Chapter 1 (part 7)

It is well known that the light of the sun does .not shine upon the earth because we desire it to shine, neither can we attract the sunlight to us. All we do is to step out of the darkness, or climb to the top of. the mountain which rises above the clouds. Likewise the sunlight of divine wisdom does not enter the mind because the mind wills it to enter; but if our soul rises up to the mountain of the true faith, whose top reaches above the clouds of fear and superstition, and idle speculations and conflicting opinions, then will that light come to us by its own sweet grace, and without any merit or effort on our part to attract it. The low cannot produce the high; neither can anything give birth to something higher than that which it contains. Neither animal nor reasoning man can create God, but the lily-bud of divinity unfolds itself in man by its own power. The divine man creates himself outside of man's willing. He is a god, and therefore self-created and self-existent; he does neither grow greater nor lesser; he is what he is; all that he requires is the conditions necessary for his revealing himself, and this condition is a pure will and a mind undisturbed by passions and idle thoughts, a heart full of calmness and peace. Few indeed are the persons capable of entering into such a state of humility that divine and eternal truth can manifest itself in them without being distorted by selfish thoughts and desires. Not that not all human p. 47 beings have not within themselves the inherent capacity for seeing the divine image that exists within themselves; but the truth is so simple and uncomplicated that it will not be accepted by those whose ways are complicated, and who therefore seek for complexity everywhere. Jacob Boehme was of a simple and unsophisticated nature. Having received but little external education, there was not for him the necessity of unlearning ingrafted errors, and erasing misconceptions and acquired prejudices from his mind. Leading a pure life, his soul was like a clear mirror, in which he could perceive the image of the Godhead reflected therein, and his mind was like an unsoiled page, whereon the word of truth was plainly written. Nevertheless he, like all other persons similarly situated, had to overcome a certain amount of illusion arising from external observation, and from the reflections of the generally prevailing ideas within his own mind. He says:— "Before I knew that which I deeply know now, I, like others, thought that there was no other true heaven than that which as a blue circle encloses the world high above the stars; thinking that God had a separate existence therein, and that He was ruling this world by means of His Holy Spirit. But after I had met with many a hard obstacle in following out this theory, I fell into a state of deep melancholy and grief in beholding the great depth of this world, the sun and the stars, the clouds, rain and snow, and in fact the whole of creation. I compared all that with the little speck called 'man,' and how insignificant he is before God, if compared with this great work of heaven and earth. 1 Finding, moreover, that there is good and evil in all things, in the elements as well as p. 48 in creatures, and that in this world the wicked meets with the same fate as the pious, having good and ill luck; furthermore, that barbarous people occupy the best countries of the world, and are more favoured by fortune than those that are pious, I became very melancholy and dejected, and could find no consolation in Holy Writ, although I knew the Bible from beginning to the end. Perhaps it may be that the devil played a part in all that, for I often had heathenish thoughts, of which I will, however, say nothing at present.