CHAPTER XXII.

Account of the hermit of Thonon, called Anselm. Her return from Thonon to Gex. Thrown from a horse and injured. Labors at Gex. Illustration of them in the case of a poor woman, whom she was the means of spiritually benefiting. Sermon of La Combe on Holiness. La Combe called to account, on the ground of preaching heretical doctrine. Views and measures of Bishop d'Aranthon. Proposes to Madame Guyon to give up her property and become prioress of a Religious House at Gex. Her refusal. Remarkable conversation between d'Aranthon and La Combe, in relation to Madame Guyon's course. Remarks upon d'Aranthon's course and upon his character. takes ground in opposition to Madame Guyon. of her inward experience at this time.

He gradually
Some account

"AT Thonon," she says, "I found a hermit, whom the people called Anselm. He was a person of the most extraordinary sanctity that had appeared for some time. He was from the city of Geneva; and God had wonderfully drawn him from thence, at twelve years of age. With the permission of the cardinal, who was at that time Archbishop of Aix, in Provence, he had taken the habit of hermit of St. Augustine, at the age of nineteen. This man and another person lived together in a little hermitage, which they had prepared for themselves, where they saw nobody but such as came to visit them in their solitary place. He had lived twelve years in this hermitage. He seldom ate any thing but pulse, prepared with salt and sometimes with oil; with

the exception that three times a week he made his meals of bread and water. He wore for a shirt a coarse hair cloth, and lodged on the bare ground. He was a man of great piety, living in a continual state of prayer, and in the greatest humility. He had been the instrument, in God's hands, of many remarkable things.

"This good hermit, who had been acquainted with Father La Combe for some time, and who had learned something of me, seemed to have a clear perception of the designs of God in relation to us. God had showed him, as he assured us, that we were both destined, in his providence, for the guidance and aid of souls; but that this mission of God would not be fulfilled in us, without our experiencing at the same time various and strange crosses."

2. At the expiration of twelve days she returned from Thonon to Gex, by the way of Geneva, a longer route, but which had the advantage of avoiding the exposures of an open boat on the lake. At Geneva she called again at the French consul's; and as no immediate means of conveyance presented itself, he proposed to her to complete the remainder of her journey, only ten miles, on horseback; and offered for this purpose one of his own horses. "I had some difficulty," she remarks, "in accepting this proposal, as I was not much acquainted with riding on horseback. The consul assuring me, however, that the horse was very gentle and that there was no danger, I ventured to mount him. There was a sort of smith standing by, who looked at me with a wild, haggard look. This man, just as I had got fairly seated upon the animal, took it into his head, to strike him with a heavy blow upon the back, which made him start very suddenly. The result was, that I was thrown upon the ground violently; falling upon my temple, and injuring two of my teeth and the cheek-bone. I was so much stunned and hurt, that I could not proceed immediately; but after

resting awhile and recovering myself, I took another horse, and with a rider beside me, to render any necessary assistance, I proceeded on my way."

3. At Gex, to which she thus safely returned, she continued to labor, as God gave her opportunity. Among those, with whom she became acquainted there, was a poor woman who came to Gex from some place in the neighboring country. She seems to have been a religious woman, in the common acceptation of the term, and even eminently so. "She was one," says Madame Guyon, "on whom the Lord had conferred very singular graces. She was in such high religious reputation in the place from which she came, that she passed there for a saint. Our Lord brought her to me, in order that she might understand and see the difference between that religion which consists in the possession of spiritual endowments and gifts, and that which consists in the possession of the Giver."

4. This woman, with whom she thought she might profitably labor, passed through the same struggle and experienced the same blessing which others experienced; no longer a great Christian by being great, but by being little; no longer great in her own eyes because she had experienced much, but great in the eyes of God, because she had become nothing in herself. Instead of seeing God in dreams and visions, which placed him in the past or future, she now saw him in the unfailing mirror of the present moment. Instead of looking chiefly for consolations, and judging of the amount of her religion by the amount of her joy, her true and chief consolation was in enduring and doing God's will; accepting, with an equal and thankful mind, the cloud and the sunshine, the suffering and the pleasure.

Of this propitious result God was pleased to make Madame Guyon the instrument. And this case illustrates the nature of a portion of her labors at this time. She endeav

ored to establish and instil permanent principles of practical Christianity; believing, as she did, that true Christianity, considered in its renovating and sanctifying relations, does not consist in having God's gifts merely, but chiefly and especially in having God himself in the soul by a perfect union with his will. She felt herself particularly called upon to point out this difference, namely, between possessing the gifts of God and possessing God himself; between emotional experience, which feeds upon what is given, both good and bad, and volitional experience, which feeds upon what is, namely, upon God's will alone; or what is the same thing, upon "every word which proceedeth out of his mouth." And on the basis of this distinction, she sometimes intimates, that the doctrines of sanctification, or of inward holy living, may be reduced, for the most part, to the two great principles of self-renunciation on the one hand, and of perfect union with the divine will on the other. He, who has nothing in himself, has all in God.

5. It was about this time that Father La Combe was called to preach on some public occasion. The new doctrine, as it was termed, was not altogether a secret. Public curiosity had become excited. He chose for his text the passage in Psalm xlv. 13. "The king's daughter is all glorious within; her clothing is of wrought gold."

What we have to say in regard to his exposition of the passage, is partly conjectural; but there probably is no doubt that by the king he understood Christ; by the king's daughter, the church. His doctrine was, whatever might be true in regard to men's original depravity, that those who are truly given to Christ and are in full harmony with him, are delivered from it; that is to say, are "all glorious within." Like Christ, they love God with a love free from selfishness, with pure love. Like Christ, they are come to do the will of the Father. Christ is formed in them. They not only have

faith in Christ, and faith in God through Christ, but as the result of this faith, they have Christ's disposition. They are now in a situation to say of themselves individually, in the language of the Apostle Paul, "I live; and yet not I; but Christ liveth in me." So that they are one with Christ, and through Christ are one with God; and being in this divine unity, and continually drawing strength from a divine source, they reflect the divine image.

6. He did not maintain that all Christians are really the subjects of this advanced state of Christian experience; but endeavored to show, that this is a possible state; that, however intense human depravity may be, the grace of God has power to overcome it; that the example of Christ, the full and rich promises, and even the commands, give encouragement to effort, and confidence in ultimate victory. And without making allusions to himself, or to the remarkable woman whose experience and instructions had revived the doctrine of present sanctification, now almost forgotten, although not unknown to the pious of former times, he could not hesitate to maintain that there have been, that there may be, and that there are, truly holy hearts in this depraved world. On this basis, and in Christ's name, he preached HOLINESS; not merely as a thing to be proclaimed, but to be experienced; not merely as a theme of pulpit declamation, but as a matter of personal realization.

7. Great was the consternation when it was found, that men were not merely required to be holy, but, what is practically a different thing, were expected to be holy. The requisition was admitted; but the belief of its practical possibility, and the expectation of the fulfilment of that possibility, which would imply a close scrutiny into the irregular lives of many, were rejected as visionary and condemned as heretical. La Combe, accordingly, although he was a man whose learning and eloquence entitled him to no small degree of consideration, was called to account.