To be near unto God - pagina 414

the soul becomes in the discovery of sin, and for this reason the more we shake ourselves free from sin, the sense of guilt does not diminish, but rather increases. The world does not understand this, when it hears an angel of love and mercy touchingly plead for forgiveness of guilt. But by itself there is nothing strange in this.' They who have far advanced in godly living now discover sin in what before seemed to them perhaps even virtue. Jesus knew this, and therefore this can not have been meant. It does not say: Blessed are they who have a pure heart, a heart without sin, but: Blessed are they who are pure of heart. In the heart the ego dwells, the person acts, the child of God thinks, ponders, decides and chooses. Hence there is a difference between what the self finds in the heart, and what it there orders and directs. And since no one dwells anywhere else than in a heart that is inwardly defiled, and from which all sorts of poisonous vapors arise, the question regarding purity or impurity of heart is only decided by the question, whether these corrupting tendencies of the heart are regarded with deep hatred and fiery indignation, or whether there is sympathy with them, and they are granted indulgence by the Will and by the Mind. Frequent failure is not suflficient proof of impurity of heart. The question is whether impurity is resisted, whether it is striven against with all the spiritual power one has at his command, whether with the invocation of the help of God and of his Christ and of his angels, everything that threatens defeat is avoided, and the supplication "Lead me not into tempation, but is continued: deliver

me from

evil."

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