Dialogues on the Supersensual Life Part 2

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Now if we did not contend about our different fruits, gifts, kinds, and degrees of knowledge, but did acknowledge them in one another, like Children of the Spirit of G.o.d, what could condemn us? For the Kingdom of G.o.d consisteth not in our knowing and supposing, but in Power.

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If we did not know half so much, and were more like children, and had but a brotherly mind and goodwill towards one another, and lived like children of one mother, and as branches of one tree, taking our Sap all from one Root, we should be far more holy than we are.

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Knowledge serves only to this end, viz., to know that we have lost the Divine Power in Adam, and are now become inclined to sin; that we have evil properties in us, and that doing evil pleaseth not G.o.d; so that with our knowledge we learn to do right. Now if we have the Power of G.o.d in us, and desire with all our hearts to act and to live aright, then our knowledge is but our sport, or matter of pleasure, wherein we rejoice.

13

For true knowledge is the manifestation of the Spirit of G.o.d through the Eternal Wisdom. He knoweth what he will in his children; he sheweth his wisdom and wonders by his children, as the earth putteth forth her various flowers.

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Now if we dwell with one another, like humble children, in the Spirit of Christ, are rejoicing at the gift or knowledge of another, who would judge or condemn us? Who judgeth or condemneth the birds in the woods that praise the Lord of all Beings with various voices, every one in its own essence? Doth the Spirit of G.o.d reprove them for not bringing their voices into one harmony? Doth not the melody of them all proceed from his Power, and do they not sport before him?

15

Those men therefore that strive and wrangle about the knowledge and will of G.o.d, and despise one another on that account, are more foolish than the birds in the woods, and the wild beasts that have no true understanding. They are more unprofitable in the sight of the holy G.o.d than the flowers of the field, which stand still in quiet submission to the Spirit of G.o.d, and suffer him to manifest the Divine Wisdom and Power through them.

16

All Christian Religion consisteth wholly on this, to learn _to know ourselves_; whence we came, and what we are; how we are gone forth from the Unity into dissension, wickedness, and unrighteousness; how we have awakened and stirred up these evils in us; and how we may be delivered from them again, and recover our original blessedness.

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_First_; How we were in the Unity, when we were the Children of G.o.d in Adam before he fell. _Secondly_; How we are now in dissension and disunion, in strife and contrariety. _Thirdly_; Whither we go when we pa.s.s out of this corruptible condition; whither with the unnatural, and whither with the natural part. And _lastly_; How we came forth from disunion and vanity, and enter into that one Tree, Christ in us, out of which we all sprung in Adam. In these four points all the necessary knowledge of a Christian consisteth.

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So that we need not strive about any thing; we have no cause of contention with each other. Let every one only exercise himself in learning how he may enter again into the Love of G.o.d and his Brother.

19

The written Word is but an instrument whereby the Spirit leadeth us to itself within us. That Word which will teach must be living in the literal Word. The Spirit of G.o.d must be in the literal sound, or else none is a Teacher of G.o.d, but a mere Teacher of the Letter, a knower of the history, and not of the Spirit of G.o.d in Christ.

20

All that men will serve G.o.d with must be done in Faith, viz. in the Spirit. It is the Spirit that maketh the work perfect, and acceptable in the sight of G.o.d. All that a man undertaketh and doeth in Faith, he doth in the Spirit of G.o.d, which Spirit of G.o.d doth co-operate in the work, and then it is acceptable to G.o.d. For he hath done it himself, and his Power and Virtue is in it. It is holy.

21

Strife and misunderstanding concerning Christ's Person, Office, and Being, or Substance, as also concerning his Testaments which he left behind him, wherein he worketh at present, ariseth from the deflected creaturely Reason, which runneth on only in an Image-like opinion, and reacheth not the ground of this mystery, and yet will be a mistress of all things or beings, and will judge all things. It doth but lose itself in such Image-likeness, and breaketh itself off from its Centre, and disperseth the thoughts, and runneth on in the multiplicity, whereby its ground is confused and the mind is disquieted, and knoweth not itself.

22

No Life can stand in certainty, except it continue in its Centre, out of which it is sprung.

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When the Soul that is sprung from G.o.d's Word and Will is entered into its own desire to will of itself, it will run in mere uncertainty till it return to its Original again.

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Seeing that human life is an outflowing of the Divine Power, Understanding and Skill, the same ought to continue in its Original, or else it loseth the Divine Knowledge, Power and Skill, and with self-speculation bringeth itself into centres of its own, and strange imaging, wherewith its Original becometh darkened and strange.

Therefore say I, that this is the only cause that men dispute about G.o.d, his Word, Essence or Being, and Will, that the understanding of man hath broken itself off from its Original, and now runneth on in mere self-will, thoughts and images in its own l.u.s.t to selfishness, wherein there is no true knowledge, nor can be, till the Life returneth to its Original, viz. into the Divine Outflowing and Will.

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If this be done, then G.o.d's Will speaketh forth the Divine Power and Wonders again through the human willing. In which Divine Speaking, the Life may know and comprehend G.o.d's Will, and frame itself therein. Then there is true Divine Knowledge and Understanding in man's skill, when his skill is continually renewed with Divine Power.

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As Christ hath taught us when he said, _Unless ye be converted and become as a Child, ye shall not come into the Kingdom of G.o.d_. That is, that the Life turn itself again unto G.o.d out of whom it is proceeded, and forsake all its own imaging and l.u.s.t, and so come to the Divine Vision again.

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All disputation concerning G.o.d's Being or Essence or Will is performed in the images of the senses or thoughts without G.o.d. For if any liveth in G.o.d, and willeth with G.o.d, what needeth he dispute about G.o.d, who, or what G.o.d is? That he disputeth about it is a sign that he hath never felt it at all in his mind or senses, and it is not given to him that G.o.d is in him, and willeth in him what he will. It is a certain sign that he exalts his own meaning and image above others, and desireth dominion.

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Men should friendly confer together, and offer one another their gifts and knowledge in love, and try things one with another, and hold that which is best, and not so stand in their own opinion as if they could not err. It lyeth in no man's person that men should suppose that the Divine Understanding must come only from such and such. For the Scripture says, _Try all things and hold that which is good_, 1 Thess.

v. 21.

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