A Reasonable Mystic

Of Confession and Self-examination

Self-examination should always precede Confession, and in the nature and manner of it should be conformable to the state of the soul: the business of those that are advanced to the degree of which we now treat, is to lay their whole souls open before God, who will not fail to enlighten them, and enable them to see the peculiar nature of their faults. This examination, however, should be peaceful and tranquil, and we should depend on God for the discovery and knowledge of our sins, rather than, on the diligence of our own scrutiny.

When we examine with constraint, and in the strength of our own endeavours, we are easily deceived and betrayed by self-love into error; “we believe the evil good, and the good evil” (Isa. v. 20); but when we lie in full exposure before the Sun of Righteousness, His Divine beams render the smallest atoms visible. It follows from hence that we must forsake self, and abandon our souls to God as well in examination as Confession.

When souls have attained to this species of prayer no fault escapes reprehension; on every commission they are instantly rebuked by an inward burning and tender confusion. Such is the scrutiny of Him who suffers no evil to be concealed; and under His purifying influence the one way is to turn affectionately to our Judge, and bear with meekness the pain and correction He inflicts. He becomes the incessant Examiner of the soul; it can now, indeed, no longer examine itself, and if it be faithful in its resignation, experience will convince the soul that it is a thousand times more effectually examined by His Divine Light than by the most active and vigorous self-inspection.

Those who tread these paths should be informed of a matter respecting their Confession in which they are apt to err. When they begin to give an account of their sins, instead of the regret and contrition they had been accustomed to feel, they find that love and tranquillity sweetly pervade and take possession of their souls: now those who are not properly instructed are desirous of withdrawing from this sensation, to form an act of contrition, because they have heard, and with truth, that it is requisite: but they are not aware that they lose thereby the genuine contrition, which is this Intuitive Love, infinitely surpassing any effect produced by self-exertion, and comprehending the other acts in itself as in one principal act, in much higher perfection than if they were distinctly perceived, and varied in their sensation. Be not then troubled about other things when God acts so excellently in you and for you.

To hate sin in this manner is to hate it as God does. The purest love is that which is of His immediate operation in the soul: why should it then be so eager for action? Let it remain in the state He assigns it, agreeable to the instructions of Solomon: “Put your confidence in God; remain in quiet, where he hath placed you” (Eccles. xi. 22).

The soul will also be amazed at finding a difficulty in calling faults to remembrance: this, however, should cause no uneasiness; first, because this forgetfulness of our faults is some proof of our purification from them; and in this degree of advancement it is best. Secondly, because when Confession is our duty God will not fail to make known to us our greatest faults, for then He Himself examines, and the soul will feel the end of examination more perfectly accomplished than it could possibly have been by the utmost exertion of its own endeavours.

These instructions, however, would be altogether unsuitable to the preceding degrees while the soul continues in its active state, wherein it is right and necessary it should in all things use the utmost industry in proportion to the degree of its advancement. It is those that have arrived at this more advanced state whom I would exhort to follow these instructions, and not to vary their one simple occupation even on approaching the Communion; they should remain in silence, and suffer God to act freely and without limitation. Who can better receive the Body and Blood of Christ than he in whom the Holy Spirit is indwelling?

Posts in this series:
Madame Guyon – A Spiritual Reading
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Preface
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 1
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 2
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 3
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 4
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 5
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 6
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 7
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 8
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 9
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 10
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 11
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 12
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 13
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 14

The Universal Call to Prayer

What a dreadful delusion hath prevailed over the greater part of mankind, in supposing that they are not called to a state of prayer! whereas all are capable of prayer, and are called thereto, as all are called to and are capable of salvation.

Prayer is the application of the heart to God, and the internal exercise of love. S. Paul hath enjoined us to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. v 17), and our Lord saith, “I say unto you all, watch and pray” (Mark xiii. 33, 37): all therefore may, and all ought to practice prayer. I grant that meditation is attainable but by few, for few are capable of it; and therefore, my beloved brethren who are athirst for salvation, meditative prayer is not the prayer which God requires of you, nor which we would recommend.

Let all pray: we should live by prayer, as we should live by love. “I counsel you to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that ye may be rich” (Rev. iii. 8), this is much more easily obtained than we can conceive. “Come, all ye that are athirst, to these living waters”; nor lose your precious moments in “hewing out cisterns, broken cisterns that will hold no water” (John vii. 37; Jer ii. 13). Come, ye famished souls, who find naught whereon to feed; come, and ye shall be fully satisfied!

Come, ye poor afflicted ones, who groan beneath your load of wretchedness and pain, and ye shall find ease and comfort! Come, ye sick, to your Physician, and be not fearful of approaching Him because ye are filled with diseases; expose them to His view and they shall be healed!

Children, draw near to your Father, and He will embrace you in the arms of love! Come, ye poor, stray, wandering sheep, return to your Shepherd! Come, sinners, to your Saviour! Come, ye dull, ignorant, and illiterate, ye who think yourselves the most incapable of prayer! ye are more peculiarly called and adapted thereto. Let all without exception come, for Jesus Christ hath called all.

Yet let not those come who are without a heart; they are not asked; for there must be a heart, that there may be love. But who is without a heart? O come, then, give this heart to God; and here learn how to make the donation.

All who are desirous of prayer may easily pray, enabled by those ordinary graces and gifts of the Holy Spirit which are common to all men.

Prayer is the guide to perfection and the sovereign good; it delivers us from every vice, and obtains us every virtue; for the one great means to become perfect, is to walk in the presence of God: He Himself hath said, “walk in my presence and be ye perfect” (Gen. xvii. 1). It is by prayer alone, that we are brought into this presence, and maintained in it without interruption.

You must then learn a species of prayer, which may be exercised at all times; which doth not obstruct outward employments; and which may be equally practiced by princes, kings, prelates, priests and magistrates, soldiers and children, tradesmen, labourers, women and sick persons: it cannot, therefore, be the prayer of the head, but of the heart; not a prayer of the understanding alone, which is so limited in its operations that it can have but one object at one time; but the prayer of the heart is not interrupted by the exercises of reason: indeed nothing can interrupt this prayer, but irregular and disordered affections: and when once we have tasted of God, and the sweetness of His love, we shall find it impossible to relish aught but Himself?

Nothing is so easily obtained as the possession and enjoyment of God, for “in him we live, move, and have our being;” and He is more desirous to give Himself into us, than we can be to receive Him.

All consists in the manner of seeking Him; and to seek aright, is easier and more natural to us than breathing. Though you think yourselves ever so stupid, dull, and incapable of sublime attainments, yet, by prayer, you may live in God Himself with less difficulty or interruption than you live in the vital air. Will it not then be highly sinful to neglect prayer? But this I trust you will not, when you have learnt the method, which is exceedingly easy.

Posts in this series:
Madame Guyon – A Spiritual Reading
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Preface
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 1
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 2
Madame Guyon – A Short and Easy Method of Prayer – Chapter 3

I am a mathematician at heart. I say this for a number of reasons.

When I was in secondary school mathematics was one of my worst subjects. Until 5th year that is. Then I had the best maths teacher I have ever encountered. In one year he transformed my struggle with maths into a delight. I went on to do a bachelors’s degree in mathematics, not because it offered good job prospects (it didn’t). Rather I did it because I wanted to be an electronic engineer. For many years I had been a licensed radio amateur, and found that I easily learned about electronics and radio, but the maths was a deterent. So, the obvious solution, to me, was to study maths. On the strength of these studies I eventually became a university lecturer in electrical and electronic engineering, and did a Master of Engineering by research into artificial intelligence and computer speech recognition and understanding.

As an aside, this reminds me of a post I just made to Mal’s Meanderings about the great effects small unselfish acts have in the lives of other people. I doubt that Charlie Green (the maths teacher) knew what he was getting me into.

Back to the subject in hand. On other reason I like mathematics is undoubtedly explained by my Myers-Briggs personality profile – INTP. On the first test I did, many years ago, I was high up the corner of the Analyser quadrant – not quite Mr Spock from Star Trek, but getting there! I’ve moved a long way towards the centre since then, but I still enjoy knowing about things and seeing how different areas of knowledge relate to each other.

But, what is the main reason I like maths?

There’s something mystical about mathematics – the way it can describe nature using symbols, and then those symbols be manipulated to predict things that are not yet known. These things are almost invariably found to exist when we go looking for them. Good examples are the prediction, and eventual confirmation of the existence of black holes, electromagnetic waves, trans-uranic elements, gravitational lensing, entangled electrons, etc.

I love being able to look at the sky and see in the cloud patterns a map of the weather. Then, looking at an actual weather map and seeing in the highs and lows, the poles and zeros, the same mathematical equations that I would to design a feedback control system, or an electronic filter for a radio receiver.

The natural world is so wonderfully interconnected, with an economy of use and reuse of concepts, that one can not go past the idea of it being designed by an infinite mind that also loves mathematics, even more than I do.

Mathematics is a descriptive and predictive language that has no physical existence of its own – it is simply an organizing principle, a completely abstract human construct. Except, it has a perfection which makes me sure that it is not simply human, but comes first from the mind of God.

There is much more to be said about this, another day.

I’ve begun reading some of the works of Evelyn Underhill, an Anglican writer on mysticism, a novelist, a metaphysical poet, and a student of Baron Friedrich von Hügel. Early in the Twentieth Century she wrote many books on mysticism, some of which go a long way to demystify it (if you’ll pardon the pun).

In the first chapter of Mystics of the Church she gives a useful description of the words “mystic” and “mystical”:

“Mystic” and “mysticism” are words which meet us constantly in all books that deal with religious experience; and indeed in many books which do not treat of religion at all. They are generally so vaguely and loosely used that they convey no precise meaning to our minds. and have now come to be perhaps the most ambigous terms in the whole vocabulary of religion. Any vague sense of spiritual things, any sort of symbolism, any hazy allegorical painting, any poetry which deals with the soul – worse than that, all sorts of superstitions and magical practices – may be, and often are, decribed as “mystical”. A word so generalized seems almost to have lost its meaning; and indeed, not one of these uses of “Mysticism” is correct, though the persons to whom they are applied may in some instances be mystics.

Mysticism, according to its historical and psychological definitions, is the direct intuition or expereince of God; and a mystic is a person who has, to a greater or less degree, such a direct experience – one whose religion and life are centred, not merely on an accepted belief or practice, but on that which he regards as first-hand personal knowledge. In Greek religion, from which the word comes to us, the myste were those initiates of the “mysteries” who were believed to have received the vision of the god, and with it a new and higher life. When the Christian Church adopted this term it adopted, too, this its original meaning. The Christian mystic therefore is one for whom God and Christ are not merely objects of belief, but living facts experimentally known at first-hand; and mysticism for him becomes, in so far as he responds to its demands, a life based on this conscious communion with God. It is found in experience that this communion, in all its various forms and degrees, is always a communion of love; and, in its perfection, so intimate and all-pervading that the word “union” describes it best. When St. Augustine said, “My life shall be a real life, being wholly full of Thee,” he described in these words the ideal of a true Christian mysticism.

So, there is nothing too esoteric here, nor magical, nor superstitious – just Christians desiring to be filled with God and to know him intimately – which is exactly what I find held out to me in the Gospels and the letters of the early church!