November 14

Thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest Hell.

"IN man" (says Behmen) "lies all whatsoever the sun shines upon or Heaven contains, as also Hell and all the Deeps." . . . Does not every man, who has lived his full life, know the truth and reality of all this? It is known more especially and actually by those ardent and adventurous spirits who have sailed in far seas of thought or action, not merely coasting along the shores of tradition, authority and established rule. Sinners know some things more vividly than those who have ever and easily been good. . . . These wanderers, if they return in time, know best, taught by the heart-rending lessons of experience, the difference between the Heaven and Hell within them. . . . They know that Heaven and Hell can alike be revealed in the soul. From youth they have felt something in them striving, often feebly enough, against passionate desires for wealth, honour, success, and for mastery over the minds, affections, and bodies of others. Behind all this turmoil and ever unsatisfied anguish of seeking that which satisfies not, they have been aware of a diviner life slowly growing towards Heaven, ever and again thwarted and driven back by the renewed assaults of the Spirit of the World, yet never quite destroyed. At the moments of fiercest fight against rebel passions, they have felt the divine assisting strength flow into them, if only they powerfully invoked it, turning towards its source as a babe towards its mother's breast. They have heard the "Peace be still" amid the wildest spiritual storms. They know that if they have been saved, it is not by their own strength, nor by reasoning, but by this power from without.

BERNARD HOLLAND

THE INMOST HEAVEN