ever written.' Some of his disciples have the hardihood to affirm indeed
that even ISAAC NEWTON ploughed with Behmen's heifer, but had not the
boldness to acknowledge the debt. I entirely accept it when his
disciples assert it of their master that he had a privilege and a
passport permitted him such as no mortal man has had the like since
JOHN'S eyes closed upon his completed Apocalypse. After repeated and
prolonged reading of Behmen's amazing books, nothing that has been said
by his most ecstatic disciples about their adored master either
astonishes or offends me. Dante himself does not beat such a soaring
wing as Behmen's; and all the trumpets that sound in _Paradise Lost_ do
not swell my heart and chase its blood like Jacob Behmen's broken
syllables about the Fall. I would not wonder to have it pointed out to
me in the world to come that all that Gichtel, and St. Martin, and Hegel,
and Law, and Walton, and Martensen, and Hartmann have said about Jacob
Behmen and his visions of GOD and Nature and Man were all but literally
true. No doubt,--nay, the thing is certain,--that if you open Jacob
Behmen anywhere as Gregory Richter opened the _Aurora_; if a new idea is
a pain and a provocation to you; if you have any prejudice in your heart
for any reason against Behmen; if you dislike the sound of his name
because some one you dislike has discovered him and praised him, or
because you do not yourself already know him and love him, then, no
doubt, you will find plenty in Behmen at which to stumble, and which will
amply justify you in anything you wish to say against him. But if you
are a true student and a good man; if you are an open-minded and a humble-
minded man; if you are prepared to sit at any man's feet who will engage
to lead you a single step out of your ignorance and your evil; if you
open Behmen with a predisposition to believe in him, and with the
expectation and the determination to get good out of him,--then, in the
measure of all that; in the measure of your capacity of mind and your
hospitality of heart; in the measure of your humility, seriousness,