for Righteousness sake And by consequence the Doctrine of the learned now adays is altogether Antichristian that is to say contrary to that of Jesus Christ Not that their words are dissonant for they read the same Gospel which Jesus Christ and his Apostles taught but they gloss and explain so the words of the Gospel that they bring forth a quite perverse sence Notwithstanding they live in quiet though all their actions manners and desires be quite contrary to the Gospel Doctrine For every one now idolizes his own proper will And Jesus Christ said That we must renounce it Methinks all Christendom is become at present the people of Ephesus which adored the great Diana with this difference that Christians now adays adore the Corruption of the flesh whereas those adored a Statue of gold or Silver For we see these learned strive who can best find out subtil Inventions by which they may flatter men in their sins or perswade them that they may well follow the motions of their corrupt nature and withall attain to Salvation So that every one follows that Doctrine without perceiving that it is evil That is the reason why every one adores that Diana of corrupt nature as a Goddess And so they bestow all their time and goods to nourish honour and satisfie corrupted nature And more they think there is no evil in so doing while the ministers and learned do the same and promise Salvation to the people that live in that Idolatry But they ought to teach in effect the mortification of their senses the corruption of their natures how much it is ruined by sin and finally the necessity of denying our selves to be saved as Jesus Christ taught by word and works But these savage Pastors will not teach so unto their flocks and will yet less put it in practice themselves Yea nor will not suffer another to teach these Christian Truths It is for that they pursue me every where and would gladly exterminate me because I have written of true Virtue The same befel St. Paul by them of Ephesus who would exterminate him when he taught the truth Saying one to another That they should lose their gain if they suffered Paul to continue preaching Jesus Christ That he would ruin the worship of the great Diana and cause that the Goldsmiths should gain no more in the Workmanship of the Image of Diana It goes just so with these learned ones who are as the masters of the great Diana of corrupt nature which every one adores for his own particular But the Learned are the Masters to gain Money by the worship and adoration of corrupt nature So they speak and teach the people such things as please their corruption and endeavour to please men that they may receive advantages of them which they will not lose When then I begin to speak of true Virtue they are all allarmed against me as they of Ephesus were against St. Paul But these learned take also the Judges to their assistance and persecute me that I should be banisht or be discharged to write or speak of true Virtue Some wish me dead others burnt others that I were thrown in the midst of the Sea that I might speak no more of solid Virtue and so their gain and trade be not diminisht and their shops become unfrequented that is that they sell no more their frivolous Discourses to please men It is that which at last allarm'd them so at Flensburg whither I had gone about some business for the Ministers no sooner had any suspicion that I was in their Town but they preached in divers Churches that I am an arrant and pernicious person that I have a devilish Doctrine and finally no person should lodge me So that I behoved to come out secretly lest I should be massacreed by the Rable and Children whom the preachings of the Ministers had animated against me For they had spoken of me with great spite and horrours proclaming publickly that my Doctrine is worse than that of the Jews Adding beside that my doctrine is a mass of all the old Heresies that ever were in the world Yet I will not teach any thing by my Writings or Discourse but what Jesus Christ taught And if there is any thing contrary to that in them I detest and revoke it as I have often offered to revoke all that they would shew me to be contrary to the holy Scripture But it is not for Errors they persecute me or any evil in my Writings seeing they can shew me nothing such therein They persecute me then because I declare truely what is true Virtue and how a true Christian should live to be a Disciple of Jesus Christ I know well they mask these things saying that there are Errors in my Writings But no person shews me these errors They know not what to say to contemn the truths which I maintain For the Learned said first that I bring nothing of new and that they taught and preached tho same things twenty years agot But when they saw in the Book entituled The testimony of the Truth particulars and truths more clear in divine Mysteries than those they learnt in the Schools they say presently that they are Errors and that never any person wrote such things So that it behoved that God should regulate all according to their studies And should not give any new Graces to men now adays But that he should measure his Light by the rule of their scholastique doctrine and should not send the Holy spirit promised by Jesus Christ who shall teach all Truths Men then resist that Holy spirit and will not hear of other Truths but those they have learnt in the Schools It is every lamentable to see men such enemies of their eternal Happiness in rejecting the Light of the Truth which comes in this last time as the Prophets of God have fore-told That he will pour out his Spirit on all flesh and that your Sons and Daughters shall prophecy and the Old Men see Visions Now because I repeat the same things with many others from God they would kill me as was done to the ancient Prophets they think to hinder by that that true Virtue should be known and far more practised But though they should kill me the Spirit of God shall not die for that And rhe Truth shall always be true For if I should not speak it the Dead would speak or the Stones to declare it unto men And tho these Ministers put me to death God hath yet more than a hunderd millions of persons whom he can use to declare the same Truths which I advance And therefore my Son I exhort you to retain them well and put them in practice for though I were not in the world you must nevertheless save your own soul cost what it will if you will enjoy God to all eternity Which she wishes you with all her heart who loves your Happiness Husum Febr. 5. 1684. St. vet ANTONIA BOURIGNON The
life were with incomparable Purity Evidence Clearness and Solidity in that Soul which thou didst sanctifie and are yet in her holy Writings In truth the way that is there recommended as necessary to Salvation is the only and the true way there is no danger to abandon our selves wholly and entirely in it for it is the very Truth it is the Truth it self It is the pure Truth There is none Lord there can be none other in Heaven nor in Earth There is none other way unto eternal life than that which thou hast put into the Mouth in the Writings and in the Life of thy most holy hand-maid Antonia Bourignon I praise and bless and thank thee O my God that thou gave me to know the same and hast opened and enclined the ear of my heart thereto Give me Grace to love to observe and to maintain that heavenly Truth unto Death Happy he that should lose a thousand lives for so worthy a subject Happy he who shall never for any consideration leave the practice of it Let me by thy divine Grace be of that number that after this short life of Tryal that most certain and most infallible mean make me enjoy my soveraign End which is to have the happiness ever to adore and praise thy great Majesty O Jesus eternal God Creator Saviour and redeemer of the World while with the Father and holy Spirit thou shalt reign Gloriously in all eternity Amen Revelation Ch. 3. He that hath Ears to hear Let him hear THE PREFACE OF THE PUBLISHER THis Treatise consists of two parts whereof the one may be called Extructive which builds or establishes and the other Destructive which destroys or everts For the first ten Letters are adapted to the planting of Virtue and all the rest to evert and root out what may hinder its increase To recommend Virtue is taken the precept of him who is the Master and Example of it by which is made an introduction shewing what Virtues we must in the first place embrace and by what meanstend to them which is by Obedience and renouncing our own will unto the Meekness Lowliness and Humility of Heart of Iesus Christ see Let. 1 2 3. the Nature of which Humility is explained and the means conducing to the attainment of it viz the knowledge of our Corruption and the Miseries which our Bodys and Souls ly under Let. 4 5 6. Which ought to produce in us the effect of renouncing our natural senses and being content with what is of meer necessity we should flee all Pleasure and proper Satisfaction Let. 7 8. which emptying of our selves will be accompanied with the Love of God which incontinently possesses the Heart from which vitious affections are expelled because of the near relation and sympathy between them as between the Creature and its natural Element In which Love consists the Essence and Complement of all Virtue and all Good Let. 8 9 10. Concerning the overturning and resisting the Impediments and Tentations of Satan is treated Let. 11. whether they be offered to our Imagination or Sensibility even spiritual Let. 12 13. or to the Understanding making us rest in the naked knowledge of the Truth Let. 14. Or exciting us to external acting or internal with Vain Glory or by Dejecting us through immoderate mortifications or in unseasonable good works spiritual or corporal toward our Neighbour Let. 15 16. Or in regard of the Devil accusing him too much or too little of our sins Let. 17 18. Whether these Tentations affect the will whose godly fervour Satan would extinguish by Grief Spiritual Negligence and Self-love as shew Let. 19 20 and to the end There is briefly represente the whole subject handled in this divine Treatise which is more specially noted at the beginning of each Letter that you may kind Reader view as in a Table and beter retain in your memory the divine Instructions therein delivered Moreover you may with us well admire the infamous audacity of some as the Church-men in Holsatia whereby some years ago they caused that these so wholsome instructions while under the Press in the German and Low Dutch Tongues were taken away by force and violence and rent While I consider these obscure enemies of the truth that Scripture offers it self to me that Every one that Doth and will do evil hateth the Light and cometh not to the Light lest his deeds be reproved and this is the Condemnation that Light is come into the world and men Love Darkness rather than Light because their Deeds are Evil. It is far otherwise with him who doth and will do the Truth for he cometh to the Light that his Deeds may be made manifest because they are wrought in God Joh. Ch. 3. I pray the God of Truth that he graciously please to instruct and lead you in the way of Truth that you never refuse to come to the Light Farewell TO THE READER Friendly Reader I Cannot abstain from imparting unto you these twenty four letters which I have written to one of my particular Friends where I shew him what Solid Virtue is because it is a matter so necessary for the present time when we see false virtue reign or such as is only apparent to the eyes of men and while so many persons deceive themselves perswading themselves that they have true Virtue whereas they have nothing but fine Speculations They think themselves Humble when they can talk well of Humility and think they have the Love of God when they desire to have it notwithstanding they have in effect only the Love of themselves and it is but Deceit and Falshood when they say they have the Love of God They do not so much as know the corruption of their Nature seeing they think they may follow that corruption without sinning provided they do no evil reproveable before men and have a will to do well and love God Which notwithstanding is not sufficient to be saved for good desires without effect are nothing before God They are indeed Foundation stones serving to the building of true Virtue For without good Desires we cannot do good Works We must first have the desire and after put it in execution which is wanting to many persons of a good will who content themselves to be of a good will and hope with that all shall go well without considering that the holy Scripture says to all in general Depart from evil and do Good Now the Evil is in our corrupt nature which no person ought to ignore yet few depart from that corruption and most love and follow it thinking they do well which is a great abuse and presumption of spirit for we cannot do good except we depart from evil and he that does not resist that corrupt Nature and renounce it cannot acquire true Virtue which few persons comprehend and thence is it that they have only apparent Virtues and no real ones Therefore is it that I have resolved to cause print these twenty four
four Parts V. and VI. The Funeral of false Theologie in four Parts VII The Light of the World in three Parts VIII The Accademy of learned Theologues in three Parts And Confusion of the Builders of Babylon IX A Treatise of Solid Virtue in two Parts X. Advertisment against the sect of Quakers And the persecution of the Righteous XI The Testimony of the Truth first Part. XII A Collection of Testimonies given unto A. Bourignon XIII The Testimony of the Truth second Part. And Innocency avowed and Truth discovered XIV The Touch-stone And the Morning-star XV. The Blindness of the men of this time in two Parts XVI Antichrist discovered in three Parts And the Holy Perspective XVII The renewing of the Gospel Spirit in three Parts XVIII The New Heaven and New Earth And the Stones of the New Jerusalem XIX Wholsome Advices All these Books are originally in French The greatest part of them are translated into High and Low Dutch Solid Virtue 1 Part The Touch-stone and The Gospel Spirit 1 Part are translated into Latin And are all to be sold by Henry Wetstein Bookseller at Amsterdam AD SOLIDAE VIRTUTIS Amicum ejusdemque hostem ALLOQUIUM Totius libelli ideam exhibens DIscere Virtutem Lector sine fraude doloque Vis liber hic monstrat Christum panditque sequendum Pare teque nega mitesce dejice temet Mens ignara tibi est cor pravum corpus iniquum Et cujus pudeat miseri ne tu illius ergo Sensibus indulge satis esto necesse repelle Cetera replet amor vacuas sacer almaque virtus Ast non una manet te crux non pugna reposcit Te semel Assiduos versas o Orce labores Mox sensum mulces mox ludis imagine mentem Jam specie veri noti Jam gloria pellit Te motore animum vis mox in corpore regnet Saevitia utve alios jam passim mens pia curet Jam te astute reum fers intus mox sine culpa Ut lateas fueris Jam mentem sanguine tetro Obruis laxas eam ut aut ignavia perdat Perdat amorve suus Sic sunt fraudesque dolique Orce tui Patet ars tua sic patet modus illam Frangendi Rabiem fundis nec miror in ista Quae docet haec sacro 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 numine virgo THE FIRST LETTER That all Christians ought to learn of Jesus Christ Meekness Mildness Gentleness and Lowliness of Heart Written to one desirous of true virtue Shewing him that to attain thereto we must have submission and obedience by which we may begin to learn meekness lowliness and humility of heart My Dear Child I Perceive you have not yet comprehended well what Jesus Christ teaches saying learn of me for I am meek and lowly and humble of heart because upon occasion you do not exercise it enough but yield loose reins to your nature for when it enclines to anger you speak harshly and sometimes use force and violence to fulfil what you have resolved as well in small matters as in great which does not testify humility of heart seeing the humble heart yields willingly to another in things not evil and does not imagin that another ought to follow our will But it is always willing to follow anothers will in whatever is not contrary to God and the perfection of its own soul I suppose you may well have observed that in me for ordinarily I inform my self of the will of my brethren to Know what they love best in indifferent things and I have more contentment to do any thing after their desires than after my own for that yields me more quiet and inward peace feeling a certain satisfaction to see them content and joyful And even my nature enclines to it by the habit which I 've used to resist my own will in every thing and being overcome it rules over all things and has no grudge for whatsoever comes contrary to it provided it be not against the glory of God or the love of our neighbour All beside is indifferent to me if it is rain or fair weather if I eat harsh meats or sweet when they wrong not my health if I be alone or in company so that the one be as wholesome as the other And finally I 'm as well content to be in one countrey as another providing I have the same occasions to live well And so I am comforted in every event whether I be sick or in health I have no choose in case I honour God as well in one state as in another it is all one to me and I would never choose any thing so that I receive from the hand of God whatsoever comes to pass and so I as always content and joyful If you knew but to learn that method you would be very happy and continually in quiet whereas now fretting and discontent you disquiet and trouble your Spirit and are burthensome to others and so hinder mutual love for a bitter word is pleasant to no body and a mild one mollifies the heart even of a furious person I know your heart is good and that you hate no person notwithstanding to judge by the tone of your voice one would say that you are envious and they that know not your heart think you are in rage you must know that they are not always disposed to bear with you and that may marr the peace and diminish charity which Jesus Christ hath so much recommended to Christians Saying if you love one another thereby shall all men know that you are my disciples I believe you love the brethren in the bottom of your heart but sometimes you speak to them as if you hated them and would not hear them speak If they spoke as you do you would have difficulty to suffer them So you ought to consider that they have much to suffer that you speak so harshly They do very well in suffering you but it is no advantage for your soul for if all the world should bear with you that will not justifie you before God nor will your nature for that change its evil inclinations but be strengthned in them And so you shall be in danger to live and die imperfect which you would regret much before God when too late Therefore it is much better to endeavour now to overcome that bilious humour which is in your nature than be Slave to a wrathful passion which masters you whereas you should govern it and use it only when it concerns the maintaining the truth and defence of the glory of God Then is it that there is place for anger as the scripture also says be angry and sin not But we must never be angry for things indifferent and of small import much less speak harshly because Jesus Christ says we must be meek and lowly of heart That is a lesson he gives to all Christians and exhorts them to learn it of him
which it loves and would follow if it can escape the obligation of resisting it and so perswades it self that it does not know the will of God in every thing to do it The heart of man is even so deceitful that it perswades its proper understanding that we know not the will of God and consequently cannot follow it in every thing But that is a deceit invented by Satan to amuse us by false reasons and fine appearances of truth which are in effect but wicked falsities For all Christians can know the will of God if they take pains to inform themselves but for the most part they are willing to be ignorant of it because they have not a mind to accomplish it when they do know it And they do certainly beyond doubt know it but the love they bear to themselves and the little love they bear to God makes them say that they know not his will sometimes they have the confidence to say lying they would do it if they knew it For that is false but mans heart deceives sometimes it self so that it self does not know the deceit and gives it self to believe that its falshoods are truth which causes several to live in quiet believing themselves assured in the midst of perils of their Salvation Therefore we may well desire to discover the truth in a matter of so great concern on which depends our eternal happiness and never sleep upon a false bolster of Deceiving suppositions for he that sins ignorantly goes ignorantly to hell Seeing all Christians are obliged to know the will of God which is also clearly manifested to them by his commands and yet more particularly by the doctrine of J. Ch. for there be few Christians that know not that God hath commanded men to love him with all their heart and their neighbour as themselves and there are yet fewer that observe these commands and with that they say If I knew the will of God I would follow it and so they lie to God and to themselves perswading themselves they speak truth so great is the darkness in which men live at this day in regard of their Salvation We may truly say that it is at this day that they are abandoned to the Spirit of error and wickness and that the Scripture says with good reason that all men are liars seeing they now lie to themselves to the prejudice of their eternal salvation and that sometimes without knowing it For in that they say if they knew the will of God they would follow it is falshood both in the well-intentioned and in the wicked since we see in effect that neither the one nor the other do it in the first command viz. to love God with all our heart and our neighbour as our selves For to love God with all our heart we must love nothing else but him only otherwise our heart were divided and parted instead of being whole in the love of one God so that if we love riches and the pleasures of this life and honour c. we do not love God with all our heart though we know that to be his will And when we envy the happiness of our neighbour and do not assist him in his need we do not love him as our selves and we often do to him what we would not should be done to our selves Wherein we do not the will of God though we know assuredly that his will is that we love our neighbour as our selves and so we do not practice the will of God which we know but we seek beside that so clearly revealed a more particular will in things little needful and neglect to do his will in that which regards our eternal Salvation It is therefore much to be feared that we would not do the will of God in small things though we did know it seeing we do it not in things so great and so advantagious to our eternal salvation So that it were to tempt God to ask what is his will in all things while we do not fulfil it in the principal things as are his express commands and saving ordinances I hear sometimes said that it is a very sweet thing and great happiness to have the will of God discovered in every thing esteeming that a particular grace and extraordinary happiness And yet if that mercy were given them it is to be feared it would turn to their greater condemnation for he that knows the father's will and does it not shall be beaten with many stripes And the reason why God does not communicate himself to all Christians is because they are not ready nor disposed to perform his will when it shall be contrary to their own And therefore every one ought to endeavour to fulfil the will of God which he knows by his commands rather than go to and demand of God particular things so long as he does not perform the principal things as are the commands of God or the counsels of J. Ch. and these counsels explain yet more particularly the will of God than did the commands in general For J. Ch. deduces particularly all what we ought to do and leave to fulfil that command of loving God with all our heart and our neighbour as our selves Saying Learn of me for I am meek and Lowly which teaches the love of God and of our neighbour for the meekness signifies love of the goodness of God and lowliness the Love of our neighbour Meekness or goodness is one of the essential qualities of God which seems to surpass his other qualities it is like oyl among other liquors which swims always above for we see in aâ—l Gods works his goodness superabound over his other qualities though that goodness be never seperated from his justice and truth yet it excels over them For we see in many things where God hath stayed his wrath to give place to his mercy when men would turn as he did to the people of Nineveh who by their sins had justly merited that Gods justice should be executed against them Yea and the truth of God had foretold their destruction within forty days but as soon as that people returned to repentance the goodness of God gets uppermost and swims above his justice and truth and pardons them by his great meekness and goodness So that we may with truth say that the goodness of God is over his other qualities And seeing J. Ch. exhorts us to be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect we must labour particularly for that virtue of meekness and lowliness which Jesus Christ teaches to learn of him that we may tend to that perfection of our heavenly father and when we have in the bottom of our soul justice and truth for a foundation to Christian perfection we must build upon that meekness and gentleness seeing that virtue will make us fulfil the command of Loving God with all our heart and our neighbour as our selves wherein the scripture says all the law and the Prophets are contained and
they would willingly be great and rich that they may have Means to please their Senses and these Pleasures ruin Soul and Body For since Nature was corrupted by sin all the senses of man are become brutish and insolent and know no more what is good or evil for them intemperate without order or measure and therefore the Scripture says that the Eye is never satisfied with seeing nor the Ear with hearing to show how our senses are disordered and insatiable the more the eye sees the more it would see and so the ear hear and they are never satisfied It is the same with the Feeling Smelling and Taste the other three senses For whenever a man gives himself to satisfie his senses he is never fully satisfied nor content For in every place he may find something that smells unpleasantly and though he carry about Musk and Civet that will not hinder that he breath not in the bad Exhalations and Vapours of the Air caused by the corruption and filth of the bodies of Men and Beasts although he had but the stink of his own body since all that proceeds out of it is nasty and putrid which cannot satisfie his smell which desires always good smells and agreeable and in loving that we can never be content nor satisfied And yet less can we satisfie the sense of feeling it being insatiable They would have fine Linnen Silks soft Beds smooth Coverings and other things agreeable to the touch which is not content with things that are sufficient But the sense of Taste exceeds all the others in disorder and intemperance For he that will satisfie his taste and delicacy renders himself miserable and in continual dissatisfaction For when he hath one food that is good he desires another as better the Wine is too sharp or stale for him the Beer is too sweet for his delicate taste he longs always for what he hath not and what he cannot get so insolent are mans natural senses that they often tyrannize over the spirit with a thousand tortures of Desires Intemperances Lusts Excess and Gluttony which bring Diseases Poverty and Death And yet they call him happy who hath the means to satisfie his senses without discovering that they are corrupted by sin and therefore they beget all sorts of Evils which she prays you to discover who wisheth your good Holstein near Gottorp Castle 15. Febr. 1672. St. vet ANTONIA BOURIGNON THE VI LETTER Humility is attained by Knowing our selves To the same who is admonished to learn Humility by knowing the truth of our Corruption and Sin which is the disorder of our natural senses My Dear Child I Cannot entertain you too much of the Corruption of man and the Miseries to which he is subject during this miserable life to prevent your ever placing your affections on it but that you may learn the Humility of Heart which Jesus Christ teaches which will follow upon the knowledge of your self but you shall never attain it unless you examin in retail the miseries and infirmities of your body and spirit since it is that knowledge which should teach you the Humility of Heart which Jesus Christ requires For if you remain in the general ignorance of men you shall never attain to it you will always think you deserve Honour and Esteem seeing others like your self honoured and esteemed and that they also take their pleasures and sensualities more than you do But trust me my Dear Child that conduct proceeds from the blindness of their minds and from the profound darkness in which they are without perceiving it and they blind one another still more by their practice for one thinks he is as good as the other and that he may do what another doth and so one follows another blindfoldly and thinks he doth but what is suitable for an honest man to do But however great the number of blind are that will not help you in particular and that broad way will always lead to perdition tho many tread it The great number of miserables will not lessen your condemnation on the contrary it will augment your pains and miseries far from any ways mitigating them Therefore is it that you must not regard if others be blind and know not themselves esteeming themselves and following their sensualities for you shall not give an accompt for them There shall only your own works follow you at Death and according to them shall you be judged God affords you now the occasion of Discovering the truth of all things beware of neglecting it but bless the Lord for it is a great mercy he shows you beyond so many thousands of persons who perish for want of knowing themselves and for having never discovered the truth of things as they are before God They amuse themselves to look one to another without penetrating into the state of man and what he is whence he is and whither he tends though it is a thing of so great import on which our eternal salvation depends Therefore I exhort you to lay to heart the knowledge of your self seeing that must rule all your actions and make you become humble of heart as Jesus Christ teaches us to be The truth of all things should deliver you from all evil that is also the mistress of virtues for if you possess the Truth of God that shall teach you all virtues and deliver you from all vice for the cause why man is vicious and not virtuous is because he knows not the truth of things and takes the Shadow for the Body the Bark for the Wood and so goes from evil to worse For if he knew truly what sin is and what virtue he would deliver himself from the one to attain the other since he would see clearly that sin is a meer Tyrant which tortures Soul and Body and that virtue is beautiful good sweet and pleasant And so he could not retain himself from hating sin and loving virtue seeing that is good and equitable but for lack of knowledge of things they love what they should hate and hate what is lovely and to show you what sin is know that in it self it is nothing but a disorder of corrupted nature For when God created man he was well ordered temperate and regular in all his natural functions and he might enjoy the pleasure of all his senses without doing evil because all that God made was good and he created beautiful things to please his sight and all the melodies of Beasts Men and all melodious things to afford pleasure to the hearing and all Flowers and pleasant smells for his smelling and all smooth and agreeable things for his feeling and all good and savory things to afford pleasure to his Taste so that he could allowably enjoy the Pleasures of all his five natural senses because all the other Creatures were created for the pleasure and recreation of Man who was so perfect that he used all these things only for his recreation with just order weight and measure