Ralph Cudworth (1618-1688): Obedience to the Divine Will

The learned and pious Dr. Cudworth says:

 “The highest mystery of a divine life here and of perfect happiness hereafter, consisteth in nothing but mere obedience to the divine will. Happiness is nothing but that inward sweet delight that will arise from the harmonious agreement between our wills and God’s will. There is nothing contrary to God in the whole world, nothing that fights against him, but SELF-WILL. This is the strong castle that we all keep garrisoned against heaven in every one of our hearts, which God continually layeth siege unto; and it must be conquered and demolished before we can conquer heaven. It was by reason of this self-will that Adam fell in Paradise; that those glorious angels, those morning stars, kept not their first station, but dropped down from heaven like falling stars, and sunk into this condition of bitterness, anxiety, and wretchedness, in which they now are. They all entangled themselves with the length of their own wings; they would needs will more and otherwise, than God would will in them. And going about to make their wills wider, and to enlarge them into greater amplitude, the more they struggled they found themselves the faster pinioned, and crowded up into narrowness and servility, insomuch that now they are not able to use any wings at all; but inheriting the serpent’s curse, can only creep with their bellies on the earth. Now our only way to recover God and happiness again, is, not to soar up with our understandings, but to destroy this self-will of ours. And then we shall find our wings to grow again, our plumes fairly spread, and ourselves raised aloft into the free air of perfect liberty, which is perfect happiness.”

— From Cudworth’s Criterion of the true knowledge of Christ; a sermon preached before the English House of Commons, March 31, 1647 quoted in The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 9.

Entering Into Rest

It is very obvious, that this state of mind — union with God — cannot be fully understood, except in connection with inward experience. In the language of the author of the Life of Sir Henry Vane, "Divine life must have divine words; words which the Holy Ghost teacheth, to give its own character." [Life of Sir Henry Vane, anonymous, printed in 1662.] Therefore we will not attempt to pursue the topic any further than to say, that the state of union with God, when it is the subject of distinct consciousness, constitutes, without being necessarily characterized by revelations or raptures, the soul's spiritual festival, a season of special interior blessedness, a foretaste of heaven. The mind, unaffected by worldly vicissitudes and the strifes and oppositions of men, reposes deeply in a state of happy submission and quietude, in accordance with the expressions in the Epistle to the Hebrews, that those who believe, ENTER INTO REST.

Objections to the Idea of Inward Crucifixion

When a person has gone through the process of inward crucifixion in its entire length and breadth, the great spiritual result is the complete extinction of all selfishness and of all self-will: a result brought about by means of an entire and unchangeable consecration, attended by the inwardly operating and searching influences of the Holy Spirit; a result, which in the end is so minutely explorative, so thoroughly destructive of those inward influences which obstruct the presence of God in the soul, and withal so painful oftentimes, that it may well be termed the BAPTISM OF FIRE. It is by means of such a process of inward crucifixion, that the natural life dies; and the way is thus prepared for the true resurrection and life of Christ in the soul. 

Two Things to Be Guarded Against

Two things, in particular, are to be guarded against in all the variety of their forms, viz., CREATURE LOVE and SELF WILL in other words, dependence upon self, and dependence upon our fellow men.

— Religious Maxims (1846) CXXVIII.