ears in proportion as they came to be more exclusively appropriated by
the unorthodox. It is hard to be as vigilant when danger is remote as
when it is near at hand; and until heresy has actually wrested them to
its purpose it is morally impossible that the words of ecclesiastical
and religious writers should be so delicately balanced as to avoid all
ambiguities and inaccuracies. Still less have we a right to look for
such exactitude in the words of an anchoress who, if not wholly
uneducated in our sense of the word, yet on her own confession "could no
letter," i.e., as we should say, was no scholar, and certainly made no
pretence to any skill in technical theology. But however much some of
her expressions may jar with the later developments of Catholic
theology, it must be remembered, as has been said, that they were
current coin in her day, common to orthodox and unorthodox; and that
though their restoration is by no means desirable, yet they are still
susceptive of a "benignant" interpretation. "I pray Almighty God," says
Mother Juliana in concluding, "that this book come not but into the
hands of those that will be His faithful lovers, and that will submit
them to the faith of Holy Church." [2] And indeed such can receive no
possible harm from its perusal, beyond a little temporary perplexity to
be dispelled by inquiry; and this only in the case of those who are
sufficiently instructed and reflective to perceive the discord in
question. The rest are well used in their reading to take what is
familiar and to leave what is strange, so that they will find in her
pages much to ponder, and but a little to pass over.

It is, however, not only to these occasional obscurities and ambiguities
that we are to ascribe the comparative oblivion into which so remarkable
a book has fallen; but also to the fact that its noteworthiness is
perhaps more evident and relative to us than to our forefathers. It
cannot but startle us to find doubts that we hastily look upon as