The Sermons of Johannes Tauler · 53 of 124

Sermon for the Sunday after the Ascension

Be prudent, therefore, and watch in prayers. — I Feter iv, 7.

Let every man now prepare for the approaching feast of the Holy Ghost, that he may receive Him with the best possible dispositions, keeping only God in view. Let each one search his whole way of life with all care, considering his interior soul, and whether anything dwells therein that is not God. This preparation will consist of four dispositions: detachment, self-renunciation, the interior spirit, and union with God.

A man should also be practiced outwardly in the natural virtues, and his lower spiritual powers in moral virtues. Then the Holy Ghost should be placed in possession of one’s higher spiritual powers, to adorn them with the theological virtues. All this should be done with discretion and in right order in every respect. We should carefully examine if anything has found place in our life that is not entirely for God; and if so, then it should be at once condemned and reformed. We should imitate the farmer in the month of March; as the sun gains power he prunes his trees and he digs his ground and works his farm with great industry. So should we industriously dig up the ground of our soul and find out what is underneath the surface; we should prune the tree of our outward life of the senses, and we should clean out all weeds, as well as subject our lower powers to the higher ones. We must cut out the seven capital sins by the very roots. Pride should be exterminated inwardly and outwardly; and all avarice and hate and envy; all foul lust in body and soul, in heart and senses, in spirit and act must be totally expelled; no sloth of any kind must be allowed to lurk in the soul: all these evils and hard, for although the sun grows warmer, it is yet far from summer’s clear and genial light. But soon all is changed. The Divine sun begins to do its heavenly work in the well-prepared garden of the soul.

When, therefore, the genial sun of God’s grace begins to shine brightly upon this well-cultivated garden, all the souI’b inner and outer faculties being fully prepared, all its higher and lower tendencies directed towards Heaven, then indeed the sweet flowers of May begin to bloom, and all the welcome gifts of summertime. The eternal God causes the soul to blossom forth and to produce good fruit of virtue; and the joy in that soul no tongue can tell. For now the Holy Ghost is there, and His brightness shines directly upon the soul, yea, into its inmost depths. Well may He now be called the true Comforter, since His influence is so delicious. O how great a joy! O how rich a feast, the sweet odors of whose nourishing food excite the soul’s deepest longing! These are granted in every plenty of enjoyment to the rightly prepared soul by the gentle Spirit of God. One drop of this Divine comfort is worth more than all the joys of created things put together; and it overpowers and quenches all longing for them whatsoever.

When a man feels this action of the Divine Comforter so wonderfully great and so unexpected, he would gladly sink down info its depths and rest and slumber in it forever. He feels like St. Peter at the Lord’s Transfiguration ;it is good for him to be there, and he would set up three tabernacles of joy out of one drop of the happiness now granted him, and there dwell forever. But such is not our Lord’s will. When Peter said “It is good for us to be here,” he Was far from that degree in the spiritual life that his Lord would lead him to. So it is with souls in this stage: they think they have got all when they are in this brilliant sunshine of God’s favor, and they would like to lie down and bask in it forever. And all the souls who actually do so, remain stationary in their career. They amount to nothing unless they rise up and go forward.

To some of these it happens that they slip down into unlawful liberty. Their poor human nature turns inward and regards itself with selfcomplacency, a weakness toward which we are above all other things inclined. It is with them as with sick persons who trust too much to medicines. I have heard physicians say that men, finding relief in drugs, trust to them entirely and not at all to their natural forces, and that this breeds indolence. If a man is doubtful of all help from others, bow this poisonous longing for ease and convenience, penetrates everywhere in oar natural life. And it is a thousand times worse in our spiritual life. When this very nnnsnal joy is felt, the soul forthwith counts upon being sure to keep it Earnest and faithful labor is now thought unnecessary; a soft lethargy possesses the spirit — no more activity of virtue, no more zealous toil, all is to be rest and peace. And this is Satan’s chance. He comes to this soul, thus indolently reclining, and he insinuates into it a false sweetness, hoping to hold it fast in this wrong state of rest.

What shall we do, then? Shall we run away from this happiness? Ho, by no means. But, receiving it with much gratitude, we must humbly return it again into God’s hands praising Him in all sincerity, as we nevertheless protest ourselves to be wholly unworthy of such a favor. We should act like a young and robust traveler, but poor and hungry and thirsty as he starts on his journey. If he goes forward four miles and can only manage to get a meal to eat, he springs forward blithely and makes ten miles more. So let us do, when God feeds us with His sweet food of spiritual joy. Whatever good things such a man formerly did, he does more and better things now, loves God more, praises and thanks Him more. He is more upright, his heart is full of a more burning love, and thereby he becomes worthy of the gift of a yet deeper interior comfort. Just as we may fancy a man going to the Pope and giving him a florin, and receiving in return a hundred thousand, and getting the same exchange every time he gave a florin: so is the exchange between God and a rightly guided soul. As often as he goes to God in all love and gratitude and humility, so often does God meet him on the instant with gifts and graces a thousandfold more precious than before. Thus it is that sweetness of devotion is made a help to us, and leads to greater good: we must use our spiritual gifts and not enjoy them. It is like riding in a wagon: we are there for the good of the journey and for the progress made, and not for the enjoyment of the wagon’s soft seat. So let it be with God’s gifts; draw the good out of them, leaving to God the joy. Hence St. Peter’s warning to us to be sober and watchful; not to sink into the slumber of sensual pleasure, a state in which the soul is but half alive and is incapable of activity. The sober-minded man works right on courageously and intelligently: “Be sober and watch: because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, goeth about seeking whom he may devour; whom resist ye strong in faith” (I Peter v, 8).

And again the Apostle bids ns be “prudent and watch in prayers,” that is, not to be so dull as to rest in anything that is not God; to keep the light of piety brightly burning; to keep a vigilant outlook over ourselves; always to long for God alone. It was on this account that our Saviour’s disciples must give up the bodily presence of their Master, if they would receive the Holy Ghost. “If I go not,” said He, “the Paraclete will not come to you” (John xvi, 7). These loving disciples were so possessed of the visible presence of the Lord, that heart, soul, senses and faculties were entirely absorbed — inner and outer life all taken up. This condition must be changed, if they were to arrive at the true, spiritual, interior comfort of God — they must be cut off from the outward presence, no matter how bitter the stroke. Otherwise they should have remained in the lowest spiritual degree, that of the sensible life of religion. When they rose above the senses, it was to enter the religious life of the highest powers of the soul, every way nobler and more delightful.

After that the soul enters further into its own deep interior, the very hidden shrine of God’s presence within it. Divine sweetness is there and there only quite at home, there fully and essentially experienced. And there alone is the soul wide awake and watchful.

The apostle bids us be sober, watchful and prayerful, for our “adversary the devil goeth about like a roaring lion.” What prayer does he mean? That of the mouth? Reading the Psalms over and over? All that is truly prayer, but he means a yet higher prayer. It is the prayer our Lord meant when He said: “The true adorers shall adore the Father in spirit and in truth” (John iv, 23). Saints and Divines teach us that prayer is the elevation of the soul to God. If thy prayer by word of mouth serves this purpose, well and good. But even so: if my clothing serves me, all the same it is not my own self. Thus does all prayer of the mouth serve true prayer; but in itself and taken alone it is not true prayer. For by true prayer the heart and soul of a man must go direct to God, and that is the esential thing. True prayer is this and nothing besides: a man’s mind is totally subjected to God in loving desire and genuine humility.

Clergymen and members of orders are indeed especially bound at certain times to recite vocal prayers. But none of these prayers are so devout and lovely as the sacred prayer taught us by the supreme master of prayer Himself, namely the Pater Noster. That prayer approaches the nearest of all vocal prayer to the truest, the most essential. This

God is by essence and by nature. Back and forth into this relation with Qod does such a man pass in prayer, as he pleads for every necessity of all Christendom, his holy petitions, his deep yearnings ever guided by Qod Himself. Thus does he pray for his friends on earth, even sinners, and for the souls in purgatory. The needs of every soul in holy Church are not beyond his help by counsel as well as by prayer. And yet such favored spirits do not always pray exactly for this or that particular person or object. But with a certain kind of wide-sweeping universal and in the fire of Divine love — viewing thus as with one glance the necessities of all Christians. They may seem to themselves to be in and out of God in their soul’s movements, and yet they are ever in Him, deep in the calm of fathomless love: therein is their life and being, therein all their life’s activity. Nothing is to be discovered in them under any and all circumstances but a Divine existence; whether doing thingB or leaving them undone, everything tells of Qod. These are noble souls, necessary for holy Church, sanctifying and consoling all men, giving honor to Qod. Wherever they may be, Qod dwells in them and they in Him. May Qod help us to the methods and the devotion leading to such an end. Amen.

and foolish misgivings are a hindrance — But reasonable self-suspecting is most useful — Example of the serpent changing his shin.