will come so close to you that at the last you will not know whether it
is you or he who dies, and the present death will be swallowed up in his
victory.


5. THE HERESY OF QUIETISM


God comes to us within and takes us for his own. He releases us from
ourselves; he incorporates us with his own undying experience and
adventure; he receives us and gives himself. He is a stimulant; he
makes us live immortally and more abundantly. I have compared him to the
sensation of a dear, strong friend who comes and stands quietly beside
one, shoulder to shoulder.

The finding of God is the beginning of service. It is not an escape from
life and action; it is the release of life and action from the prison of
the mortal self. Not to realise that, is the heresy of Quietism, of many
mystics. Commonly such people are people of some wealth, able to command
services for all their everyday needs. They make religion a method of
indolence. They turn their backs on the toil and stresses of existence
and give themselves up to a delicious reverie in which they flirt with
the divinity. They will recount their privileges and ecstasies, and how
ingeniously and wonderfully God has tried and proved them. But indeed
the true God was not the lover of Madame Guyon. The true God is not a
spiritual troubadour wooing the hearts of men and women to no purpose.
The true God goes through the world like fifes and drums and flags,
calling for recruits along the street. We must go out to him. We must
accept his discipline and fight his battle. The peace of God comes not
by thinking about it but by forgetting oneself in him.