The Day of Endless Bliss.
“O when shall the fair day break, and the hour of gladness come,
When I to my heart’s Beloved, to Thee O my Lord go home?
O Lord, the ages are long, and weary my heart for Thee;
For Thee, O my one Beloved, whose voice shall call for me.
I would see Thee face to face, Thou Light of my weary eyes,
I wait and I watch till morning shall open the gate of the skies;
The morn when I rise aloft to my one, my only bliss,
To know the smile of Thy welcome, the mystery of Thy kiss.
For here hath my foot no rest, and mine eye sees all things fair,
As a dream of a land enchanted, for my heart’s love is not there―
And amidst the thronging of men I am lonelier than alone,
For my eye seeketh One I find not, my heart craveth only One.”
―Henry Suso, A.A. 1340.
WE can gather something of the inner life of Richard from the many allusions in his Psalter to natural objects. For to him all things had a language, and stood for symbols of the unseen things; and therefore, in explaining the words of Scripture, he took in symbolic sense the natural objects mentioned in the text. We know that in many cases this is the true interpretation-the green pastures and the still waters, the river that makes glad the City of God, the hart that panteth after the water brooks, the kiss of righteousness and peace, are well understood by the mind which the Spirit of God has taught.
In Richard’s mind, all things, from the stars of heaven to the grass in the meadows, had a meaning which led his thoughts to God. “He telleth the number of the stars, He calleth them all by their names,” and Richard adds, “The Lord keeps all His chosen men, for He knoweth them that are His, and all their names are written in the book of life, and to each He gives his proper gift, so that each one is named by God for the place in which He setteth him.” And as he saw the sun set behind the purple moors, he said to himself the words of Christ, “ ‘The Son of Man must suffer many things, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.’ Even so is it written of Him, ‘The Sun knoweth his going down. And He shall rise again.’ “And when the moon shone down on his cell he said, “He maketh the moon for a season—for the Holy Church will be here but for a time, and then will go to God.” And he watched the ways of the birds and bees, and the woodland creatures, and found their resemblances in the spiritual world in which his soul dwelt as in a familiar home.
And sometimes he finds a quaint meaning, which we cannot follow, though the thought has truth and beauty in which we can delight.
“He giveth snow-like wool, He scattereth the hoar frost like ashes.” This he remarks upon thus― “As snow freezeth above and falleth beneath, so, when love cools in a man, he falls downwards to the earth, and is wrapped up in the things below, in the bed of snow lying still and cold. But in this snow are some that God has ordained to everlasting salvation, the which He makes to be no more snow, but wool; and of wool can clothing be fashioned.
“Therefore of some who be yet cold, Christ’s kirtle shall be made, without spot or stain. And those who some time were cold, He makes to burn in love, making lovers for Himself of sinful men.”
And again He speaks of the verse, “Turn our captivity, O Lord, as streams in the south—even as when the south wind blows, the frozen streams are loosed and flow along, so the Holy Ghost blowing on us, we are loosed from sin and flow onwards to Heaven, and our captivity is turned to joy. For He sent His word and melted them, He blew with His wind and the waters flowed. The Word of God coming, the snow crystals and the cloud are melted. Therefore neither cold nor murkiness nor hardness need despair, for they melt wholly in God’s love as soon as His Spirit breathes into the heart; and waters, the streams of knowledge and grace, run down that other men may drink. And he that hath understanding drinks of the well of eternal light.”
Thus, as Richard sat in his cell, or journeyed through the woods and meadows, the world was to him as a parable in which he learned the love of God; and the book of God’s creation, and the Bible, the book of redemption, told to him the same tale, and the one made the other more true and “shining” to his soul.
So the years passed by, during which Richard spent blessed days alone, and also blessed days when he gave forth that which the Lord had taught him. And at last he was an old man, and he was glad to know that the time was near when he should see his Saviour “eye to eye, and speak with Him mouth to mouth.”
“The yearning of my heart,” he said, “speaks to God, and He alone hears it. I seek His face―I seek Thee and none other thing, and I shall seek Thy Face for evermore till I die, and then shall I no more seek but find. My soul is as the hart that thirsteth after the water-brooks. I thirst for God’s well of life, even to come and appear before God. When shall I come and appear before His Face? For I covet to die and be with Christ.
“Methinketh it is long till I am there. I thirst in my yearning, I shall be filled in my coming. For mickleness of love my soul longs for the halls of our Lord, the court of Heaven. My heart is melted in sweetness of love, and delight of the joy that is there within. It is a true gladness when a man covets to die, for the joy thereof.
“Here are we in travail and anguish for God’s love, and are fain when God leadeth us into the desired haven, the bliss of Heaven. Then is the eternal day that has no night, when Christ the Sun setteth nevermore, and there shall I love perfectly, and fall and change no more forever. I go from the day that now is, into the day of endless bliss.”
And it came to pass in those years, that Dame Margaret, the anchoress, had suddenly an illness like that from which she had been healed by the prayer of Richard. But this time she did not lose her speech. And she said, “Now I know that Richard of Hampole is dead, for he prayed for me that I should have this illness no more whilst he lived on earth.”
And she sent a man to Hampole, which was twelve miles off, to inquire, and she found that he had died just before the illness had struck her. And she desired to be carried to Hampole to be there at his funeral, and she remained at Hampole till she died, and was buried there, near to Richard, in the church of the Cistercian convent.
And the writings of Richard were preserved by the Cistercian nuns with care. “For,” they said, “evil men of Lollardy had misused these writings for their own base purposes, and propped up their mischievous heresies by the support of his great and honored name.”
The nuns, meanwhile, were careful to cast no blame upon Richard himself, nor upon his writings, for crowds were wont to come to pray at his tomb, and miracles were declared to be worked there, so that the sanctity of Richard became a source of great profit and honor to the convent.
And it was left to those in later ages to compare the writings of Richard with those of the Lollards, otherwise the Waldensian “Brethren,” and to trace the teaching which at the same time illumined the sermons of Dr. Tauler at Strasburg and Cologne, and the wayside preaching of Henry Suso, and broke forth at last in the light of the Reformation.
“For,” writes Ullmann, “if we consider what it was which made Luther and his fellow reformers what they were, we shall find that it was by no means the example of a Huss, a Savonarola, and other martyrs of the kind. Neither was it the writings of Wiclif, but totally different elements of Christian experience and theology with which they nourished their minds.
“Their spiritual food was derived mainly from the Biblical and sound mystical divines of Germany and the Netherlands; for more was done in the way of spiritualizing the Christian faith and life by the German and Dutch mystics, more in the way of purifying theology, and conforming it to Scripture, than from the very nature of the case was possible for the more famous and heroic pioneers of the Reformation, the men of conflict and action.
“For the Reformation, viewed in its most general character, is the reaction of Christianity as Gospel, against Christianity as law, and connected with this, between the externalism and internalism of the religious and moral life. In the one case the stress is laid upon the visible at upon the character, number, and extent of the works performed, in short upon what may be weighed and measured in the spiritual life. In the other, it is laid upon what is inmost in the general bias of the mind, upon such imponderable things as faith and sentiment.
“In the one case the language is, Be righteous, and fulfill all the commandments; in the other, Believe and love, and then do what you will and must.
“The extent to which this constitutes the very germ of the Reformation can scarcely be conceived by any other means than an acquaintance with the spiritual manifestations which preceded it. Its forerunners were, almost more than its agents, under the dominion of a Christianity petrified into law, a sort of legal ecclesiasticism; while, at the same time, as the light of free grace and the Spirit, and a knowledge of the true principle of faith had beamed upon their minds from the Gospel, and the writings of Paul, they apprehended the contrast between law and Gospel still more strictly, and stated it more broadly than the Reformers themselves, though equally hostile to all Antinomianism.
“Besides being legalized, the medieval Church had more or less also fallen a prey to the principle of externalism; in opposition to which mysticism, thus also becoming an important preparatory element of the Reformation, asserted the principle of internalism.
“This it not unfrequently did in a sound and vigorous way, but sometimes also with a partial and morbid spiritualism, which, by falsely severing the outward from the inward, laid the whole strain upon the latter; and by this means sank into pure indifference respecting moral actions. The true pioneers of the Reformation occupy the sounder standing-point of an internalism strictly moral, and thoroughly consonant to the practical genius of Christianity. They recognize the love which is the offspring of living, faith, and which never remains mere sentiment, but is always and to an equal degree active, as the true fulfilling of the law. They estimate every outward work solely by the measure of the faith and love from whence it springs.”
Thus far Ullmann―and, as carrying out the same thought in a few words, we have the significant remark of a modern Christian writer: “It is important to observe that the more vigorous and living Christianity is, the more objective it is. It is but saying that God end the Lord Jesus have a greater place in our thoughts, and that we rest more really upon them.”
If we do not draw from this remark the illogical conclusion that the more vigorous and living Christianity is, the less subjective it is, we shall find it a valuable help in distinguishing between the joy, peace, and rest of heart which flow from faith in the object of faith, God and His Word; and the joy and delight, which is mere sentiment, resting upon some vague belief in a God whose goodness is shaped by human thought and feeling.
In the former case the objective faith and love produce, in proportion to their being objective, the subjective and peace. In the latter case, the joy and peace rise and fall with their producing cause; a human religionsness, or a poetical imagination, or even a sound state of health.
We must alto bear in mind that there is a Christianity which may be called objective, but which produces no subjective results. This is the case when the object is not God and the Lord Jesus, but a theological doctrine.
And it is possible to regard the blessed facts of the Gospel simply as doctrines, doctrines perfectly sound, but reached by the mind and not by the heart. Which of us could love a doctrine, even if it were the doctrine of the Atonement? But if the One who atoned for our sin is the object before our eyes, the more clearly we see Him, and the work whereby He has saved us, the more will our hearts feel the “marvelous warmth” which filled the heart of Richard Rolle.
To him it was not theology that “Christ bore His sins in His own Body on the cross,” it was a fact as true to him as that the sun rose in the morning and the stars shone at night. And therefore he rejoiced, and his “works became a song to Christ.” So is it still.
And no doubt we should find therefore far more of the singing and rejoicing saints of God amongst the poor and unlettered and simple.
Were we to travel now to some mountain villages in Dauphine, inhabited only by the poor and unlearned, we should find there in one village after another a company of those who meet together in a simple way to worship God and sing praise, as Richard did, to the Name of Jesus. How came this to be in a region to which Protestants had never wandered—amongst people who had never heard of the Reformation, or known what a Protestant meant?
It came from the reading of a book given by a lady on the quay at Marseilles to a soldier, and carried back by him to his village on the mountains.
He had not cared for the book, except for the binding, and when the curs told him it was a wicked and dangerous book, he gave it to an old neighbor, a laborer called le Pere Jacob. Le Pere Jacob opened it, and saw with unspeakable awe the words on the title-page, “The New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” And having taken it into his little room, where he could be all alone, he knelt down and said, “O my God, Monsieur le curd says this is a wicked book, but if it is the Testament of Jesus, it comes from you. And if it does, let it tell me whether I should read it or not.”
And again the Pere Jacob opened the book, and he saw these words: “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; and this is the witness of God which He hath, testified of His Son.”
And the Pere Jacob thanked God that he might read it.
And again he opened it, and saw the wonderful words. “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life.” And the Pere Jacob sprang to his feet, and in a loud voice he thanked God that the word was not “shall have,” but “hath.” “For,” he said, “if it is so, I have everlasting life, for I believe in Jesus. It must be so.”
And when the Pere Jacob had read more of his book, he called his neighbors together and told them the joyful news, and they too believed, and they met tether often, and thanked God, and prayed to Him.
And they said to one another, “The book tells us to eat bread and drink wine in remembrance of the Lord’s death,” and they did so.
But it grieved them that they could not praise God by singing hymns, as the book directed, for they had no hymns. But one day Pere Jacob met a colporteur on the mountains, who was selling hymn-books. And as he was also selling New Testaments, it seemed to be certain that the hymn-books were of the right sort, and the people bought themselves Testaments and hymn-books.
And the worst ruffian in the villages round, who drank and fought, and beat his wife and kicked his children, came to the Lord and was saved, and on Sundays the children sit on his knee, and he teaches them to sing to Jesus.
So flows on the river of the water of life, from which Gertrude and Mechthild and Richard Rolle drank in olden times; and to which the weary and the thirsty are coming still; “the Rock,” said Richard, “which God clave in the bare wilderness, Jesus pierced for us on the cross, the fullness of God’s grace flowing from Him to men out of the mickle depths.”