LXXX
THERE IS ONE POWER IN THE SOUL

        Adolescens, tibi dico: surge (Luc. 7₁₄).  We read in St Luke's gospel about a youth who was dead.  And our Lord came and took compassion on him and touched him and said, 'Young man, I say unto thee, I command thee, Arise!'
        Now you must know that in all good people God is present all at once and there is something in the soul wherein God lives and something in the soul where the soul lives in God, and if the soul turns outwards towards external things she dies and God dies also in the soul.  But he does not die in himself at all and he is alive to himself.  Just as, when the soul leaves the body the body dies and the soul lives on in herself, so God may be dead to the soul and alive to himself.  And know, there is one power in the soul wider than wide heaven, which is so incredibly extensive that we are unable to define it, and yet this power is much vaster still.
        Mark now. In this exalted power the Father is saying to the one-begotten Son, 'Young man, arise!'  It is God, and the closeness of its union with the soul is past belief, for God is so lofty in himself that nothing whatsoever can attain thereto by understanding.  It is wider than that heavens, aye than all the angels, albeit one angelic spark is the cause of all the life on earth. Desire is far-reaching, limitless. All that man can conceive, all that heart can desire, that is not God.  Where desire and understanding end, in the darkness, there shines God.
    Quoth our Lord: 'Young man, I say unto thee, Arise!'  If I am to hear God speaking in me I must be wholly estranged from all that is mine, as strange as I am to things under the sea, and especially from time. The soul is as young in herself as when she was made, for age as relating to her is an affair of the body, affecting her use of its senses. As one philosopher observes, an old man with the eyes of youth would see just as well as a boy. I made a statement yesterday which seems almost incredible. I said that Jerusalem is as near my soul as the ground I stand on now.  'Aye in good sooth, a thousand leagues beyond Jerusalem is every whit as night my soul as my own body is, of that I am as sure as of my being a man, and to any learned clerk it is not hard to understand.'  Know then that my soul is as young as when I was created, aye, much younger. And I tell you, I should be ashamed were she not younger to-morrow than to-day.
        The soul has two powers which have nothing whatever to do with the body, namely intellect and will, which function above time. Oh, if only the soul's eyes were opened so that her understanding might behold the truth!  Then it would be easy to a man to give up everything as to give up peas and lentils, aye upon my soul, to him all things would be but vanity.  There are some who give up things for love albeit greatly prizing what they leave.  But to this man who knows in truth, it matters not one whit that he should leave himself and everything, for anyone who takes this course has all things for his own in truth.
        There is one power in the soul to which all things are alike sweet; the very worst and the very best are all the same in this power which takes things above here and now. Now meaning time and here meaning place. This place I am in now, suppose I went out of myself and were entirely empty, why then I ween the heavenly Sire would bear his only Son within my mind so clearly that my spirit would bear him back again.  Verily, were my spirit as ready as the soul of our Lord Jesus Christ, then would the Father energise in me as perfectly as in his one-begotten Son, no less, seeing that he loves me with the selfsame love wherewith he loves himself.
        St John said, 'In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.'  Now to hear this Word in the Father (where it is absolutely silent), in a man must be quite quiet and wholly free from images, aye, and forms as well.  A man must be so true to God that nothing whatever can gladden him or sadden him.  He must see all things in God, as they are there.
        He says, 'Young man, I say unto thee, Arise!' meaning to effect this thing himself.  If someone tells me to carry one stone he may as well tell me a hundred if he is going to do it himself. If he orders a hundredweight load he may just as well make it a thousand if it is for his own back.  And God will do this work himself if only we will wait and not resist.  If the would soul would but stay within, she would have everything there. There is one power in the soul and that not merely power but being; and not merely being: it radiates life and is so pure, so high and so innately noble that creatures cannot live in it; none but God can abide therein.  Nay, even God himself is forbidden there so far as he is subject to condition.  God cannot enter there in any guise: God is only there in his absolute divinity.
        Then, the fact of his speaking the words, 'Young man, I say unto thee.' What is God's speaking? It is his working and God's work is so noble, so sublime, that God alone can do it. You must understand then, that our whole perfection, our entire happiness, will lie in traversing and transcending all creatureliness, all time and all limitation and getting into the cause which is causeless.  We pay thee O Lord, that we may be one and indwelling. So help us God.  Amen.

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