Tending to the Fire Within (Walter Hilton)

 “It may sometimes happen that the more troubled you have been outwardly with active work the more fervent your desire will be for God and the clearer your view of spiritual things, by the grace of our Lord, when you come to devotion. It works out as if you had a little burning coal with which you wanted to make a fire and get it burning. You would first lay sticks on it and cover the coal; and although it might briefly seem that you were putting the coal out with the sticks, nevertheless after a brief wait and a little blowing there soon springs out a great flaring flame, for the sticks have turned into fire. It is just so spiritually; the will and desire that you have for God are like a little coal of fire in your soul, for they give you some amount of spiritual heat and light: but very little, since they often grow cold and turn into bodily rest—sometimes into idleness. So it is good to put on sticks, which are the good works of active life. If it happens that these activities seem for a time to hinder your desire, so that it is not as pure or fervent as you might wish, do not be too worried on this score, but wait and bear it for a while, and go and blow on the fire: that is, first do your duty and then go alone to your prayer and meditations, and lift up your heart to God, praying him of his goodness to accept the works that you do to please him.

 Hold your actions as worthless in your own sight, but simply laid at his disposal. Meekly admit your wretchedness and frailty, and attribute all your good deeds to him, in so far as they are indeed good; in as much as they are evil—not done with the circumstances that should accompany a good deed, for lack of discernment—ascribe them to yourself. As a result of this meekness all your deeds shall turn into a fiery flame, like sticks laid on the coal, and so good outward action shall not hinder your devotion but rather increase it. Our Lord says so in holy scripture: [Leviticus 6:12] . . . ; that is say, ‘Fire shall always burn on my alter, and the priest getting up in the morning shall lay sticks under it to stop it going out.’ This fire is love and desire for God in the soul, a love which needs to be fed and kept up by the laying of sticks to prevent it from going out. These sticks are of various material: some of one tree, some of another. An educated man who understands the scriptures and has this fire in his heart benefits from gathering sticks of holy writ and nourishing the fire with them. Another man, without education cannot so easily have at hand the Bible and the saying of the learned teachers of theology, and it is therefore necessary for him to do many good outward deeds for his fellow Christians and kindle the fire of love with them. So it is good for each man in his degree to do as he is inclined, gathering sticks of one thing or another–either prayers, good meditations or bible reading, or good practical work—to nourish the desire of love in his soul, so that it does not die down; for the affection of love is tender and will easily vanish away unless it is well tended and continually fed by good deeds of the body or spirit.”

*The Mixed Life, Walter Hilton, translated Rosemary Dorward (SLG Press:2001), pp.16-17.

 

 


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