; in their originality, in their truth, in +their depth, and in their strength. As it is, the unfinished, the +scarcely-begun, _Theoscopia_ only serves to show the student of what a +treasure he has been bereft by Behmen's too early death. As I read and +re-read the _Theoscopia_ I felt the full truth and force of Hegel's +generous words, that German philosophy began with Behmen. This is both +German and Christian philosophy, I said to myself as I revelled in the +_Theoscopia_. Let the serious student listen to the titles of some of +the chapters of the _Theoscopia_, and then let him say what he would not +have given to have got such a book from such a pen in its completed +shape: 'What GOD is, and how we men shall know the Divine Substance by +the Divine Revelation. Why it sometimes seems as if there were no GOD, +and as if all things went in the world by chance. Why GOD, who is Love +itself, permits an evil will contrary to His own. The reason and the +profit, why evil should be found along with good. Of the mind of man, +and how it is the image of GOD, and how it can still be filled with God. +Why this Temporal Universe is created; to what it is profitable; and how +God is so near unto all things': and so on. 'But no amount of +quotation,' says Mrs. Penney, that very able student of Behmen, lately +deceased, 'can give an adequate glimpse of the light which streams from +the _Theoscopia_ when long and patiently studied.' + +Another unfinished fragment that Behmen's readers seek for and treasure +up like very sand of gold is his _Holy Week_. This little work, its +author tells us, was undertaken upon the entreaty and desire of some +loving and good friends of his for the daily exercise of true religion in +their hearts and in the little church of their families. The following +is Behmen's method of prayer for Monday, which is the only day's prayer +he got finished before his death: 'A short prayer when we awake early +and before we rise. A prayer and thanksgiving after we are risen. A +prayer while we wash and dress. A prayer when we begin to work at our +calling. A prayer at noon. A prayer toward evening. A prayer when we +undress. A prayer of thanks for the bitter passion and dying of JESUS +CHRIST.' What does the man mean? many of his contemporaries who came +upon his _Holy Week_ would say, What does the madman mean? Would he have +us pray all day? Would he have us pray and do nothing else? Yes; it +would almost seem so. For in his _Supersensual Life_ the Master says to +the disciple who has asked, 'How shall I be able to live aright amid all +the anxiety and tribulation of this world?': 'If thou dost once every +hour throw thyself by faith beyond all creatures into the abysmal mercy +of GOD, into the sufferings of CHRIST, and into the fellowship of His +intercession, then thou shalt receive power from above to rule over the +world, and death, and the devil, and hell itself.' And again, 'O thou of +little courage, if thy will could but break itself off every half-hour +from all creatures, and plunge itself into that where no creature is or +can be, presently it would be penetrated with the splendour of the Divine +glory, and would taste a sweetness no tongue can express. Then thou +wouldst love thy cross more than all the glory and all the goods of this +world.' The author had begun a series of reflections and meditations on +the Ten Commandments for devotional use on Tuesday, but got no further +than the Fifth. Behmen is so deep and so original in his purely +philosophical, theological, and speculative books, that in many places we +can only stand back and wonder at the man. But in his _Holy Week_ Behmen +kneels down beside us. Not but that his characteristic depth is present +in his prayers also; but we all know something of the nature, the manner, +and the blessedness of prayer, and thus it is that we are so much more at +home with Behmen, the prodigal son, than we are with Behmen, the +theosophical theologian. When Behmen begins to teach us to pray, and +when the lesson comes to us out of his own closet, then we are able to +see in a nearer light something of the originality, the greatness, the +strength, and the true and genuine piety of the philosopher and the +theologian. When Behmen's philosophy and theology become penitence, +prayer, and praise, then by their fruits we know how good his philosophy +and his theology must be, away down in their deepest and most hidden +nature. I agree with Walton that those prayers are full of unction and +instruction, and that some of them are of the 'highest magnetical power'; +and that, as rendered into modern phraseology, they are most beautiful +devotional compositions, and very models of all that a divinely +illuminated mind would address to GOD and CHRIST. For myself, +immediately after the Psalms of David I put Jacob Behmen's _Holy Week_ +and the prayers scattered up and down through his _True Repentance_, and +beside Behmen I put Bishop Andrewes' _Private Devotions_. I have +discovered no helps to my own devotional life for a moment to set beside +Behmen and Andrewes. + +_A Treatise on Baptism and the Lord's Supper_; _A Key to the Principal +Points and Expressions in the Author's Writings_; and then a most +valuable volume of letters--_Epistolae Theosophicae_--complete the +extraordinarily rich bibliography of the illuminated and blessed Jacob +Behmen. + +Though there is a great deal of needless and wearisome repetition in +Jacob Behmen's writings, at the same time there is scarcely a single +subject in the whole range of theology on which he does not throw a new, +an intense, and a brilliant light. In his absolutely original and +magnificent doctrine of GOD, while all the time loyally true to it, +Behmen has confessedly transcended the theology of both the Latin and the +Reformed Churches; and, absolutely unlettered man though he is, has taken +his stand at the very head of the great Greek theologians. The Reformers +concentrated their criticism upon the anthropology and soteriology of the +Church of Rome, and especially upon the discipline and worship connected +therewith. They saw no need for recasting any of the more fundamental +positions of pure theology. And while Jacob Behmen, broadly speaking, +accepts as his own confession of faith all that Luther and Calvin and +their colleagues taught on sin and salvation, on the corruption and guilt +of sinners, and on the redeeming work of our LORD, he rises far above the +greatest and best of his teachers in his doctrine of the GODHEAD. Not +only does he rise far higher in that doctrine than either Rome or Geneva, +he rises far higher and sounds far deeper than either Antioch, or +Alexandria, or Nicomedia, or Nice. On this profound point Bishop +Martensen has an excellent appreciation of Behmen. After what I have +taken upon me to say about Behmen, the learned Bishop's authoritative +passage must be quoted:--'If we compare Behmen's doctrine of the +Trinity,' says the learned and evangelical Bishop, 'with that which is +contained in the otherwise so admirable Athanasian Creed, the latter but +displays to us a most abstruse metaphysic; a GOD for mere thought, and in +whom there is nothing sympathetic for the heart of man. Behmen, on the +contrary, reveals to us the LIVING GOD, the GOD of Goodness, the Eternal +Love, of which there is absolutely no hint whatever in the hard +Athanasian symbol. By this attitude of his to the affections of the +human heart, Behmen's doctrine of the Trinity is in close coherence with +the Reformation, and with its evangelical churches. . . . Behmen is +anxious to state a conception of GOD that will fill the hiatus between +the theological and anthropological sides of the dogmatical development +which was bequeathed by the Reformation; he seeks to unite the +theological and the anthropological. . . . From careful study of Behmen's +theology,' continues Bishop Martensen, 'one gains a prevailing impression +that Behmen's GOD is, in His inmost Being, most kindred to man, even as +man in his inmost being is still kindred to GOD. And, besides, we +recognise in Behmen throughout the pulse-beat of a believing man, who is +in all his books supremely anxious about his own salvation and that of +his fellow-men.' Now, it is just this super-confessional element in +Behmen, both on his speculative and on his practical side, taken along +with the immediate and intensely practical bearing of all his +speculations, it is just this that is Behmen's true and genuine +distinction, his shining and unshared glory. And it is out of that +supreme, solitary, and wholly untrodden field of Behmen's +super-confessional theology that all that is essential, characteristic, +distinctive, and fruitful in Behmen really and originally springs. The +distinctions he takes within, and around, and immediately beneath the +Godhead, are of themselves full of the noblest light. The Divine Nature, +Eternal Nature, Temporal Nature, Human Nature, when evolved out of one +another, and when related to one another, as Behmen sees them evolved and +related, are categories of the clearest, surest, most necessary, and most +intensely instructive kind. And if the height and the depth, the +massiveness, the stupendousness, and the grandeur, as well as the +sweetness, and the beauty, and the warmth, and the fruitfulness of a +doctrine of GOD is any argument or evidence of its truth, then Behmen's +magnificent doctrine of the GODHEAD is surely proved to demonstration and +delight. GOD is the Essence of all Essences to Behmen. GOD is the +deepest Ground, the living and the life-giving Root of all existence. At +the same time, the Divine Nature is so Divine; It is so high and so deep; +It is so unlike all that is not Itself; It is so beyond and above all +language, and all thought, and all imagination of man or angel, that +universe after universe have had to come into existence, and have had to +be filled, each successive universe after its own kind, with all the +fulness of GOD, before that universe of which we form a part, and to +which our utmost imagination is confined, could have come into existence, +and into recognition of itself. Behmen's Eternal Nature must never be +taken for the Eternal GOD. The Divine Nature, the Eternal Godhead, +exists in the Father, in the Son, and in the Holy Ghost; and then, after +the Eternal Generation of the Son, and the Eternal Procession of the Holy +Ghost, there comes up in order of existence Eternal Nature. Eternal +Nature is not the Divine Nature, but it is as near to the Divine Nature +in its qualities and in its powers as any created thing can ever by any +possibility be. Now, if we are still to follow Behmen, we must not let +ourselves indolently think of the production of Eternal Nature as a +divine act done and completed in any past either of time or of eternity. +There is neither past nor future where we are now walking with Behmen. +There is only an everlasting present where he is now leading us. For, as +GOD the Father generates the Son eternally and continually; and as the +Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son eternally and +continually, so GOD the Word eternally and continually says, 'Let this +Beginning of all things be, and let it continue to be.' And, as He +speaks, His Word awakens the ever-dawning morning of the ever new-created +day. And He beholds Eternal Nature continually rising up before Him, and +He pronounces it very good. The Creator so transcends the creation, and, +especially, that late and remote creation of which we are a part, that, +as the Creator's first step out of Himself, and as a step towards our +creation, is His creation, generation, or other production of a nature or +universe that shall be capable of receiving immediately into itself all +that of the Creator that He has purposed to reveal and to communicate to +creatures,--a nature or universe which shall at the same time be itself +the beginning of creation, and the source, spring, and quarry out of +which all that shall afterwards come can be constructed. Eternal Nature +is thus the great storehouse and workshop in which all the created +essences, elements, principles, and potentialities of all possible worlds +are laid up. Here is the great treasury and laboratory into which the +Filial Word enters, when by Him GOD creates, sustains, and perfects the +worlds, universe after universe. Here, says Behmen, is the great and +universal treasury of that heavenly clay of which all things, even to +angels and men, are made; and here is the eternal turning-wheel with +which they are all framed and fashioned. Eternal Nature is an invisible +essence, and it is the essential ground out of which all the visible and +invisible worlds are made. For the things which are seen were not made +of things which do appear. In that radiant original universe also all +the thoughts of GOD which were to usward from everlasting, all the Divine +ideas, patterns, and plans of things, are laid open, displayed, copied +out and sealed up for future worlds to see carried out. 'Through this +Kingdom of Heaven, or Eternal Nature,' says William Law, in his _Appeal +to all that Doubt_, 'is the invisible GOD eternally breaking forth and +manifesting Himself in a boundless height and depth of blissful wonders, +opening and displaying Himself to all His heavenly creatures in an +infinite variety and an endless multiplicity of His powers, beauties, +joys, and glories. So that all the inhabitants of heaven are for ever +knowing, seeing, hearing, feeling, and variously enjoying all that is +great, amiable, infinite, and gracious in the Divine Nature.' And again, +in his _Way to Divine Knowledge_: 'Out of this transcendent Eternal +Nature, which is as universal and immense as the Godhead itself, do all +the highest beings, cherubims and seraphims, all the hosts of angels, and +all intelligent spirits, receive their birth, existence, substance, and +form. And they are one and united in one, GOD in them, and they in GOD, +according to the prayer of CHRIST for His disciples, that they, and He, +and His Holy Father might be united in one.' A little philosophy, +especially when the philosopher does not yet know the plague of his own +heart, tends, indeed, to doubt and unbelief in the word of GOD and in the +work of CHRIST. But the philosophy of Behmen and Law will deepen the +mind and subdue the heart of the student till he is made a prodigal son, +a humble believer, and a profound philosopher, both in nature and in +grace, like his profound masters. + +Behmen's teaching on human nature, his doctrine of the heart of man, and +of the image of GOD in the heart of man, has a greatness about it that +marks it off as being peculiarly Behmen's own doctrine. He agrees with +the catechisms and the creeds in their teaching that the heart of man was +at first like the heart of GOD in knowledge, righteousness, and true +holiness. But Behmen is above and beyond the catechisms in this also, in +the way that he sees the heart of man still opening in upon the Divine +Nature, as also upon Eternal and Temporal Nature, somewhat as the heart +of GOD opens on all that He has made. On every page of his, wherever you +happen to open him, Behmen is found teaching that GOD and CHRIST, heaven +and hell, life and death, are in every several human heart. Heaven and +all that it contains is every day either being quenched and killed in +every human heart, or it is being anew generated, rekindled, and accepted +there; and in like manner hell. 'Yea,' he is bold to exclaim, 'GOD +Himself is so near thee that the geniture of the Holy Trinity is +continually being wrought in thy heart. Yea, all the Three Persons are +generated for thee in thy heart.' And, again: 'GOD is in thy dark heart. +Knock, and He shall come out within thee into the light. The Holy Ghost +holds the key of thy dark heart. Ask, and He shall be given to thee +within thee. Do not let any sophister teach thee that thy GOD is far +aloft from thee as the stars are. Only offer at this moment to GOD thine +heart, and CHRIST, the Son of GOD, will be born and formed within thee. +And then thou art His brother, His flesh, and His spirit. Thou also art +a child of His Father. GOD is in thee. Power, might, majesty, heaven, +paradise, elements, stars, the whole earth--all is thine. Thou art in +CHRIST over hell, and all that it contains.' 'Behmen's speculation,' +Martensen is always reminding us, 'streams forth from the deepest +practical inspiration. His speculations are all saturated with a +constant reference to salvation. His whole metaphysic is pervaded by +practical applications.' And conspicuously so, we may here point out, is +his metaphysic of GOD and of the heart of man. The immanence of GOD, as +theologians and philosophers call it; the indwelling of GOD, as the +psalmists and the apostles and the saints call it; the Divine Word +lightening every man that comes into the world, as John has it,--of the +practical and personal bearings of all that Behmen's every book is full. +Dost thou not see it and feel it? he continually calls to his readers. +Heaven, be sure, is in every holy man, and hell in every bad man. When +thou dost work together with GOD then thou art in heaven, and thy soul +dwells in GOD. In like manner, also, thou art in hell and among the +devils when thou art in any envy, malice, anger, or ill-will. Thou +needest not to ask where is heaven or where is hell. Both are within +thee, even in thy heart. Now, then, when thou prayest, pray in that +heaven that is within thee, and there the Holy Ghost shall meet with thee +and will help thee, and thy soul shall be the whole of heaven within +thee. It is a fundamental doctrine of Behmen's that the fall would have +been immediate and eternal death to Adam and Eve had not the Divine Word, +the Seed of the woman, entered their hearts, and kept a footing in their +hearts, and in the hearts of all their children, against the fulness of +time when He would take our flesh and work out our redemption. And thus +it is that Behmen appeals to all his readers, that if they will only go +down deep enough into their own hearts--then, there, down there, deeper +than indwelling sin, deeper than original sin, deep down and seated in +the very substance and centre of their souls--they will come upon secret +and unexpected seeds of the Divine Life. Seeds, blades, buddings, and +new beginnings of the very life of GOD the Son, in their deepest souls. +Secret and small, Behmen exclaims, as those seeds of Eden are, despise +them not; destroy them not, for a blessing for thee is in them. Water +those secret seeds, sun them, dig about them, and they will grow up in +you also. The Divine Life is in you, quench it not, for it is of GOD. +Nay, it is GOD Himself in you. It depends upon yourself whether or no +that which is at this moment the smallest of all seeds is yet to become +in you the greatest and the most fruitful of all trees. + +'Man never knows how anthropomorphic he is,' is a characteristic saying +of a fellow-countryman of Behmen's. And Behmen's super-confessional and +almost super-scriptural treatment of that frequent scriptural +anthropomorphism,--'unavoidable and yet intolerable,'--the wrath of GOD, +must be left by me in Behmen's own bold pages. Strong meat belongeth to +them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their +senses exercised to discern both good and evil. Behmen's philosophical, +theological, and experimental doctrine of sin also, with one example, +must be wholly passed by. 'If all trees were clerks,' he exclaims in one +place, 'and all their branches pens, and all the hills books, and all the +water ink, yet all would not sufficiently declare the evil that sin hath +done. For sin has made this house of heavenly light to be a den of +darkness; this house of joy to be a house of mourning, lamentation, and +woe; this house of all refreshment to be full of hunger and thirst; this +abode of love to be a prison of enmity and ill-will; this seat of +meekness to be the haunt of pride and rage and malice. For laughter sin +has brought horror; for munificence, beggary; and for heaven, hell. Oh, +thou miserable man, turn convert. For the Father stretches out both His +hands to thee. Do but turn to Him and He will receive and embrace thee +in His love.' It was the sin and misery of this world that first made +Jacob Behmen a philosopher, and it was the sinfulness of his own heart +that at last made him a saint. Behmen's full doctrine and practice of +prayer also; his fine and fruitful treatment of what he always calls 'the +process of CHRIST'; and, intimately connected with that, his still super- +confessional treatment of imputation,--of all that, and much more like +that, I cannot now attempt to speak. Nor yet of his superb teaching on +love. 'Throw out thy heart upon all men,' he now commands and now +beseeches us. 'Throw open and throw out thy heart. For unless thou dost +exercise thy heart, and the love of thy heart, upon every man in the +world, thy self-love, thy pride, thy contempt, thy envy, thy distaste, +thy dislike will still have dominion over thee. The Divine Nature will +be quenched and extinguished in thee, till nothing but self and hell is +left to thee. In the name, and in the strength of GOD, love all men. +Love thy neighbour as thyself, and do to thy neighbour as thou doest to +thyself. And do it now. For now is the accepted time; and now is the +day of salvation!' + +Jacob Behmen died in his fiftieth year. He was libelled and maligned, +harassed and hunted to death by a world that was not worthy of such a +gift of GOD. A sudden and severe sickness came upon Behmen till he sank +in death with his _Aurora_ and his _Holy Week_ and his _Divine Vision_ +all lying still unfinished at his bedside. 'Open the door and let in +more of that music,' the dying man said to his weeping son. Behmen was +already hearing the harpers harping with their harps. He was already +taking his part in the song they sing in heaven to Him who loved them, +and washed them from their sins in His own blood. 'And now,' said the +prodigal son, the blessed Behmen, 'I go to-day to be with my Redeemer and +my King in Paradise,' and so died. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JACOB BEHMEN*** + + +******* This file should be named 16306.txt or 16306.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/3/0/16306 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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