Revelations of Divine Love · 100 of 127 · tr. Grace Warrack

Chapter LXIVb

It is God's will that we set the point of our thought in this blissful beholding as often as we may,—and as long time keep us therein with His grace; for this is a blessed contemplation to the soul that is led of God, and full greatly to His worship, for the time that it lasteth.

And [when] we fall again to our heaviness, and spiritual blindness, and feeling of pains spiritual and bodily, by our frailty, it is God's will that we know that He hath not forgotten us.

And so signifieth He in these words: And thou shalt never more have pain; no manner of sickness, no manner of misliking, no wanting of will; but ever joy and bliss without end.

What should it then aggrieve thee to suffer awhile, seeing it is my will and my worship?

It is God's will that we take His behests and His comfortings as largely and as mightily as we may take them, and also He willeth that we take our abiding and our troubles as lightly as we may take them, and set them at nought.

For the more lightly we take them, and the less price we set on them, for love, the less pain we shall have in the feeling of them, and the more thanks and meed we shall have for them.

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Themes

◆Active Contemplationpraxis

A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness.

The passage explicitly instructs the soul to 'set the point of our thought in this blissful beholding,' describing a deliberate, active form of contemplation as central to the text.

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◆Detachment Gelassenheitpraxis

Eckhart's Abgeschiedenheit/Gelassenheit — radical letting-go of will, image, and grasping that opens the soul to God; distinct from inner_silence (quietness) and from material renunciation, and adjacent to Sufi tark and Buddhist non-grasping as a practice rather than a metaphysical claim.

The passage advises taking troubles 'lightly' and setting them 'at nought' to reduce pain and increase spiritual merit, reflecting a practice of radical letting-go.

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◆Divine Providencetheology

Pronoia — the doctrine that the divine actively orders the unfolding of the cosmos and human affairs toward intelligible ends, against pure chance or blind necessity.

The text repeatedly asserts that suffering, joy, and the soul's state are all governed by 'God's will,' emphasizing a divine ordering of human affairs.

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◆Living Godtheology

The divine conceived as active, present, and dynamic—not an abstract principle but a personal responsive reality.

God is portrayed as an active, personal reality who speaks ('signifieth He in these words'), comforts, and wills specific outcomes for the soul.

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Related passages · 2 parallels

◆neoplatonism|Select Works of Plotinus|Select Works, Section 713 (part 2)

“Any that have seen know what I have in mind: the soul takes another life as it approaches God; thus restored it feels that the dispenser of true life is There to see, that now we have nothing to look for but, far otherwise, that we must put…”

Both passages describe the soul's journey towards divine union and the transcendence of earthly suffering. They share the conceptual insight of divine comfort and the elevation of the soul through divine love, despite different traditions and vocabulary.

◆renaissance_hermeticism|The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori)|Fifth Dialoguek

“That is a maxim of the Epicureans which, being well understood, would not be considered so unworthy as the ignorant hold it to be, seeing that it does not detract from what I have called virtue, nor does it impair the perfection of firmness…”

Both passages discuss the idea of transcending pain and suffering through divine or philosophical contemplation, emphasizing the attainment of a state where pain is either not felt or is minimized through focus on higher truths or virtues.