Poor, Yet Having All Riches

Of the truly holy man it can be said, also, he is poor, and yet he has all riches; he is poor, because he sits loosely to the world, because he cannot set his affections upon it, and because he has nothing which he can call his own. That, which the world calls his, he calls God’s. He has nothing but what God gives him, and if, in the arrangements of divine providence, God does not see fit to give him anything, he is still rich in the possession of Him, who makes him poor. He may be said to be desolate; but he can never be deserted. He is a poor son; but he has a rich Father; so that, although he has nothing in possession, he can never come to want. God is his banker, who both keeps the funds, and tells him when and how to draw for them; so that he is free from care as the birds of heaven and the lilies of the field.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 8.

Ignorant, Yet Full of Wisdom

The Christian is ignorant, and feels himself to be so, and yet is full of divine wisdom. He is ignorant, comparatively speaking, because there are many things, the knowledge of which is not profitable, and which, therefore, he does not  seek. He  cannot seek knowledge in his own will any  more than he can seek anything else. He can say with the  utmost  sincerity, "I know nothing;" because all human knowledge, as compared with divine, is, and must  be, utter ignorance. And yet, being a "son of God,"  and being "led by the Holy Spirit," he feels that he may and will possess all that knowledge which will be necessary for him. If he knows but little, he knows enough; and if he has no knowledge from himself, he still has God for a teacher.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 8.

Always Suffering, Yet Always Happy

Again, it may properly be said of the man who is truly regenerated, and is fashioned anew into the image of Christ, that he is always suffering, and yet always happy. The natural and necessary opposition between the state of his own soul and the condition of things around him causes affliction. The inhabitant of a dying body, and surrounded by a sinning world, pierced by the thorns of the flesh and by the arrows of Satan, the law of his outward position and the still lingering trials of his fallen nature necessarily constitute him, till his last footstep on this stricken and bleeding earth, "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." But if, in some departments of his mental being, he is always suffering, in others he is always happy. And he is so, because, being born of God and made a partaker of the divine nature, he cannot be otherwise. In the inmost recesses of the soul, in that part which is central and controlling to all the rest, faith stands unshaken; faith which gives sight to the blind and strength to the weak; faith which proclaims sunshine after the storm, victory after the contest, a present God and everlasting rest.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 8.

Without Action, Yet Always Acting

Again, it is sometimes said by experimental writers, in relation to the eminently devoted Christian, that he is without action, and yet always acting.  That is to say, he has no action which comes from himself, — no action originated on worldly principles, none which he can call his own, — but he is always acting in harmony with Providence; moving as he is moved upon; instructed and actuated by  the outward occasions as they are laid hold of and interpreted by the inward principle; retreating, going forward, or standing still, just as the voice of God in the soul directs: so that it is not more true that he never acts than it is that he always acts. Action is as essential to him as life; but still it is action in God and for God.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 8.

Dead, Yet Alive Again

It is said that the Christian who has experienced in himself the highest results of religion, is dead, and is alive again. That is to say, he is dead to private aims and private interests; dead to selfish passions, prejudices and pleasures; dead to worldly reputation and honor. But, being dead to himself and whatever concerns himself, he is alive to God; alive to the aims and interests for which Christ came down from heaven, alive to the honor which comes from God, and from God only.

— edited from A Treatise on Divine Union (1851) Part 8, Chapter 8.

Thou Giver of the Rising Light

I.
 

Thou Giver Of the rising light,
Thou Author of the morning ray;
At whose command the shades of night
Are changed to bright and sudden day;
Thou too canst rend the clouded heart,
Enveloped in the shades of sin;
And let the light, that dwelt apart,
The glory and the gladness in.
 

II.
 

Oh God, our Father and our Friend,
Dark is the cloud that wraps us now;
But not in vain our prayers ascend,
Nor hopeless at thy feet we bow.
'Tis in the dark, distressing hour,
That thou dost hear thy people's cry;
And come and clothe them in thy power,
And hide them in thy majesty.

— Religious Maxims (1846).

Inward Recollection and Prayer

Again, we have good reason for supposing, that the state of inward recollection is eminently propitious to the spirit and practice of prayer. There certainly can be no acceptable prayer without a considerable degree of recollection. And the requirement that we should "pray without ceasing," seems almost necessarily to imply, that we should always be in a recollected state.

He, who is always dissipated like a house open to all comers and goers, is very unfit for prayer. He, that will never pray, but in the hour that calls him to it, will never do it well. But he, that would succeed in this great exercise, ought, by continual RECOLLECTION, to keep himself always ready, and in an actual disposition for praying. — Francis de la Combe, Letter of Instruction on Christian Perfection.

One of the great excellencies of the state of inward recollection is, that it gives us the place of central observation and power, the KEY, if we may so express it, to the position of the religious life; and enables us to exercise an effective control over its whole broad extent. That is to say, it places us in the most favorable position to discover and meet the attacks of our spiritual adversaries, and also to render our own movements and efforts fully available. However well disposed may be our intentions, whatever good purposes we may have formed, whatever may be the formality and solemnity of our recorded resolutions, they will ever be found in a great degree useless, without this aid. It will be in vain to think of living a life of true religion, a life in which God himself is the inspiring element, without a present, permanent, and realizing sense of his presence.  It  is, therefore, not without a good degree of reason, that the pious Cecil has remarked, that "RECOLLECTION is the life of religion."

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (2nd Edition, 1844) Part 3, Chapter 7.