THE PATH
Thou canst not travel on the Path before thou hast become that
Path itself.
Let thy Soul lend its ear to every cry of pain like as the lotus
bares its heart to drink the morning sun.
Let not the fierce Sun dry one tear of pain before thyself hast
wiped it from the sufferer's eye.
But let each burning human tear drop on thy heart and there
remain; nor ever brush it off, until the pain that caused it is
removed.
These tears, O thou of heart most merciful, these are the streams
that irrigate the fields of charity immortal. 'Tis on such soil that
grows the midnight blossom of Buddha, more difficult to find, more
rare to view, than is the flower of the Vogay tree. It is the seed of
freedom from rebirth. It isolates the Arhat both from strife and
lust, it leads him through the fields of Being unto the peace and
bliss known only in the land of Silence and Non-Being.
Kill out desire; but if thou killest it, take heed lest from the
dead it should again arise.
Kill love of life; but if thou slayest Tanha, let this not be for
thirst of life eternal, but to replace the fleeting by the
everlasting.
Desire nothing. Chafe not at Karma, nor at Nature's changeless
laws. But struggle only with the personal, the transitory, the
evanescent and the perishable.
Help Nature and work on with her; and Nature will regard thee as
one of her creators and make obeisance.
The Voice of the Silence
THE WAYLESS
As long as we dwell in the shadow, we cannot see the sun itself;
but Now we see through a glass darkly, says St. Paul. Yet the shadow
is so enlightened by the sunshine that we can perceive the
distinctions between all the virtues and all the truth which is
profitable to our mortal state. But if we would become one with the
brightness of the Sun, we must follow love, and go out of ourselves
into the Wayless, and then the Sun will draw us with our blinded eyes
into Its own brightness, in which we shall possess unity with God....
In his outpouring, He wills to be wholly ours: and then He teaches
us to live in the riches of the virtues. In His indrawing touch all
our powers forsake us, and then we sit under His shadow, and His
fruit is sweet to our taste, for the Fruit of God is the Son of God,
Whom the Father brings forth in our spirit. This Fruit is so
infinitely sweet to our taste that we can neither swallow It nor
assimilate It, but It rather absorbs us into Itself and assimilates
us with Itself.
JAN van RUYSBROECK
